By Alec Rosenberg
What if the spread of invasive pests could be forecasted like the weather?
UC Davis environmental science and policy professor Alan Hastings and Brett Melbourne, a University of Colorado faculty member who previously was a postdoctoral scholar at UC Davis, have taken initial steps toward such forecasting with their study on bugs in boxes. They put 600 flour beetles in plastic boxes with holes between them. Lab researchers fed beetles flour and brewer's yeast, counted and weighed them. The beetles spread at different rates, suggesting it's important to consider variance.
"Just like rolling dice, different introductions will spread differently," said Hastings, who also works with the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis at UC Santa Barbara to find tools for managing invasive forest pests.
"I would like to get to a stage in ecology where you could do forecasts," he said. "Unlike the weather, we hope to control the invasive species. With weather, the best you can do is react to it."