Stephen Burke
Non Forest Service
In the 1980s, I created a special chemical in a chemistry lab. This was a powerful pheromone that is a very strong attractant for a particular species of beetle. This beetle causes severe damage to logs that will be cut into lumber. Tiny amounts of the pheromone that I made were formulated into lures, and the lures were placed in funnel traps similar to the one you see in this photo. One month later, we inspected the traps, which we had placed at lumber mills. Many traps contained more than 25,000 beetles and virtually no other insects. At one mill, we caught over 12 million beetles in 1 year. Here was science in action! It was truly amazing that the chemical, made in the sterile environment of a laboratory, could cause such a strong effect in the field. This photo was taken in China, where I was studying the pine shoot beetle. I am the person on the left.
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