Weevlis Wobble but they don't fall down

We went to a new research site today called Cook's Lake. It's privately owned by one of the scientist's parents and has a long history of being managed by people. It has a mixture of habitat including grassland, forest, brush, wetlands and a lake! We set up traps in both the grassland and the brush in hopes of catching some larger shrew (in the grassland) and jumping mice in the brush! We'll check them twice tomorrow to see what we've got!

One interesting thing we learned about today is why trees sometimes have multiple trunks. This happens when something causes part of the stem (when it's young) to die or break off. This could be any disturbance such as a lightning strike, an animal grazing the tip or a weevil. A weevil is a type of beetle that likes to lay it's eggs in one particular kind of tree. They lay the eggs inside the tree and when the young hatch they eat their way out. You can see a weeviled tree here:

Weeviled trees are not usually good for lumber because there is no clear straight piece of wood. Thus weeviled trees don't fall down due to the logger's saw. Studies have started to show that shaded pine trees don't get weeviled but ones in sunny areas do. So foresters again should not clear-cut their forests leaving exposed trees but be selective in their logging, leaving trees to shade others.