Brian Crouse

A changing climate can bring with it innumerable changes to ecosystems. A local example is a parasite called the Balsam Woolly Adelgid, which is attacking fir trees in the Maritime Provinces and is moving more and more northward as winters become warmer.

Brian works in the Mount Allison Dendrochronoly Lab (MAD Lab), and his research involves using dendrochronological techniques to look at the spread of the Balsam Woolly Adelgid. When the parasite infests a tree, it changes the tree’s method of wood production. By taking cores of many fir trees to examine their ring structure and also looking at how damaged any infested trees are in other ways, links can potentially be made between the altered structure of the tree rings, the external damage to the trees, and how long the trees have been infested.

Eventually, a better understanding of how the trees are infested, how quickly the Balsam Woolly Adelgid causes damage, and how quickly the parasite will continue to spread to the north will be gained.

Geography is the study of space and place that combines the Earth's physical and human dimensions with an integrated examination of people, places, and environments. Learning occurs through lab work, field study, library and archival searching, as well as by using computer technologies as research tools. Students research climate change, examine issues of overpopulation, and explore the processes of globalization.

X-ray Dendrochronology of Eight Softwood species in Sussex, NB
Carrie White

X-ray technology has been used in the study of human medicine for many decades, but this same technology can also be used to gauge the environmental effects that have occurred through time and are stored in the rings of a tree. X-ray analyzed tree rings give us information on various aspects of wood density within a given year. My research looks at the changes in the characteristics within the varying wood density of each annual growth ring and how this changes over the life of a tree.

Samples were taken from previously studied areas in the Fundy region and then special increment cores were extracted from the same forested stands in Sussex, NB. Once the cores were collected I traveled to the University of Victoria’s Tree Ring Laboratory as they generously offered to collaborate with the Mount Allison Dendrochronology Laboratory (MAD Lab) in this project. At the Tree Ring Laboratory, I was able to use advanced x-ray equipment including the only ITRAX automated tree ring density machine in North or South America, and a Dendrocut high precision saw.

I was able to process my samples of eight different softwood species from the east coast of Canada which is significant as it has not been done before. Ultimately I hope my samples will better indicate any intra-annual (early and latewood) climate/growth patterns found within the annual rings. These new results will increase the MAD lab's ability to understand the past climates in eastern Canada.