How do bark-beetle outbreaks begin, how do they spread? What are the key factors that affect their population dynamics? Ongoing research has provided some understanding and knowledge, although many questions still remain to be answered fully.

The story of bark-beetle outbreaks in the Šumava National Park, in the Czech Republic along the German and Austrian borders, provides some insight into the impact of stable/unstable zonation regimes on efforts to fight the beetle, as well as a better understanding of what may be described as the “paradoxes of sanitary cutting.”