BIONOMICS, ECOLOGY AND ECONOMIC IMPORTANCE OF THE FIR WEEVIL, PISSODES PICEAE (III) (COL, CURCULIONIDAE) IN MOUNTAIN FORESTS

The biology, ecology and ethology of Pissodes piceae, taking into acco unt phenology, life cycle, kind and state of inhabited breeding materi al, factors limiting the reproduction and development, and its ecologi cal requirements (species composition and structure of the stand, soil moisture, shading conditions, age and size of infested trees, quality of their crowns and stems, needle condition, coexistence with other s pecies of cambio- and xylophagous insects in ecological communities an d associations, etc.) are presented in a monographic manner on the bas is of the long-term field observations (1980-1992) carried out mainly in the Krynica Experimental Forest of the Faculty of Forestry, Agricul tural University of Krakow (Western Carpathians, Southern Poland), sup plemented with laboratory rearings. The results obtained during this s tudy permitted us to determine the economic importance of the fir weev il in the pure fir and mixed mountain forests as well as to work out t he methods of preventing the damages, forecasting its occurrence and c ontrolling its numbers.