In areas where even a light controlled burn can be dangerous to surrounding communities, forestry officials at the Montague Plains Wildlife Management Area in west-central Massachusetts is one of the largest remaining inland, pitch pine-scrub oak habitats in the region. An open-canopy ecosystem that is normally adapted to frequent, low-intensity fires, the pitch pines took over the forest and closed the canopy after fire had been suppressed for many decades, leading to the decline or disappearance of more than two dozen species of butterflies, moths, and birds.
Since the nearby village of Massachusetts Endangered Species Act. The rare barrens buckmoth, which feeds exclusively on scrub oak at this latitude, returned in good numbers, too.
Simmons said that some species take a few years to recolonize historic locations, so he expects even more butterflies and moths will be turning up at the Montague Plains in the next few years.