User:Tmp1071/Populus tremuloides

Ecology
As all trees in a given clonal colony are considered part of the same organism. '''One clonal colony, named Pando, is considered the heaviest and oldest living organism on the planet. Pando spans across 43 hectares, weighs six million kilograms, and is perhaps 80,000 years old .'''

The leaves of the quaking aspen and other species in the genus Populus serve as food for caterpillars of various moths and butterflies .

Dieback
Increased mortality in trembling aspen stands have been reported since the early 1990s across North America '''. This increased dieback has been linked to multiple stressors, such as defoliation by the forest tent caterpillar (Malacosoma disstria), wood-boring beetles such as the poplar borer (Saperda calcarata) and the bronze poplar borer (Agrilus liragus), and fungal disturbances such as those by the Cytospora canker (Valsa sordida) .'''

'''Increased mortality has also been linked in turn to climate change. Thaw-freeze events and light snowfall in late winter as a result of increased temperatures has led to increased dieback in Southern and Western Canda . Furthermore, climate records show that historically, most periods of aspen decline have been paired with periods of severe drought, which has worsened in recent years due to a changing climate . Many stands of aspen that have been affected by climate change in recent years have poor regeneration potential, leading to concerns of widespread loss of aspen cover in the future'''.