"My family and I have been RV camping across Alaska for the last several years. This year, the mass amounts of dead spruce trees have been more apparent than any year prior."

Dead, red trees signal an increasingly dire outbreak driven by warm summers and plentiful spruce, especially in the Susitna Valley.

The worst-hit areas appear to be established neighborhoods with older spruce trees, especially in Turnagain and Spenard.

8-11-13 Long horned beetle - Pitkas Point, Alaska, USA

The closures of the campgrounds, facing the threat of falling trees, likely will last through summer, the state parks division said.

There is a spruce beetle outbreak in Southcentral Alaska. Since the beetles don't emerge for a few weeks, we might as well start thinking about the problem.

We are worried about the effects of large infestation and about wildlife.

Spruce beetles damaged nearly 600,000 acres of forest in 2018, and the damage continues to grow.