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A researcher is trying to understand how an invasive bug and the chemicals used to kill it are affecting the species living in old hemlock forests. Hemlock woolly adelgid (HWA) has been wreaking havoc on forests in southwestern Nova Scotia for almost a decade. To fight its spread, Parks Canada, the province, local organizations and private landowners have been using insecticides, namely imidacloprid and dinotefuran. But Mathilde Christjansen, a master’s student at Mount Allison University in Sackville, N.B., said little is known about if and how woolly adelgid and the insecticides used to fight it are impacting other species. Rather than studying all species in all hemlock forests one by one, Christjansen said the team is using the eastern red-backed salamander to get a snapshot of the ecosystem. …The study is also looking at the impact that dying hemlocks have on the salamanders.