First Blog; Walking in a Harvest
So, you may be wondering, "Who the fuck is this Arborsexual bloke?", or perhaps you aren’t, but it is a useful way for an introduction blog. Well I'm a Forester for the USDA Forest Service, I like trees, I LOVE TELLING PEOPLE TREE FACTS, and my wife has decided that my love of trees borders on the sexual. Personally, I think she is being overly dramatic, must mean she wants me to tell her more tree facts!
Anyways, I was walking through a regeneration harvest the other day and decided to snap some photos with the camera my wife bought me last Christmas, and a new lens I bought a couple of weeks ago. All of these were taken with a Sony a5000 with a 7artisans 25mm f1.8 lens. Regeneration harvests are very misunderstood, so I'm going to try and explain why this is a good silvicultural practice for this harvest site.
For some background, this harvest is taking place on an Upland Oak stand located within the Appalachian Mountains. The overall growing conditions of the site are a mixed bag, the soil is rich in organic matter, but excessively drained. The dominant species were Scarlet Oak and Chestnut Oak, though there are a fair bit of Black Oaks, and other more minor hardwood species mixed in. There were also some Shortleaf Pines, but the soils aren't poor enough for them to dominate the hardwoods.
Most of the trees had 2-2.5 logs within them...kinda. This stand was overdue for regeneration, and the logger is very much noticing this. While Scarlet Oak can produce decent quality "Red Oak" lumber, and likewise Chestnut Oak can produce decent quality "White Oak" lumber, you run into an issue once their boles exceed a certain size. That issue is heart rot, and it can destroy the economic value of an otherwise good-looking tree. The types of oak growing in this stand aren't the long lived monster trees people think of when they think of oaks, rather they are trees that typically top out at 80-125 years before they rot from within and fall over, or die from some other calamity.
Upland Oak species, with a few exceptions, are disturbance adapted species. If an area with these trees goes without some sort of major disturbance, then their offspring end up being out competed by other species, and the stand transitions to a different dominant composition as the oaks decline. Historically, dry upland sites like this would burn with regularity, at varying intensities, and that would ensure oaks (and historically American Chestnut) would remain dominant. Modern prescribed burns don't even come close to replicating the conditions these oaks evolved in, so we need another type of disturbance to keep more shade tolerant species from displacing the oaks.
Enter the Regeneration Harvest!
Yes, I know it looks absolutely horrible to the eye of a lay man, but to the Forester it looks like a new beginning. The stumps from the oaks that are small enough will sprout, acorns that germinate next spring will have a chance, and the advance regeneration that was already in the understory will grow like crazy. It doesn't replicate the effects of a stand replacing fire perfectly, and there will need to be a secondary cut called, "Site Prep", to knock down undesirable competitors, and ensure species like Red Maple don't take over the site. Still, it is the best option, as local people probably don't want a stand replacing near their homes, and that would be a serious waste of the economic value on the land.
Now you may be wondering why worry about the stand transitioning out of oaks at all. Maples provide many of the same ecosystem services to air and water as oaks do, but they don't really provide the same environment the local wildlife need to survive. Deer, Elk (where applicable, but Elk are making a comeback on the east coast), Bears, Turkeys, &c. all need the hard mast produced by oaks, and the young oak shoots in spring to survive, either directly or indirectly. They need the open early successional habitat, the thick regeneration, and the small areas of STRUCTURAL Old Growth habitat, all within the same general area to survive and thrive. A future blog will be all about Old Growth and why it causes Foresters physical pain to hear people misuse this term; it doesn't mean what you think it means.
The top view picture demonstrates this desired structure well. The harvest created a good chunk of early successional habitat, the islands of leave trees and the stream buffers create the structural old growth, and within a year or two there will be thick regeneration. First five years after harvest, this will be a hunter's wet dream because of the diversity in plant life will lead to a diversity in animal life. Twenty-five years, and the common man won't know a harvest even happened. Seventy-five to hundred years, and the stand will be ready for another harvest.
All was not terrible for the logger. While nearly every tree on this site had some level of heart rot, most weren't too far along. The above, slightly out of focus, stump was a rather large Scarlet Oak that was just starting to exhibit heart rot. Unfortunately, an oak that large typically wont sprout strongly, but this tree likely produced tens of thousands of acorns over its short life.
Although, I mean short in terms of a tree lifespan. This is a chunk of the tree cut off during felling. As you can see the growth rings are pretty wide. The widest ones in this photo are just over a half inch wide. For a hardwood, let alone an oak, that is some pretty serious growth to happen in a single year.
So, I'm going to leave you all with two things:
1. Trees act their size, not their age
2. Big trees do not mean old trees and vice versa