#forest-management — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #forest-management, aggregated by home.social.
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“The clearest way into the Universe is through a forest”*…
Robert Beauchamp, owner of Sierra Cone, one of the largest cone collection contractors in the West, reaches for a red fir cone outside of Dorrington, California. Nina RiggioDillon Osleger explains that, while the future of Western forests depends on professional pinecone collectors, they’re slowly being starved out of existence…
High in the crown of a giant sequoia, the world becomes a cathedral of green and amber, hushed but for the creak of ancient wood and the sharp, rhythmic snap of cones being pulled from boughs. Dan Keeley, 31, moved around with a practiced, fluid economy, suspended by thin lines of high-tensile rope 200 feet above the ground on the western edge of California’s Sequoia National Park. To his left, the sequoia’s cinnamon-colored bark provided a steady presence as he leaned out over the negative space between branches.
“There is a lot of trust that goes into this work,” Keeley said, speaking over the wind. He eyed a cluster of green, egg-sized cones. “Trust in the trees, predominantly, but also trust in the system — that I’m being sent to the right trees, at the right time, and for the right reason, not all of which are always the case.”
Keeley, a lean, tanned former rock climber and arborist, is what some in the forestry industry call a pinecone cowboy, a freelance contractor hired to harvest the genetic future of Western forests. He climbs trees of important or threatened species to collect ripe cones for seeds intended to be used for reforestation.
Keeley is part of a specialized workforce that’s become the primary resistance against the rapid erasure of a Western landscape. As megafires — fueled by climate change and a century of heavy-handed forest management and fire suppression — incinerate millions of acres in the West, natural regeneration is failing. Cones from serotinous species, which open their scales and drop their seeds in response to low-intensity wildfires on the forest floor, are now incinerated in increasingly common crown fires — high-intensity blazes that leap into the canopy. Meanwhile, other species’ seeds, dropped into the soil by wind and animals like squirrels and birds, are choked underneath layers of ash or outcompeted by invasive shrubs. The future of a relationship between trees and wildfires that has existed for 350 million years now rests on the shoulders of rope-suspended climbers who collect the trees’ cones one 45-liter bag at a time…
[The work, which dates back to the 1930s, is both arduous and precise; the workers, dedicated. But, as Osleger explains, a number of forces– main among them, Federal budget cuts, have taken a huge toll on the effort…]
… The result is an annual reforestation shortfall that is compounding and transforming entire ecosystems. The Forest Service produces 30 million to 50 million seedlings a year, according to American Forests, a mere fraction of the 120-million annual seedling goal the REPLANT Act established. Roughly 80% of those seedlings will survive, while it takes about 220 trees to reforest each burned acre. Altogether, the agency meets just 6% of its post-wildfire planting needs annually, according to its 2022 Reforestation Strategy Report.
And that’s just on Forest Service land: Wildfires on both public and private lands have affected, on average, 7.8 million acres a year over the last decade, according to the National Interagency Fire Center. In California alone, current seedling production and planting rates mean that it would take 15 to 20 years to reforest what has already been lost, while each additional fire “puts us further behind,” said Kuldeep Singh, operations manager of seed production for CAL FIRE. While the Forest Service considers a tract reforested after seedlings survive their first five years, research says that a functioning ecosystem like the one the fire destroyed won’t return for several decades.
When a forest fails to regenerate, either because it wasn’t replanted or because new seedlings didn’t survive, it often becomes scrub-land, in a permanent ecological shift known as type conversion. The new brush-based ecosystem creates a more flammable fuel bed that resists the forest’s return, effectively locking the land into a cycle of fire and scrub. In areas like South Lake Tahoe, California, for example, fields of 8-foot-tall manzanita and buckbrush now dominate hundreds of acres where conifers once stood. In Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Wyoming and throughout the Southwest, Forest Service research says that high-severity burn areas — which are difficult to regenerate regardless of human intervention — are increasingly repopulated by invasive grasses or the flowering plants called Brassicaceae, which store less carbon and prevent conifers from taking root. This process is permanently altering the hydrology, fire cycle and carbon-sequestration capacity of the West…
More– and more photos– at: “The plight of the pinecone cowboy,” from @highcountrynews.org.
Pair with: “Make Your Own Micro Forest” (“The Miyawaki method of reforestation inserts small, densely packed wild acreage into urban environs. It’s proving wildly successful.”)
* John Muir
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As we treasure trees, we might recall that it was on this date in 1910 that Glacier National Park in northwestern Montana was established. The park encompasses more than 1 million acres and includes parts of two mountain ranges (sub-ranges of the Rocky Mountains), more than 130 named lakes, more than 1,000 different species of trees and plants, and hundreds of species of animals. Its pristine ecosystem is the centerpiece of what has been referred to as the “Crown of the Continent Ecosystem,” a region of protected land encompassing 16,000 square miles.
The park’s predominantly coniferous forest is home to various species of trees such as the Engelmann spruce, Douglas fir, subalpine fir, limber pine and western larch, which is a deciduous conifer, producing cones but losing its needles each fall.
Mountain goats (the official park symbol) at Logan Pass (source) #culture #forest #forestManagement #forestry #forests #GlacierNationalPark #history #MiyawakiForests #pineconeCowboy #pineconeCowboys #pinecones #politics #Science #trees -
Why forest loss is making our watersheds leak rain
#Forest #ForestLoss #Watersheds #Environment #Rivers #ClimateScience #SustainableForestry #LoggingImpact #Rain #Hydrology #ForestManagement #NatureProtection #EcosystemHealth #Water #Deforestation
https://the-14.com/why-forest-loss-is-making-our-watersheds-leak-rain/ -
“Gorrell said two of the major threats they face are predation and choosing the wrong habitat.
“We know that they like Alpine valleys and meadows where you can see a long way,” he said. “Sometimes they will move into cut blocks where the forestry industry has come through and ruined all the trees.””
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/vancouver-island-marmot-gob-9.7141028
#Courtenay #MtWashington #VIMarmot #BCPoli #ForestManagement
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"Under community #ForestManagement [in Nepal 🇳🇵] local forest rangers worked with the community groups to develop plans outlining how they could develop and manage the #forests. People were able to extract resources from the forests (fruits, medicine, fodder) and sell forest products, but the groups often restricted grazing and tree cutting, and they limited fuelwood harvests. Community members also actively patrolled forests to ensure they were being protected."
https://science.nasa.gov/Earth/earth-observatory/how-nepal-regenerated-its-forests-150937/
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Kaye Kittrell: I was HOLDING MY BREATH! Tree climbing, MASSIVE Forest Cleanup! https://www.allforgardening.com/1661120/kaye-kittrell-i-was-holding-my-breath-tree-climbing-massive-forest-cleanup/ #CountryLiving #EmptyNester #flowers #ForestCleanup #ForestManagement #gardening #green #GrowYourOwn #GrowYourOwnFood #GrowYourOwnVegetables #homesteading #KayeKittrell #LateBloomer #LateBloomerShow #LateBloomerUrbanOrganicGardenShow #organic #RainCapture #StartingOver #sustainability #SustainableHomestead #Tennessee #TennesseeGardening #TennesseeHomestead #TreeTrimming #VLog
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Researchers calculated how disturbances like #wildfires, storms, and #barkbeetles, fueled by #climatechange, could transform Europe’s forests by 2100. #ForestDamage could increase, especially in Southern and Western Europe: http://go.tum.de/187640
📷R. Seidl
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Alpine mountain forests are particularly affected by #ClimateChange. Our university launches the Center for #AlpineForest Management to study impacts and long-term options for protective forests: http://go.tum.de/885204
#ForestManagement #sustainability
📷R. Seidl
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Forest dieback, often related to #ClimateChange, is increasing in many parts of the world, and there is an urgent need to develop an efficient large-scale monitoring system of forest health, to improve forest management.
This study by Carletti et al 2025, based on a combination of satellite and ground level observations, will allow to improve detection of forest dieback, with a species specific calibration, and can therefore be used to produce high-resolution dieback maps at species levels and thus monitor dieback trends over time.https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/22797254.2025.2547386#d1e1030
#AcademicChatter #BioDiversity
#ForestManagement #Forests #Forestry
#ForestHealth #ForestDieback #ForestDynamics #ForestMonitoring -
This was a huge work that we just got published on trends and patterns in evidence synthesis within the field of Forestry and Forest-based Sector (F&FS) . The study investigates potential biases in evidence synthesized by examining different forms of synthesis (i.e. systematic and non-systematic), topics covered and geographical distribution of underpinning studies.
Reviewed topics are dominated by #ForestManagement, #Biodiversity and #ClimateChange, even though the field is sprawling away from core silviculture themes and into more transdisciplinary issues.
https://kwnsfk27.r.eu-west-1.awstrack.me/L0/https:%2F%2Fauthors.elsevier.com%2Fsd%2Farticle%2FS1389-9341(25)00272-2/1/0102019bb8f33f70-22cdeb05-eff2-4afb-8f03-b9eb7a3813b3-000000/ERe2uC45FU6T7aRnqe4DgN9NIdQ=460
#bibliometrics #Forests #Forestry #ForestResearch #ForestBasedSector #EvidenceSynthesis
#AcademicChatter -
Many prescribed fires are burning in Arizona. This weather satellite loop shows the smoke plumes becoming more visible in the late afternoon.
I can tell that the last few days have been a little bit smoky.
#AZwx #Fire #PrescribedFire #Forest #ForestManagement #NMwx #Arizona #NewMexico
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Diversity in forest management promotes biodiversity
An international team studied #ManagementZoning in European beech woods using real-world data and virtual landscapes. They collected data about three types of #ForestManagement to develop “virtual forest landscapes” for analysis: https://www.uni-goettingen.de/en/3240.html?id=7924
Research in PNAS: https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2512683122
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Berry Mountain Climb: Working Woods, Living History
Me, the kids, and the FJ headed for the spine of Berry mountain. We weren't blazing new trails, but we were still exploring.https://adventureadjacent.com/2025/09/26/berry-mountain-climb-working-woods-living-history/
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Northern Arizona University: NAU researchers launch groundbreaking tool to track and improve wildfire treatments. “A new nationwide database developed by researchers at Northern Arizona University is helping land managers answer a long-standing question: Are fuel treatments actually reducing wildfire risk? The Treatment and Wildfire Interagency Geodatabase, or TWIG, is the most comprehensive […]
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Bradfield Woods thrives thanks to coppicing, an ancient practice where trees are cut down every 25 years, allowing them to regrow.
This method not only creates habitats but also supports a rich variety of life.
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I'm protecting an aspen sapling with a wire mesh cage.
Deer and elk love to eat these saplings, so if I want to see them grow to mature trees...they need help for a few years.
The second photo shows the cage with scrap 2x2's laid up against it in a circle.
Why?
Elk need to see this cage even on a cloudy moonless night so they won't trample it. With enough stuff laying across it, it'll be visible. I learned the hard way that wire cages by themselves get accidentally destroyed at night.
#Aspen #Habitat #Protection #Forest #Mountains #Elk #Deer #ForestManagement
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Forests And Cycles Of Agrarian Sustenance - Time-To-Event Analysis Of Ecosystem Provisioning Services And Seasonal Food Insecurity [Sub-Saharan Africa]
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https://doi.org/10.1080/26395916.2025.2484490 <-- shared paper
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#GIS #spatial #mapping #Ghana #MoleNationalPark #Larabanga #Kananto #Kabampe #Grupe #Jang #ecosystem #savanna #Africa #SubSaharanAfrica #food #farming #agriculture #foodsecurity #water #hydrology #weather #climate #watersecurity #rainfall #precipitation #forest #Agrarian #services #seasonal #foodinsecurity #risk #hazard #vegetation #rights #humanrights #forestmanagement #commonland #enclosures #agronomic #stewardship #spatiotemporal #spatialanalysis #income #cost #economics #planning #policy #governance #community -
#Forests can sequester large amounts of the global climate-influencing #greenhousegas CO2, important especially in times of #globalwarming. This is provided, of course, that these forests themselves can withstand the #increasingtemperatures. Authors, A. C. Rice & R. E. Froese (2024), Incorporated #climateadaptation into a #forestmanagement plan in Michigan (USA).
© #Stefan FWirth Berlin 2025
Reference
A. C. Rice & R. E. Froese (2024)
https://doi.org/10.1093/forsci/fxae012Photo
© S.F. Wirth Berlin 2025 -
Another excellent article on the hydrological effects of clearcut logging. Be sure to take the time to watch the video featuring UBC forest hydrologist Younis Alila. Alila and his colleagues have transformed the way we analyze logging impacts on floods, drought, mass wasting, and sediment delivery to streams from logging operations.
https://thenarwhal.ca/trouble-in-the-headwaters-documentary/
#Clearcut #Logging #ForestHydrology #Hydrology #Floods #ExtremeEvents #ForestManagement
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This. I mean…. I can’t even….
#Trump: …I’ve been meeting w/heads of… #forest countries, call themselves forest, Austria & others... they say we're a forest nation. We live in forest…In one case you know they say our #trees are much more flammable than #California but we don’t have #ForestFires because we clean the floor. We sweep the floor….
#Idiocracy #kakistocracy #science #nature #FEMA #Interior #ForestManagement #forests #wildfires #Climate #ClimateCrisis #ClimateChange
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Very interesting conference on "Adapting temperate forest management to climate change: from assessment to solutions"
June 10, 2025 - June 13, 2025
Orléans, Francehttps://www.lestudium-ias.com/fr/node/107588
#Forests #ForestManagement #ClimateChange -
Cuts to US national parks and forests met with backlash — https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/czx7kez4vx2o
#HackerNews #Cuts #to #US #national #parks #and #forests #met #with #backlash #nationalparks #conservation #environmentalissues #backlash #forestmanagement -
#TheGremlinZoo #USPol #Wildfires #ForestManagement
From AP.com: Trump wants states to clean up forests to stop wildfires. But his administration cut off funds
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@mustapipa even better if the reforestation efforts are well thought through in terms of species and within species diversity seeded or planted (planted seedlings are less drought resistant than seedlings that had grown from seeds in situ) : nearly one in three tree species are on the IUCN redlist, #reforestation would be a chance to get these locally out of the redlist.
https://iucn.org/press-release/202410/more-one-three-tree-species-worldwide-faces-extinction-iucn-red-list
#Forests #ForestManagement #Silviculture -
Wind is not only a hazard, resulting in windbreak. Wind also changes a tree's growth pattern and thereby enhances its mechanical stability. Including this into #ForestEcology models is essential for a comprehensive understanding of forest growth dynamics and for informed decision-making in #ForestManagement Dlouhá et al 2025
#Forests
https://annforsci.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13595-024-01271-6