Draft Logging Research?

[near horse]

I wondered about Lyme because they were being put forward as an example in an article titled “Conservationists Team Up with Ranchers and Loggers”.

Also, in a few cases I know of here in our area, timber companies will log an area then want to swing a trade with the USFS or other public landholder to “exchange” their land for some public land. There’s been a big battle over a land exchange like that and every retired USFS forester from the region has condemned the transaction as flawed ….. those still employed by the USFS remain silent.

What would be a good base to build a management system around? I know (maintaining?) ecological integrity was mentioned but how would we measure that (sounding like Andy :p)? Would you do a pre and post harvest assessment of key species? I’m not trying to be difficult but this is one of those things that seems like it could gel into something workable but still feels a little sketchy to me right now.

With the 3rd party certification process idea – would the proposed harvest need to be evaluated as well as the result?

[Carl Russell]

@near horse 38724 wrote:

….What would be a good base to build a management system around? I know (maintaining?) ecological integrity was mentioned but how would we measure that (sounding like Andy :p)? …….
With the 3rd party certification process idea – would the proposed harvest need to be evaluated as well as the result?

I am not sue that we need to have a “measure” for Ecological Integrity, as much as we establish the “value” of Ecological Integrity. We are faced with a culture that measures the functional value of land-use through economic return. Pure and simple. We are held hostage by this, needing to somehow show that ecological services, that pay material dividends to biological entities miles and years away from the “here and now”, are equally economically valuable.

Jason’s Draft Wood establishes guidelines for harvesting operations that incorporate observable methods that reduce impact on soil and the nature the forest stand, and which improve the value of the residual stand by growing the best trees for future harvest and removing the lowest quality trees first, using draft-animal power. The third party review doesn’t measure how close these methods are to true ecological integrity, they just verify that the methods have been employed as they were intended to be.

The Draft Wood mission clearly describes the belief that these methods protect ecological services in ways that conventional/mechanical operations cannot, and it is the responsibility of the prospective client to determine if they are willing to see these long-term, non-quantifiable, values brought to bear on their property.

As in so many other things, the onus is on the operator to perfect techniques that employ the draft-animals to their greatest abilities, and to use cultivation methods that not only protect long term ecological health, but create a residual timber stand that continues to grow vigorously as a functional forest ecosystem and as an ever-increasing resource of quality sawtimber. This is where the certified training comes in.

This method may not answer the questions of those observing from the outside, looking to find a broad sweeping solution based on measurables as a way to turn around a set of cultural habits, but in local or regional markets and communities it can be effective, leaving the determination up to thoughtful interaction of real people.

Carl

[Andy Carson]

@Carl Russell 38729 wrote:

I am not sue that we need to have a “measure” for Ecological Integrity, as much as we establish the “value” of Ecological Integrity. We are faced with a culture that measures the functional value of land-use through economic return. Pure and simple. We are held hostage by this, needing to somehow show that ecological services, that pay material dividends to biological entities miles and years away from the “here and now”, are equally economically valuable.

I see a somewhat different world. In my world, I am aware of the ecological disasters created by purely profit oriented businesses and people. The damage from this was undeniably widespread, but it also produced countless positive things, including the computer I am writing on now. I have also known several people whose lifestyles were modeled by their environmental beliefs. One of them even lived in a makeshift house made of hay bales and mud so as to save the trees. Predictably, this lifestyle didn’t last long, and the direct positive impact was very very tiny. Still, i, as well as many others, are impressed by this level of commitment and listen to the ideas and arguments. Many people in my generation (I am not saying all) attempt to balance economic gain and ecologic impact. Catalytic converters, Conservation easements, wetlands protection, smokestack scrubbers, etc all attest to a culture than responds to environmental and ecological impacts when they are measured and steps can be taken to reduce impact (even when they add cost). IMO measuring impact is a weapon for the movement, not a distraction. Think about why fracking companies won’t release a list of the chemicals in thier fracting solutions. If they owned the scientists and tests there would have no fear. But they don’t, so they live in fear that specific chemicals will leak, or leach, and will be detected and measured by a community they have no control over and communicated to a population that is susoecious that this is a problem. The companies know that once chemicals are detected, their goose is cooked. Is this what you would expect from a culture totally motivated by profit??? I think not. I think this is what you would expect from a culture that listens to evidence, and probably poo-poo concerns when they are not backed up with data.

[near horse]

Sigh – this is why I have a hard time with all this. We don’t support an economic driven management system, although we too are making money from the same woodland. In addition, we offer nothing to verify the long term ecological value provided by draft horse logging other than “It looks better.” And “Because I said so.” I just don’t feel comfortable asking a client to invest in me without something more tangible to present them with.

“”measure” for Ecological Integrity, as much as we establish the “value” of Ecological Integrity.”
How do you establish a value of ecological integrity? If we can’t explain what constitutes EI then how can we establish a value for it?

I’m trying to get a better idea of how this can work when presented to those who believe EI is best preserved by no intervention. Or is that the underlying premise – “Trees will be harvested.” So how will that be done?

Not meant to be argumentative but I’m feeling like I’m going round in circles with no argument to present to those who want more details.

I’m sure I’ll get bashed for this statement but really “worst first” is just a different spot on the continuum of forest management that ranges from “no removal at all” to “remove all at specified intervals”. Taking what we consider to be inferior trees is still altering the ecological integrity of the ecosystem. So what we’re presenting an owner with is a “less worse” version of conventional logging’s “less worse version”.

[Carl Russell]

It isn’t really economics vs. ecology. It comes down to the realization that when we use biological systems for economic gain that we need to place higher value on the inherent wisdom of the complex interrelationships that make those systems function than we currently are doing. If our long term goals are to insure we can utilize the products of those systems into perpetuity, then we need to protect, or even enhance, biological resiliency, or ecological integrity.

There are some folks who have found ways to measure some of these limitations. William Weida is an Agricultural Economist who has gone to lengths to show how economy of scale models don’t work when biological systems are involved. While some impacts can be limited by technological improvements, which are easily accommodated by the concepts of economy of scale, the inherent amorphous nature of the biological systems typically excludes impacts from the straight-line economics, resulting in reduced biological resiliency.

Organic farming methods are based on these concepts. Reducing detrimental impacts on the biological systems, soil ecology, animal health, etc., to build resiliency in the systems that supports the production of the vital product, food. Marketing has developed an intangible concept that organic food is better for you. We are still arguing about how to measure that.

I am not purporting some purist model, just a comparative approach to changing the impacts that the conventional methods create. Many people acknowledge that our modern society ignores vital connections to our environment, and the organisms inhabiting it. There are observable conditions of the natural forest. Recognizing how our methods cause impact on them does not require measurement. While I believe that the insistence on measurement is a stalling mechanism, I also understand that most people require more than intuition to direct their decisions.

I still contend that just by taking horses into the woods, you won’t have much to offer, other than the reduction of fossil-fuel consumption, or aesthetics. I have nearly 50 years of environmental education (my mother was an Env Ed), 40+ years of working and observing people working in the woods, 30 years of applied forestry knowledge and exposure to the industry, and 27 years experience working draft animals in the woods.

In my mind it still comes down to how you care about the work you do, how you apply the skills, methods, techniques, and principles that you have, that makes the product superior. Unless you undertake some sort of intensive training, you will have a hard time other than years of practice, to verify that you can deliver that product.

Even IF we can come up with a measure of the relative economic value of the product, it will still come down to how well you can document that you can deliver what you say you will do.

During this month I am going to follow up on my contact with the resource economists at UVM to try to determine where there are measurable parameters, and how we can determine the broad ecological impacts/benefits of different methods.

Carl

[Rick Alger]

I tend to side with Andy and Geoff on this issue. To me horselogging is more economic activity than art form.

If as a group we are trying to restore horselogging as a profession, we have got to get beyond the idiosyncratic. We should strive to measure the “economic value of the product.”

The way I try to “document what I can deliver” to private landowners is through informal bid specs. I tell them I will make four-foot wide trails, leave no bole scaring, and no rutting. The residual stocking level will remain high and undamaged, and species composition will shift in a positive direction.

These “specs” don’t go deeply into the ecological integrity issue, but they are a start. I believe they are measurable, invite comparison to other harvesting methods, and are capable of being measured economically.

[Carl Russell]

@Rick Alger 38973 wrote:

I tend to side with Andy and Geoff on this issue. To me horselogging is more economic activity than art form.

If as a group we are trying to restore horselogging as a profession, we have got to get beyond the idiosyncratic. We should strive to measure the “economic value of the product.”

The way I try to “document what I can deliver” to private landowners is through informal bid specs. I tell them I will make four-foot wide trails, leave no bole scaring, and no rutting. The residual stocking level will remain high and undamaged, and species composition will shift in a positive direction.

These “specs” don’t go deeply into the ecological integrity issue, but they are a start. I believe they are measurable, invite comparison to other harvesting methods, and are capable of being measured economically.

You are absolutely correct Rick, but these aspects have nothing to do with horses, and everything to do with the way you apply your “craft”. You can choose to see it as a service that you charge for, therefore it is economic, but it really comes down to how much you care about the way you do your work, and has very little to do with what you use to do it with. If it were purely an economic activity for you, you would be cutting as many corners in harvesting as you could…… disregarding impact….. just using horses to do it.

Your choice to use horses has great value to you, and that enhances the care that you can bring to the work you do, but that is your choice, and it is the choice of the landowner to decide if that matters to them. The truth is, you could do the same work using an ATV, Kubota, small crawler, or some such thing. Unless you can show that the actual work has some distinct ecological significance to the woodland, and that horses actually facilitate that, then it just comes down to preference.

I have a meeting scheduled for 1/31/13 with Jon Erickson, a Natural Resource Economist Professor and Interim Dean at the Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources at UVM. We share the same concerns about how forestry is/isn’t being applied through conventional harvesting practices, and we are going to be discussing these issues, and what we may be able to do at the UVM Research Forest to address them.

My feeling is that we need to establish that significant aspects of conventional harvesting are done with economics in mind, and that there are no ecological forestry principles that actually support those practices. Then we need to evaluate the degree of ecological compromise that is accepted to facilitate economic forestry, ie., is reduced stocking having effect on ecological integrity?. Next would be a choice, do we expend lots of money and time measuring what ecological ecological impacts are and HOW significant they are? Or, do we establish studies that show how the use of draft animals, and possibly small machinery (not my priority, as I think the inherent “Green-ness” of animals adds a level of ecological integrity that cannot be attained by any machine), can effectively deliver forestry practices that both address issues of forest improvement for timber production, and protect ecologically important features of the natural forest.

I’ll keep you all posted, Carl

[irish]

Carl it has been shown that horse logging is economically viable Simon lenihan has just down some work with dr Watson ( an old lecture at uni I am at) at balmoral on the viability of horse logging and found in favour of horse logging in the long term valve of the timber. Simon will known a lot more though.

Just rember machines can not turn and move through trees or work on slopes safely so this is why horses are still used to day, and remain viable and then there is the ecological benefits too

[Carl Russell]

@irish 38997 wrote:

Carl it has been shown that horse logging is economically viable ….

This has never been disputed. The original premise was

I was wondering if anyone was aware of any studies that have been done pitting draft powered logging against mechanized operations/hand crews, either in terms of nutrient output, sedimentation, water output or residual stand damage from logged areas. Learning about horse logging, it seems clear to me that draft powered forestry operations touch the forest more lightly than just about any other method of timber extraction… But has anybody done any research to this effect?

I have been logging with horses for many years and I totally agree that the work I do could not be done with machines for the same cost.

The contested point here is whether using horses by themselves give us an ecological advantage. I contend that the only way they do is in the way they are applied, which has more to do with principles of forestry and the commitment of the operators than with the equipment.

The advantage we have is that mechanical operations are hamstrung by the economics of conventional timber harvest, preventing them from applying the same forestry that we can… if we choose.

By addressing basic principles of ecological forestry, and inserting horses into a harvesting system that supports them, we CAN create a process-based product that can truly provide “a lighter touch” that is more economically viable.

Carl

[Carl Russell]

This doesn’t speak to horselogging, but covers some interesting aspects of ecological services of the natural forest. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/01/130109081141.htm

Mixed Forests More Productive Than Monocultures Jan. 9, 2013 — Forestry and nature conservation can benefit from promoting a diversity of tree species, new study finds.
[HR][/HR]

Modern forestry is largely based on monocultures — in Sweden usually pine or spruce — mainly because it is considered more rational. However a forest contributes more ecosystem services than timber production, such as biological diversity, carbon storage, and berries. A new study from the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU) and Future Forests shows that mixed forests, in comparison with monocultures, have positive effects on several different areas, including production.
“Many people have suggested that high diversity of tree species has a favorable impact on processes in the ecosystem, but until now this connection has primarily been studied in terms of one process or ecosystem service at a time,” says Lars Gamfeldt from University of Gothenburg, who directed the new study.
The study, performed by an international research group, is based on material from the Swedish National Forest Inventory and the Swedish Forest Soil Inventory. By examining the role played by the occurrence of diverse tree species for six different ecosystem services (tree growth, carbon storage, berry production, food for wildlife, occurrence of dead wood, and biological diversity), the study demonstrates that all six services were positively related to the number of tree species.
Different trees contribute to different services. For example, the amount of spruce is related to high tree growth and the amount of pine to berry production, while carbon storage was found in plots with more birch. In order to attain more of all services, forestry may thus need to make use of different tree species. Other studies of forests in Central Europe, the Mediterranean region, and Canada support these findings.
The study also investigated the relationship between the various ecosystem services. For example, high tree growth appears to be negatively related to the production of both berries and food for wildlife and to the occurrence of dead wood. On the other hand, food for wildlife was positively associated with both berry production and biological diversity in ground vegetation.
“It’s not so simple that you can always get more of everything. Sometimes you have to consider trade-offs between different ecosystem services,” says Jon Moen from Umeå University.
The new study, which is published in the scientific journal Nature Communications, runs partly counter to conventional thinking in forestry in Sweden. According to 2011 data from the Swedish National Forest Inventory, only about 7.5 percent of the productive forest land has mixed forests.
“Our findings show that both forestry and nature conservation stand to gain by promoting a greater variety of tree types, thereby providing more diverse ecosystem services,” says Jan Bengtsson, from the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences.

This is the published study;

http://www.nature.com/ncomms/journal/v4/n1/full/ncomms2328.html

Not until recently, however, have scientists begun to explicitly investigate how species diversity might be important for the simultaneous provision of multiple functions or services^{13, 14, 15, 26, 27}. Our results from boreal and temperate production forests show that the relationships between tree species richness and multiple ecosystem services were positive to positively hump-shaped, and that all services attained higher levels with five tree species than with one species.

Carl

[Tim Harrigan]

To me this really demonstrates the extent to which forests have been narrowly defined in terms of timber production. If the conventional thinking had valued any ecosystems functions at all there would not be much insight in this report. It takes a long time to change peoples thinking about systems like this, particularly if they have a vested interest in things the way they are. It will take several of these reports to turn the tide.

[Carl Russell]

@Tim Harrigan 39040 wrote:

To me this really demonstrates the extent to which forests have been narrowly defined in terms of timber production. If the conventional thinking had valued any ecosystems functions at all there would not be much insight in this report. It takes a long time to change peoples thinking about systems like this, particularly if they have a vested interest in things the way they are. It will take several of these reports to turn the tide.

This is exactly what we are up against. Many of us have an intuitive sense about this, even to some degree backed up by scientific knowledge, but we need to understand the bubbles we live in. Just because this stuff seems obvious to us, doesn’t mean that the label of Forestry, or Forester, actually gives credence to this.

Not only does this report move in the direction of quantifying these factors, but is points out how remedial the effort to require quantification is. Can we actually believe that this basic ecology has to be demonstrated in scientifically significant measures before it can be taken seriously by the forest industry?

The truth of the matter is that there are great researchers, and professors, who have been sharing this stuff with foresters and resource managers for generations, but it has been relegated to academicians, research botanists, and ecologists, and industrial foresters have been allowed to refer back to it, as though it applies to what they are doing, while basically ignoring it.

Carl

[Andy Carson]

@Carl Russell 39044 wrote:

The truth of the matter is that there are great researchers, and professors, who have been sharing this stuff with foresters and resource managers for generations, but it has been relegated to academicians, research botanists, and ecologists, and industrial foresters have been allowed to refer back to it, as though it applies to what they are doing, while basically ignoring it.

I think many of these concepts have only started to be investigated in a careful way. In the Gamfeldt paper, you might notice that nearly all the references were in the last decade and many were in the last 5 years. I have no doubt that many researchers had an intuitive sense about the value of biodiversity and probably communicated this intuitive sense for years. Intuition is a great source of ideas that can be tested, and I value intuition a lot. It does not, however, make a very compelling argument when faced with an opponent who has (or at least states they have) a different intuitive idea. I think to bring these studies out of the completely acedemic realm and into the real world, researchers must be sure to communicate clearly to a wide audience, recognizing non-acedemics will be present. Also, non-academics must read and discuss some of these papers and ask questions if they don’t understand some terminology. Nearly all academics I know are willing (damn near excited!) to explain how thier findings, esp when thier work is actually going to have an impact in the real world. I think discussions like the one we are having serve a valuable purpose in translating (literally and figuratively) these sort of acedemic works to a wider audience.

Also, I would encource people who are out in the woods to carefully think about they base thier intuitive understand on. Perhaps it is based partly on how many different animal/plant species are present? Maybe it’s based on how many rare species are seen? Maybe on how many steps you have to take before you see deep ruts? Maybe one notes how many acorn caps or cherry pits you see? All of these probably add up to an intuitive sense, and all are individually measureable and quantifiable. Those out in the worlds every day would know to measure best, and everyone should demand that this science reflect observable experience. I do think this type of study is in its infancy and measuable criteria have not been developed and established. The process of establishing good measuables might start by comparing a “balanced” (by intuition) ecosystem with one that is not “balanced” (again by intuition). List the obvious differences. Which of these can be measured? Which would go hand in hand (IE, why deer if you can count deer droppings, why count squirrels if you can count nuts)? Of these, which are easist to measure? I like the methology used in the Gamfeldt paper where they measure the percent of the forest floor covered by Bilberry (as an example). Compare this to a technique where one simply tries to see if bilberry is present in a 100 acre area. Both methods place a value on Bilberry, but because of the measurement methods used (percent coverage vs present/absent) they are going to support very different forest management techniques. My understanding is that he USFC uses a present/absent type method to make provisions for indicator species, which I do not think makes much sense.

[near horse]

“If the conventional thinking had valued any ecosystems functions at all there would not be much insight in this report.”

Tim – sort of a literal “can’t see the forest for the trees”. :confused:

Some times intuition can fool us. One example was a study looking at the impact of snowmobiles on movement of large wild ungulates (deer and elk in this case). Flight distance and longevity of displacement ended up being greater for crosscountry skiers moving through an area than it was for snowmoblies. Seems the duration of the “disturbance” had greater impact than how “disturbing” we perceived the disturbance to be.

Oh – too many thoughts going too many directions = time out for Geoff.

[irish]

carl sory my post was not that clear. the thing i was refering to was looking at horses for thining and compairdeed it to machines would have to do in that wood and then looked a the costs and then final value value of the crop and a horse was dearer for the operation but the final redusal value was alot greater as the machines would need to cut racks.

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