what is unique about the clearcut with reserves treatment

The clearcut system manages successive, even-aged stands by cutting the entire stand of trees at planned intervals (the rotation). New stands then regenerate in their place. A “clearcut with reserves” is a variation of clearcutting that retains uniformly spaced or small groups of trees for purposes other than regeneration.

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What is a “clearcut with reserves?

A “clearcut with reserves” is a variation of clearcutting that retains uniformly spaced or small groups of trees for purposes other than regeneration. Clearcutting provides baseline data for comparing forest health and productivity in silvicultural systems that use partial cutting. For photos of clearcut with reserves see Tour Stop 8.

Is clear-cutting a viable option in tropical forests?

In many species-diverse tropical forests, clear-cutting is neither an economically nor an ecologically appropriate option, since only a few tree species are commercially accepted – although the number of accepted species is rising fast in response to a number of technical and industrial drivers.

Why study clearcut forests?

Long-term studies of clearcut forests, such as studies of the Pasoh Rainforest in Malaysia, are also important in providing insights into the preservation of forest resources worldwide. Many variations of clearcutting exist; the most common professional practices are:

What is the purpose of clearcutting?

In addition to the purpose of harvesting wood, clearcutting is used to create land for farming. The "insatiable human demand for wood and arable land" through clearcutting and other activities has led to the loss of over half of the world's rainforests.

Why is clearcutting the best method?

Clearcutting is the most efficient and economical method of harvesting a large group of trees. Fewer disturbances to the forest floor. By entering a forest to log trees once instead of multiple times in a series of timber harvests, the landowner minimizes disturbance to forest soil.

What are the pros and cons of clearcutting?

What Are Some Advantages & Disadvantages of Clear Cutting?Pro: Financial Reasons. Clearcutting advocates argue that the method is the most efficient for both harvesting and replanting trees. ... Con: Effects on Plant and Wildlife. ... Pro: Increased Water Flow. ... Con: Loss of Recreation Land. ... Pro: Increased Farmland.

What happens when a forest is clearcut?

Clearcutting can destroy an area's ecological integrity in a number of ways, including: the destruction of buffer zones which reduce the severity of flooding by absorbing and holding water; the immediate removal of forest canopy, which destroys the habitat for many rainforest-dependent insects and bacteria; the removal ...

Does clearcut cause water pollution?

Clearcutting can send heavier loads of sediments and nutrients downriver, harming water quality and fish and decreasing storage capacity (as water volume is displaced by sediments).

What harmful effects does clearcutting have on Canada's environment?

Clearcutting disturbs soils, wetlands, and peatlands, releasing their vast carbon stores, and diminishes the boreal forest's ability to sequester carbon from the atmosphere. As such, it is often an ecologically harmful form of logging.

What are the environmental impacts of clearcutting?

[15] Clearcutting may lead to increased stream flow during storms, loss of habitat and species diversity, opportunities for invasive and weedy species, and negative impacts on scenery,[16] as well as a decrease in property values; diminished recreation, hunting, and fishing opportunities.

What are the advantages and disadvantages of selective logging?

Selective logging is more sustainable than clear-cutting because other trees and plants do survive in the logging process and over time can allow the forest to recover. However, it does have major drawbacks. Although single trees are felled because they are valuable, other trees can be damaged in the process.

What is the most sustainable method of harvesting trees?

Selective LoggingSelective Logging Is The Most Sustainable Method Of Harvesting Trees. Although there are many benefits of using selective logging as the most sustainable method of harvesting trees, there are also many disadvantages.

What are the benefits of cutting trees?

5 Reasons Why Cutting Down Trees Is a Good ThingImproves Forest Restoration. Forests depend on cycles of life and death. ... Encourages Environmental Diversity. A diverse forest is a healthy forest. ... Reduces Risk of Falling Trees. ... Provides Renewable Resources. ... Prevents the Spread of Diseases and Infestations.

What is a better method of tree harvesting?

Clearcutting is the solution to forest types whose seedlings or sprouts require full sunlight. Seeds and buds respond well to the warmed ground. The abundance of light produces excellent growth, some of the fastest we have.

Which is used to reduce the impact of timber harvesting?

In selective-cutting. only few number of timber trees are cut down from the large forest and new seeds are planted there. So, this forest contains trees of various ages and is more diverse and this method also has less impact on environment.

Does clear-cutting prevent forest fires?

Plantation trees are less fire-resilient. Clearcutting removes all fire-resilient trees and replaces the entire area with younger trees in plantations, which are a high-fire risk. Over many years, the bark of mature trees thickens and becomes more resistant to fire.

What will the harvest do to the forest?

The harvest will reset the ecological clock on this area and regrow into a new, younger, fast growing forest. This will enhance the age and species diversity of the Forest and make it more resilient to damages from insects, diseases, and storm events.

What are the trees in the Forester's View?

There are black birch, oak, aspen, cherry and sassafras with an understory of mountain laurel and low bush blueberry. Forester’s View. This stand is regenerating well to native trees and shrubs. The 8 acres of young trees adds habitat diversity to the Forest.

What is clearcutting in forest?

Clearcutting, clearfelling or clearcut logging is a forestry / logging practice in which most or all trees in an area are uniformly cut down. Along with shelterwood and seed tree harvests, it is used by foresters to create certain types of forest ecosystems and to promote select species that require an abundance of sunlight or grow in large, ...

Why are clearcuts important?

Clearcuts are used to help regenerate species that cannot compete in mature forests. A number of them are aspen, jack pine and, in areas with poor soils, oaks—are important species for both game and nongame wildlife species. Clearcutting can also lead to increased vascular-plant diversity in the area.

Why do we clearcut trees?

Clearcutting can be practiced to encourage the growth and proliferation of tree species that require high light intensity. Generally, a harvest area wider than double the height of the adjacent trees will no longer be subject to the moderating influence of the woodland on the microclimate. The width of the harvest area can thus determine which species will come to dominate. Those with high tolerance to extremes in temperature, soil moisture, and resistance to browsing may be established, in particular secondary successional pioneer species .

Where was clearcut logging in the Blue Ridge Mountains?

Clearcut logging in the Blue Ridge Mountains (Tennessee) in 1936. Clearcutting in Southern Finland. Clearcutting near Eugene, Oregon. Clearcutting can be differentiated into. Clearcutting - clean felling by complete exploitation and removal of all the trees in one operation ... a harvesting method.

What is outcome based forest?

Known as Outcome Based Forestry, (OBF) is a form of logging different from original regulations of logging harvesting. This newer program allows for a wide range of harvesting as long as the removed trees do not exceed the amount of tree growth. Since implemented, this program has led to a method of large-scale clearcutting and monoculture tree planting to meet economic demands. This program brings about some concern because along with clearcutting degrading the land, the effects of such degrading management practices affect the human laborers and livelihoods of people who are not even associated with the logging.

What is selective cutting?

when so done it is often called ecoforestry. Clearcutting contrasts with selective cutting, such as high grading, in which only commercially valuable trees are har vested, leaving all others.

What is the purpose of clearcutting?

In addition to the purpose of harvesting wood, clearcutting is used to create land for farming. Ultimately, the effects of clearcutting on the land will depend on how well or poorly the forest is managed, and whether it is converted to non-forest land uses after clearcuts.

What were the concerns of clearcutting the forests of western British Columbia?

Concern over clearcuttingthe forests of western British Columbia (Figure 17.10), actions that were guided by forest management prescriptions designed under sustained yield of timber production principles, began in the early 1990s (Dempsey 2011). The income and jobs created through this process were important objectives of the forest industry and the provincial government. However, the land involved was considered traditional territory of several indigenous tribes (First Nations) and these groups were not involved in the development of the land use plans for the region. It is also argued that much of the benefits derived from the harvesting activities were accrued by people living outside the local communities. With the rise of these socioeconomic issues, and citing forest fragmentation and a decline in forest health as ecological issues, environmental groups pressured the government and expressed the need for large reserves to counteract ecosystem decline. These groups also used end-market campaigns (i.e., boycotts of certain products) to successfully initiate a compromise agreement. Interestingly, in the aftermath of this agreement, all of the major stakeholders were pleased. Environmental groups were content that some land was to be protected, forest products companies obtained a level of credibility and secured timber supplies, and some groups of indigenous peoples gained a voice in the management of forest areas. Not all stakeholders were pleased, however, as some were excluded from the development of the agreement, while others felt that the agreement had failed to protect enough grizzly bear (Ursus arctos horribilis) habitat (Dempsey 2011).

How profitable is clear cutting?

Clear-cutting is a silvicultural system that removes an entire stand of trees from an area of 1 ha or more, and greater than two tree heights in width, in a single harvesting operation ( Figure 5 ). It can be highly profitable. However, its application in mountain forests often involves unacceptable risks, or impairs landscape values.

How does clear cutting affect the world?

If clear-cutting is not properly applied as a silvicultural system and is the first step to permanent deforestation, it usually has a negative impact on the fresh water supply. More than half of the world's population relies on clean water from mountains. While the demand is increasing, the supply is endangered.

Why is clear cutting not used?

Not all damage attributed to clear-cutting is caused by the unwanted side-effects of the silvicultural system itself. The damage may actually be the result of inadequate road construction, of inappropriate site preparation treatments such as burning, or of careless logging practices, which damage the advance regeneration. However, even careful clear-cutting should not be used in those mountain forests where protection from natural hazards is needed, where erosion is a matter of major concern, and where the sites do not restock easily.

Why are feller-bunchers more compaction than boom-mounted?

(1990), it was found that a frame-mounted feller-buncher caused more soil disturbance and compaction than a boom-mounted because the first machine type has to travel to each tree.

How do forests prevent avalanches?

Any rough surface structure, such as a rock, trunk, or tree, reduces the risk of snow movement by creating heterogeneity in the snow layer and ‘nailing’ the snow to the ground. While forests can rarely stop flowing snow avalanches, they are highly effective in preventing avalanche release. Surface roughness is also important for impeding rockfalls. However, in this case, forests serve not to prevent rockfall starting, but rather stop falling rocks.

What is ploughing after clearing?

Soil ploughing after clear-cutting is a common forestry practice, which has positive effects on the first phases of forest regeneration. In the Upper Silesian Industrial Region, full tillage of the sandy soil promoted better growth of nearly all tree species in their juvenile period than other methods of soil preparation (plowing or disk cultivation). Full tillage decreased soil acidity, reduced metal contents, enhanced microbiological activity, and decreased infections of young trees by root-rot fungi ( Heterobasidion annosum ). However, plowing also decreased mycorrhyzal infestation of Scots pine roots and the soil content of N, K, and Mg, requiring compensatory measures.

Why is clear cutting important?

Clear-cutting is just one tool, but an important one in promoting a habitat spectrum attractive to all species. ”. Rocky Bunnell, a logger and lifelong hunter from Monroe, New Hampshire, speaks to the value of clearcuts to game species.

How to maintain a percentage of forest in early succession?

As Northeastern farmland has cycled to shrubland, then pole timber, and now to older woodlands, clear cutting and patch cutting are the most common ways to maintain a percentage of forest in early succession. The Great Swamp is Rhode Island’s principal experiment.

When was the Phelps Research Area cut?

Cutting, even clear-cuts, has a place, but there’s an argument for old growth. Look at the Phelps Research Area in Colebrook [Connecticut]. It was cut in 1912, but even with a hundred years the place is spectacular, and people should stop omitting no logging as an option, especially on public land.”.

When was the Great Swamp Management Area completed?

We were talking about the Great Swamp Management Area in south-central Rhode Island. Two clearcuts were completed here in 1995, three in 2007, then two in 2012. There are two more rounds on the way. The idea is that the young forest conditions will help restore the region’s grouse population, which has been severely depleted over the past few decades.

What is clearcutting regeneration?

Clearcutting Regeneration Method with Reserves - A clearcutting regeneration method in which varying numbers of reserve trees are retained to achieve goals other than regeneration. This method produces a two-aged stand in which varying numbers of reserve trees are not harvested.

What is the Coppice Regeneration Method?

Coppice Regeneration Method - An even-aged method of regenerating a stand in which the trees in the previous stand are cut and the majority of regeneration is from sprouts or root suckers.

What is harvest activity?

Harvest Activity - A reference to a specific type of cut applied under a regeneration method or intermediate treatment. Refer to the TRACS-SILVA Table S1020 for valid codes. (TRACS-SILVA Data Dictionary).

What is cleaning in trees?

Cleaning. An intermediate, release treatment made in an age class not past the sapling stage to free the favored trees from less desirable individuals of the same age class that overtop them or are likely to do so (see improvement cutting, liberation, and weeding).

What is group selection regeneration?

Group Selection Regeneration Method - A method of regenerating uneven-aged stands in which trees are cut, in small groups, and new age classes are established . The width of groups is commonly approximately twice the height of the mature trees, with small openings providing microenvironments suitable for tolerant regeneration, and the larger openings providing conditions suitable for regeneration that is more intolerant. In the group selection regeneration method, the management unit or stand in which regeneration growth and yield are regulated consists of a landscape containing an aggregation of groups.

What is advance regeneration?

Advance Regeneration (also called advance reproduction or advance growth) - Seedlings or saplings that develop or are present in the understory.

What is improvement cutting?

Improvement Cutting - An intermediate treatment made in a stand, pole-sized or larger, primarily to improve composition and quality by removing less desirable trees of any species.

Overview

Types

Clearcutting regeneration, harvesting or system

Effects on the environment

See also

External links