Letters to the Editors - Autumn 2005
Foresters and Ethics
To the Editors:
Lloyd Irland’s Another View, “The Ethics of Forest Management,” in your Summer 2005 issue was disappointing, especially concerning a “two-for-one,” both forestry and logging service all at once. To me, the two-for-one presents lots of ethical conflicts, because one company determines which trees to cut, the volume of those trees, their value, and the cost of forestry and logging. Unfortunately, neither the Society for American Foresters (SAF) nor the Association of Consulting Foresters was clear on whether to support or condemn such a practice.
To me, the ethics of forest management on someone else’s land is a means to control the less-desirable aspects of human behavior so that neither the forest nor the landowner is compromised. What has the SAF ethics code done for the Northern Forest? Does $200 per acre for land, water, trees, and roads equate to a well-managed forest?
Irland failed to mention a national group of foresters and associated scientists that belong to the Forest Guild, which among other things has tackled a difficult ethical problem that the SAF has not. This problem, a polarizing issue in Massachusetts, is whether a forester can highgrade the forest even if it is what the landowner wishes. Apparently, the SAF ethics code says this is okay as long as the forester documents his effort to convince the landowner otherwise. The Forest Guild sees it differently, and a Guild forester’s first duty is to the forest; “when the management directives of clients or supervisors conflict with the mission and principles of the Guild and cannot be modified through dialogue and education, a forester should disassociate.” The Guild’s mission and principles do not allow highgrading.
Bruce Spencer, New Salem, Massachusetts
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Wilderness, Old Growth, and Forest Management
To the Editors:
In the “Letters to the Editors” in the Summer 05 issue, Dennis LaBare writes: “. . . both Northrup’s and Fidel’s outfits simply don’t want any active forestry on public lands—just the lower biodiversity that ‘old growth’ and wilderness foster.”
Is it true that “old growth” is a less diverse ecosystem?
In a recent article in The New Yorker, Richard Preston wrote a wonderful article about old-growth redwood stands in northern California, and if I recall the article correctly, he reported that researchers have recently discovered amazing and unexpected biological diversity in these stands, notably in the upper reaches of these forests, where previously humans could not go.
So my question is: Is it actually true that “old growth” in the Northeast lacks diversity? Or might it be more accurate to say that “old growth” is differently diverse?
Thomas Rawls, Bristol, Vermont
The editors respond:
The answer to this question is too complicated to be readily summarized here. Old growth in eastern forests is especially problematic, since virtually no true old growth exists in this part of the world.
Some research being done in Big Reed Reserve in Maine and in uncut regions of the Adirondack Park indicates that true old growth does in fact host a vast array of otherwise uncommon species, especially soil microorganisms, mosses and lichens, and insect life.
True old growth forests are complex in their structure because centuries of natural disturbance create openings of diverse sizes so there are always trees of different ages on the landscape in a huge variety of configurations. This diversity of plants fosters diversity of animals.
The kind of forests that easterners tend to think of as old growth are, for the most part, comparatively “young” forests that have not been cut for, say 80 to 100 years. These relatively untouched forests are not particularly diverse, especially in terms of forest structure. They tend to be made up largely of full-canopy stands without a rich mid-story or understory. If much of the forest is in this condition, then, indeed there would be less overall diversity – no early succession, no large openings, and no mid-succession, a phasing out of pine, perhaps, and so on. After another long stretch of time, measured in centuries rather than decades, these forests will closely approximate the diversity of old growth. Forest management can increase diversity by adding complexity to the structure, in a sense accelerating the process that takes place naturally in uncut forests.
A scientist interested in this question would likely say, “Let’s set aside a careful selection of diverse large blocks to study; we’ll have an answer in 500 years.” The political, cultural, and economic obstacles to this course of action are not insignificant.
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Nailed Down
To the Editors:
Regarding the ongoing discussion of driving nails into black locust, (which began with the story on my organization, the Black Locust Initiative, in your Winter 2004 issue), I wanted to give some advice. Galvanized nails, eight-penny to sixteen-penny will go into locust, if the point is blunted. Hold the nail upside down, its head on a solid surface, and tap the point with a light hammer blow to square it. That way, when you drive it, it punches a hole. Rotate the nail so the widest, burred axis of the point is cutting across the grain, not wedging it. Because galvanized nails leave a glaze on your hammerhead, cuff the glaze off with a swipe of fine sandpaper. Make sure you hold the nail firmly when starting, and strike it smooth and square. Drilling pilot holes is an improvement. Galvanized nails for pressure-treated lumber look like common nails, with waffle head and ring-textured shank. Spiral nails bend more, but split the wood less. Galvanized box nails (three-and four-penny) are good for small wood. When using locust for fencing, it can be difficult getting the 1 ¼-inch fence staples to go into locust posts. If the fencing can be wrapped around a nail before driving it, 1 ½-inch TECO nails work well.
Like all hardwoods, locust is usually fastened with screws. The all-locust gazebo pictured in the Winter 2004 issue stands as a monument to the forested flood plain where it grew, which is now covered with big box stores. Teens drilled, then screwed rafters to the top plate; purlins were simply screwed to rafters with 2 ½-inch square-drive grey-coated deck screws with the self-drilling tip. Later, some wood shingles were drilled and nailed where the 1-inch locust purlins were bouncy. For fine work, pilot, counterbore, countersink and screw. Try a little beeswax/linseed oil on the screw tip, the same as every hardwood.
Dave Gell, Trumansburg, New York
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Gray Fox
To the Editors:
Great issue, Summer 2005, especially Susan Morse’s article on gray foxes. They have been here in our sugarbush 50 years that I know of. Because of ground-nesting birds, I was tempted to trap them. I didn’t. I learned.
We have 20 miles of sap-gathering maple tubing out all year ’round. The point is, for the past five years, we have had minimal squirrel damage to our tubing. Gray foxes have kept them (and mice) under control, a great help for us.
Jack Leadley, Sr., Speculator, New York
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