Rather than good fences, it's cooperation that can make the difference.
Ken Clayton's two-acre lot in Bennington includes not more than one acre of wooded land to the north of his house. That's not what one would call extensive holdings. Still, it was enough that last winter, trees cut from that single acre brought him stumpage payments of $3000.
By any measure, Clayton's windfall is extraordinary — his trees were 28-inch diameter oaks that had been growing for a century — and homeowners probably shouldn't expect their back yards to be goldmines. However, many owners of small lots don't even consider managing their land, because they can't imagine that a forester or logger would work on such small acreage.
But, as in most other areas of life, there is indeed strength in numbers, and many landowners have found that by working cooperatively with their neighbors, they can achieve much more than would be possible on their own.
All it takes is a little imagination, an ability to think outside the boundary lines. The logging job on Ken Clayton's Bennington land is a good example of what can happen when landowners join together.
First, some history. In 1964, Ken Clayton bought two acres on Pippin Knoll, a mile northwest of Old Bennington on a gravel road. When he and his wife, Nancy, built their house later that year, it was the first one on Pippin Knoll Road. Half of the lot was wooded with some sixty- to seventy year-old red oaks growing straight and tall.
Then, almost 30 years later, a Pownal logger named Ken Comar knocked on Clayton's door and asked if he was interested in cutting some of the oaks. In that time, there had been some big changes. The neighborhood had grown, slowly and inevitably, much like the oaks; the road was now paved and five other houses had been built. Power poles carrying electric and telephone lines paralleled the tree-lined street.
How could they possibly log on that small lot without disturbing what had become a residential neighborhood?
Comar, who has logged in Bennington and Pownal for 18 years, said, 'It would have been a mess. Building a landing was out of the question and even putting a road in to a landing would have meant cutting a hole in the hedgerow."
But Comar had done his homework and he had already contracted with three other contiguous landowners to work on their land at the same time. This would allow him to build a landing in a field up the hill that provided easy access to a little-used farm road. He could then skid the logs away from Clayton's house and the frontage on the blacktop.
Clayton, a retired banker, had never had any logging done, so he called Bennington County forester Jim White, who made a site visit along with Comar.
White told Clayton that the stand was getting crowded and that the most crowded oaks should be removed, leaving the most vigorous trees. In addition, White advised him that with good markets and with Clayton's neighbors already on board, this was a good opportunity for him to improve the stand, and do it efficiently. By then convinced it was a good idea, Clayton also saw the opportunity to remove an oak that was shading his vegetable garden.
The job went well and all four landowners were thrilled with Comar's work. On the four lots — measuring one, two, 10 and 30 acres for a total of 43 acres—he cut 100,000 board feet and paid out $27,000 in stumpage.
When he was done at Clayton's, he left an undisturbed 100-foot deep visual buffer along the blacktop. This buffer included trees that would make any logger's eyes brighten, 28-inch diameter oaks with four sawlogs in them. Surrounding the large oaks are saplings which complete the screen so that joggers ormotorists would have to strain their eyes to see any indication that there had been a logging operation in there.
Clayton knew that Comar and his family were planning a vacation, so he gave Comar the last tree he cut so he'd have some extra cash for a side trip which otherwise didn't fit financially into their itinerary. Said Jim White, "Now, that's a pretty good indication of how pleased he was with the work. It was a valuable tree, maybe the best tree on the lot."
The key element that made this happen was cooperation. Ed Holden, who owns the 10-acre woodlot uphill from Clayton, agreed to let Comar build a landing on his adjacent field to handle the logs from all four properties.
Was he compensated for having the landing for the entire operation on his land?
"No, I didn't ask to be compensated," Holden said. "My field seemed to be the appropriate place for the landing. It was the most convenient for the logger, which made it the most economical for him and the other landowners and it was not at all to my detriment.
"All of this, of course, takes into consideration the kind of logger that Ken is. Knowing Ken, I felt certain that regardless of the number of logs that were being skidded there, he was going to leave the property the same way he found it. If it had been someone else, there might have been some question in my mind."
Cooperation on a Larger Scale
Forty orsomilestothe east, on the other side of the Green Mountains, there is an other, larger, on-going example of cooperation among landowners. The Wildlife Habitat Improvement Group (WHIG) is a rural neighborhood association which colleaively manages 4600 acres in the Windham County towns of Newfane, Townshend and Wardsboro.
The group was formed in 1987 and includes 42 landowners whose holdings range from three acres to 855 acres. Of the 42 WHIG landowners, only eight of them are year-round residents; the others use their land primarily for vacation homes. According to David Clarkson of Newfane, one of the group's founders, they are a diverse group, ranging from a Harvard economist to a New York Times columnist to a mountain man who lives in a school bus. What binds them together is their desire to improve the seven square mile area as habitat for wildlife.
Because of the sparse human population and the diversity of land cover, the WHIG land is home to deer, turkey, snowshoe hare, rabbit, mink, otter, herons, ducks and a wide variety of small mammals, song birds and amphibians; also present are predators such as raptors, fox, fisher and coyote. Recently there has been an increase in summer use by moose, and in heavy mast and berry years, black bears.
WHIG is a very informal organization, and involvement with it is purely voluntary. Members meet periodically and have walkthroughs in the summer and ski-throughs in the winter to which they invite the general public.
Clarkson, whose 230 acres includes a deeryard and a wetland, was instrumental in forming the group. Through his involvement with Vermont Coverts, a group dedicated to teaching landowners about wildlife habitat, he had become aware of his own land's potential. In ensuing conversations with his neighbors, he found that they shared a concern that some wildlife species seemed to be more scarce than in the past. Clarkson, along with two of his neighbors, Lucille Duncan and John Kenneth Galbraith, began to manage their collective holdings (about 650 acres) using the services of consulting forester George Weir.
By 1991 the threesome had grown to 42 landowners and 4600 acres. They applied for and received grants from the Vermont Stewardship Committee and the Windham Foundation to develop a management plan for the seven square mile area. This was accomplished with the assistance of Windham County forester Bill Guenther and Fish & Wildlife biologist Kim Royar.
At the core of the plan is the concept of important habitats, which identifies those habitats that are in short supply and without which there would be diminished wildlife populations. The grant also funded a Geographic Information System (GIS) map of the WHIG land, which identified close to 70 important habitats, including spring seeps, hard mast stands, and den sites. These sites were distributed among 30 or so of the parcels.
The landowners agreed to manage the important areas designated on their properties for wildlife. In some cases—wetlands, for example — this requires leaving them undisturbed. In areas not designated, landowners are free to carry on normal forestry operations, which of course could include managing for wildlife.
The map and plan give a clear overview of the important habitats and their relationships to each other. "It's nice because it has made neighbors aware of how we depend on each other," Clarkson said.
Clarkson, who represents the Windham 3 district in the Vermont House of Representatives, had some advice for anyone thinking about trying to form an organization like WHIG. "This is a long-term proposition. You have to be real patient and listen to other people and not push. The last thing any landowner wants to hear is 'This is what you should do with your land.' Avoid giving any impression that you have a better idea than he does and it should work out fine."
Bill Guenther recommended involving resource managers like wildlife biologists and the county forester." And you need a point person who is enthusiastic, who can carry the torch," Guenther said. "This group has been very successful largely due to the extraordinary efforts of David Clarkson. There have been other attempts at groups like this, but it's difficult to pull off, and they can fizzle without consistent energy. David has created an awareness in his neighbors of the importance of wildlife habitat, and his enthusiasm is never-ending.”