Site Discussions

Thank you Mr. Mance for this article! I have been trying to encourage those I know in permaculture fields to consider Haiti as a project to consider helping with. With sound Biodynamic growing practices I do not doubt this ailing country could reclaim its fertile landscape and benefit from food and other crop production. Would you consider sending your article to Paul Farmer and the other members of PIH (Partners in Health)? They could direct this wave of interest to those who could hear and use it. Many thanks again - Deborah

Mr Wooster,

Thank you for writing that.  Public misunderstanding of the carbon cycle is deeply troubling.  Perhaps your article will help to open peoples’ eyes and minds.

Over the long term, forests are carbon neutral. Your article is the first I have seen clearly stating this.  Net carbon sequestration or release is associated with land use changes, not equilibrium conditions. 

The only aspect of your article I would question is in regards to the origins of oil.  There is much controversy and debate about biotic versus abiotic origin.  I certainly don’t know the answer to that one and sincerely doubt anyone else does either.

Thank you for an excellent article.

Regards,

Matt Stacy
West Topsham, VT

Agree with Chuck’s points and am glad to see them stated so clearly and succinctly.  There is one point I would like to add- that burning wood for fuel does displace burning fossil fuels, and burning wood is a closed loop, if you assume that you grow wood back at the same rate that you use it for fuel.  Burning fossil fuels is not a closed loop, unless you look at enough hundreds of millions of years.  So in theory burning wood does not add to atmospheric carbon if you look at enough decades to absorb it back into new trees.  This of course assumes perfect management and also doesn’t take into account the diesel fuel required for harvesting and processing.

Thanks for the thoughtful analysis of forest management and global warming.  As we try to figure out the right thing to do with our northern forest land, Sandy and I have been “literature tourists” on this topic for a few years now.  It’s often difficult to distinguish fact from fiction, particularly when much of the fiction is aimed at advancing a particular business or policy agenda.

Below is a link from the US National Academy of Sciences to an interesting recent study that addresses the controversial topic of clearcutting, or “deforestation”, and global warming.  The study distinguishes the northern forest (latitudes that are snow-covered in the winter) from tropical forests (not).  The conclusion is that deforestation in the northern latitudes, particularly in evergreen forests, may actually reduce global warming.  This is because a dark green winter landscape (evergreen cover), which captures heat from solar radiation, is converted, after clearcutting, to a snow-covered white one.  The white winter landscape reflects back heat-causing radiation, and thus reduces the warming effect.

This is of course just one of many factors in a complex soup of cause and effect, and there may be other factors that outweigh the shift in heat retention from cutting an evergreen forest.  But the study probably should be taken into account and given some amount of weight in the political environment where “cutting” or “deforestation” is often simply equated with “bad”.

Here’s the link:  http://www.pnas.org/content/104/16/6550.abstract

Thanks,

Jim

I think the title of this article is unfortunate and confuses some of the good points in the article. I think what you meant is “Forests can’t stop climate change on their own.” Agreed. But they can be part of the solution, and the article says as much when it identifies the importance of deforestation. The correlation to avoided deforestation is of course reforestation which also holds promise in parts of the world.  In addition, the loop is not entirely closed with the forest cycle because carbon is absorbed and released by other biological systems, such as the oceans.  More carbon can be moved into the on-site forest part of the loop to our benefit.  What is important is the movement and location of carbon in the loop over critical periods of time. As we can flush the carbon out of the forests by harvesting them all right now, so too can we also manage them to build up forest carbon supplies over critical periods to give us the time to develop alternatives. The point that forests cannot by themelves solve the entire climate problem is well understood. I haven’t met anyone who believes this or read anything that presents this point of view.  The question we are now struggling with is how much can it help, what management strategies work, and what are the costs and benefits of using forests in this way.

Interesting and good article. There is a lot of confusion about what’s good and what’s not, as you note.

Can you expand on the 80 percent fossil fuels part and talk about the move to biomass and the like? And the differences between new carbon and old, fossilized carbon? Thanks.

Thank you , Chuck, for putting into words the thoughts I have not been able to express.  It is ironic that the simplest carbon market exchange will reward investors who reforest their cutover land and agree to keep it forested (perhaps softwood plantations on former cotton fields) for 20 or so years.  Ironic also that those 20-year old trees could be “financially mature” and cut as part of the normal management scheme in some parts of the US.

If we are serious about managing atmospheric carbon levels, we need to keep it buried in the ground where it took millions of years to accumulate.

I am always dismayed during reportage of tragedies how infrequently anyone mentions their effect on flora and fauna. Focus is always about people and money.

Thanks, Dave, for talking about Haiti as a place occupied by people and an environment in interaction!

My father had died and he used to fly small planes and made almost any thing out of wood, but his favorite is cherry, so I thought to take his ashes up in a plane and sprinkle them over a cherry tree forest, that’s where he’d be the happiest! Would you be able to give me a location of a forest where cherry is processed?
Thanks,
Wendy Jayne

Virginia,
That was an informative summary that was easy to read.  Can you tell me who is working on the albino strain?  I worked on a project like that with Forintek about 15 years ago and I’d be interested to know the status

The balance between keeping the natural habitat and forests alive and keeping coffee in the cups of consumers is a delicate one. Personally, I think that more emphasis should be placed on protecting the environment, even if it means that coffee prices will go up. Caffeine is the most consumed drug in the world, and people don’t really need to be drinking coffee each and every day anyway.

- GCBM

A fourth possible option subject to local fire codes would be dividing the field into thirds or quarters by mowing lanes or planting cool season grasses in lanes and performing a controlled burn each year of one third or one fouth of the land. This approach will invigorate the soil and do minimal damage to all critters flora and fauna a like. The burn is best done very early in the day or late in the afternoon in a no wind condition as soon as the snow has melted and the grasses have dried. It should go without saying this is not a one man opperation.

A fourth possible option subject to local fire codes would be dividing the field into thirds or quarters by mowing lanes or planting cool season grasses in lanes and performing a controlled burn each year of one third or one fouth of the land. This approach invigorate the soil and do minimal damage to all critters flora and fauna a like. The burn is best done very early in the day or late in the afternoon in a no wind condition as soon as the snow has melted and the grasses have dried. It should go without saying this is not a one man opperation.

I found this article most helpful to me as I operate a small barbecue business. I am dedicated to researching and maintaining traditional “old fashioned” BBQ taste. Now knowing the history of hickory, I am convinced I am using the most traditional wood for BBQ. Thank you.

Why do the un-bred females have there slumber around Christmas?

Whoever doesn’t like the smoke needs to move back to the city and inhale the smog there. Burning wood does not produce harmful gasses into the air. It does not harm the environment.  Fossil fuels DO.  Wood does not add greenhouse gasses to the environment. Fossil fuels DO.  This regulation will damage the economy of Pennsylvania by killing jobs and by increasing the heating cost of many homeowners by over 400 percent.  The Commonwealth consists primarily of heavily wooded, rural areas.  It makes no sense to burden the citizens of our entire Commonwealth with a rule that really only applies to densely populated areas that constitute a tiny portion of the Commonwealth.  I believe that any needed regulation should be left to local municipalities.  Thank you.

The mention of chipmunks awakening briefly in winter to nibble on their stores immediately brought to mind an incident that happened in the mid 1950’s.  Living on a farm in Orange,Vermont, at that time, my sister and I often coaxed chipmunks to eat out of our hands during the long summer days.  One particular chipmunk became especially tame and could easily be recognized by its bobbed tail, probably the result of a narrow escape from a hungry predator. Imagine our delight during a period of several warm days in late January when our little friend emerged from the hollow recesses of our front yard maple tree and accepted crumbs once again from our hand.  He only reappeared that one afternoon, then went back into hibernation until warmer weather came to stay.

What a wonderful crystal! We had some good hoarfrost last week but nothing like that! A great website for snow crystals is Ken Libbrecht’s (author of Snowflake) http://www.its.caltech.edu/~atomic/snowcrystals/books/books.htm

Dave, I just ran across this and was really happy to read what you wrote.  Thanks so much for helping get the word out about the discussion Ann Ferrell lead at Middlebury College a couple weeks ago.  It was a good gathering.  People really do care: about the forest, each other and the next generation of both people and trees!

What is the cause for a bar to be grooved and rolled back at the bar and tip junction, after talking to local fellers some have said chain to lose, some say the bar got pinched which causes friction and heats the bar up which softens the metal and makes it weaker than the rest of the bar, others say it’s from applying pressure there all the time,some don’t want to admit it happens to them and say anyone that happens to doesn’t know how to run a saw. Can someone give me a straight answer, thanks.