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Protecting Water Resources Through Forest Management in the Catskill Mountains

Explore the management options and challenges in protecting water resources in the Catskill Mountains of New York. Learn about the connection between forests and water and the importance of diversifying forest structure for resilience. Discover the efforts of the Massachusetts DCR-Division of Water Supply Protection in managing the Boston water supply.

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Protecting Water Resources Through Forest Management in the Catskill Mountains

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  1. Esopus Creek, Catskill Mountains, New York

  2. Protecting Water Resources from and through Forest Management …Again Thom Kyker-Snowman, C.F. Natural Resource Specialist Massachusetts DCR-Division of Water Supply Protection Paul K. Barten, Ph.D. Associate Professor of Forest Resources University of Massachusetts-Amherst One Forest Under Two Flags CIF/SAF 2004 Edmonton, Alberta

  3. Overview • Management options • From the forest to the faucet in Boston • What’s wrong with this forest? • Silviculture to enhance watershed forests • Deer and regeneration • The connections between forests and water • Questions

  4. Management Options • 1. Business as usual • timber production with conservative BMPs [CMPs] • 2. Watershed Forest Management • changing forest structure to enhance vigor and diversity • resistance to and resilience following natural disturbance • water …first, other products and values …second • 3. Do nothing …designate as a ”wilderness” area

  5. Boston’s Water Supply • Boston and 40 communities; 2,500,000 people • Unfiltered supply • DWSP Mandate: …pure water for future generations • Deliver ≥ 250,000,000 gallons/day …in perpetuity • 100,000 acres ~$1 million stumpage, $100 million water The critical first barrier

  6. The Protection Forest: What’s wrong with this picture? • What’s right? Forest…all other land covers degrade water. • But, mature, even-aged overstory • Capacity for nutrient uptake by older forests is limited • Susceptibility to catastrophic wind (‘38 data – 50-70% damage) • lower resistance • Underdeveloped understory and midstory • Slower recovery from disturbance • Lower nutrient assimilation • lower resilience

  7. Hurricane of ‘38 July Regional Forest Disturbances in the New England MA microburst 1988 HWA Ice storm 1998 Gypsy moth

  8. Remember where this forest has been. fast forward 70 to 100 years eliminate Wolves, American chestnut, hemlock? add exotic insects and diseases, invasive plants, and atmospheric deposition brace for new challenges The Harvard Forest Models 1720 1840 1930

  9. Not just young, aggrading forests everywhere… Multiple age classes/layers (The conversion of even-aged stands to uneven-aged structure in Southern NE (Kelty et al. 2003 NJAF)) • Overstory (maturing) • regulates microclimate • seed source • large woody debris • Midstory (aggrading) • assimilates nutrients • accumulates biomass • resistant to wind damage • Regeneration (ready reserve) • least susceptible to disturbance

  10. Increase frequency to decrease amplitude of disturbance • Effect of disturbance …quantity, quality, timing of flow 1635 1788 1815 1938

  11. Diversifying Forest Structure: Finding the Balance 25% removal Source: Satterlund and Adams, 1992. Wildland watershed management.

  12. Regeneration (shoot the deer!) • No hunting access (1936 – 1990) • Controlled hunt (1991 – present)

  13. Div. of Water Supply Protection Forest Management • 80,000 acres under management • 8 field foresters • 8-10 MMBF/year sawtimber, 4,500 cords fuelwood, and 7,000 tons of pulpwood • Stumpage ~$1 million • First public land in North America to be Green Certified

  14. …this all sounds vaguely familiar ~900BC…accurate concept of hydrologic cycle in China ~400BC …Plato’s observations about land degradation 1342 …first “protection forest” established in Switzerland (322 established by 1777) George Perkins Marsh, 1864 …”Man and Nature” “With the disappearance of the forest all is changed.”

  15. Sustainable forestry is [still] the antidote to exploitive logging. Gifford Pinchot, 1903 …”A Primer of Forestry “A forest, large or small, may render its service in many ways. It may reach its highest usefulness by standing as a safeguard against floods, winds, snow slides, moving sands, or especially against the dearth of water in streams.” Raphael Zon, 1911 …”Forests and Water in Light of Scientific Investigation “A national policy which, though considering the direct value of forests as a source of timber, fails to take full account also of their influence upon erosion, the flow of streams, and climate, may easily endanger the well-being of the whole people.”

  16. Hon. Joseph G. Cannon (R-Illinois) (1836-1926) First elected in 1873 Speaker of the House 1903-1911 Weeks Act debate of 1911 “Not one cent for scenery.” of Pres. Theodore Roosevelt: ”He had no more respect for the Constitution than a tomcat has for a marriage license.”

  17. Policy Statement National Association of State Foresters Jackson, Mississippi September 29, 2004 (last Wednesday) “The Connection Between Forests and Water” “Water, in all its uses and permutations, is by far the most valuable commodity that comes from the forest land that we manage, assist others to manage, and/or regulate.”

  18. The Ashokan Reservoir from Slide Mountain, New York

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