Timber Prescriptions

1. Timber Prescriptions

2. Recommendations • After measuring trees, determining volumes, grades, and values • What is the future goal of this site? • Based on what is here and what you want to be here in the future, how do you proceed? • More in Silviculture class

3. Prescriptions • No Action – reserved habitat, scenic or old growth • Regeneration Harvest • Even Aged or Two-Aged • Clear Cut • Harvest, Salvage or Sanitation • Seed Tree • Shelterwood • Uneven Aged • Group Selection • Single Tree Selection • Intermediate Harvest – enhance Composition, Growth, or Quality • Thinning, Salvage or Sanitation • Understory Management – release treatments (thin or Herbicide)

4. Clearcutting • Most economical harvest method • Mimics natural disasters • Most potential to damage site • Using BMPs helps reduce damage • Better for genetics than high grading • Unsightly • Politically unpopular • Not well suited to highly complex, multi-tiered ecosystems like the rain forest

5. Clearcutting Types • Complete – includes removal of non-commercial stems • Patch – small tracts within a large forested area harvested creating a mosaic of different even-aged stands • Strip – trees removed in row perpendicular to prevailing wind direction to reduce windthrow • Cut with reserves – leaving certain trees such as snags for wildlife

6. Patch Clearcuts

7. Clearcutting - Then

8. Clearcutting - Now

9. Seed Tree Cut • Best for trees with wind-borne seeds (pines, ash, etc.) • Requires 2 harvest operations thus less economical but saves planting costs if successful (pines again) • Seed trees susceptible to damage (wind, lightning, etc.) • Less ugly and controversial

10. Seed Tree Cut

11. Seed Tree Cut

12. Shelterwood Cut • Helps regenerate more shade tolerant species • Provides protective cover for developing stand • Similar to seed tree but with 3 treatments • 1. Remove about 50% of the overstory (~50 leave trees/acre) • 2. Remove about half of the remaining overstory • 3. Remove the rest of the overstory • Must take care to not damage regeneration during successive treatments • More visually appealing

13. Shelterwood Types • Strip – reduces damage to residual stand • Uniform – spacing of residual trees • Group – residual trees in small groups • Irregular – residual trees left longer than normal • Natural – let the stand dictate the process

14. Shade Tolerance

15. Selection Cut • Removes trees (either singles or groups) leaving an uneven aged stand (generally 3 aged). • More difficult to implement. • Provides more economic returns than other systems. • Protects site better than other systems. • Best for Shade Tolerant species. • Best for sensitive wildlife

16. USFS Regulation Classes • I = Even-aged Management • Clearcutting with or without thinning • Shelterwood with or without thinning • II = Special Conditions • Non-timber objectives = Longer rotations than optimum for timber • III = Marginal Timber Yield • Single tree/tree groups for sanitation, salvage or hazard reduction • Stand maintenance (SMZ or highways) • Regeneration encouragement • Single tree/Group selection