MFA HOSTS PRO SILVA TOUR
by Bill Botti
One day last spring we had a call from MFA member Claude Rowley,
of Hudson. Claude had attended a European forestry tour a few years
ago sponsored by a group called Pro Silva. Pro Silva is a European
federation of foresters who advocate forest management based on
natural processes. It was founded in 1989 in Slovenia.
Claude’s call was to inquire as to whether MFA would be
interested in hosting a group from Europe who might like to visit
Michigan. I answered that we would, indeed, be interested in hosting
such a visit.
Shortly after my conversation with Claude I received a call from
Si Balch, a forester in Maine, and the United States’ connection to
Pro Silva. Si had a few more details about the trip – it would be in
September. There would be two people coming; both from France. One
is a forester; the other a large forest landowner. They would be
interested in seeing any research areas we have related to the
management of our northern hardwoods.
Michigan has two outstanding research sites that fit the
description perfectly – the Dukes Experimental Forest on the
Hiawatha National Forest, and the silvicultural trials at the Ford
Center owned and operated by Michigan Technological University at
Alberta, about 40 miles south of Houghton. So we began to make plans
to visit Dukes and Alberta in September.
One of our two French guests was Roland Burrus, a retired
businessman whose family owns several thousand acres of forest.
Roland oversees its management working with a forester and others.
Roland speaks very good English and served as an interpreter for the
other French guest, Roland Susse.
Roland Susse is the head of a consulting forestry business. He is
also the president of Association Futaie Irreguliere (AFI), The
Association for Uneven-Aged Forestry (my translation). Both these
gentlemen are active in civic affairs as well as forestry related
organizations.
Rounding out our traveling band was Dean Reid, of St. Ignace.
Dean is a long-time MFA member and member of the Michigan Tree Farm
Committee. He spent many years managing a state forest in Mackinac
County and now works as a consulting forester.
Our first planned activity was to be a barbecue and visit to Nick
Thoney’s Tree Farm near Daggett, about an hour’s drive southwest of
Escanaba. We were to meet Si, Roland and Roland at the airport and
drive them to Nick’s place. Sadly, the plane was an hour late and
the weather was rainy, making it next to impossible to get to
Daggett before dark. A phone call to Nick helped us make the
difficult decision to scrap that part of the trip, so we had a quiet
dinner at the Best Western in Escanaba. MFA board member Bill Cook
joined us for dinner. Bill is the MSU Extension Natural Resource
Agent for the Upper Peninsula.
Sunday morning we met Lauri LaBumbard, a forester on the Munising
District of the Hiawatha National Forest. Lauri is just completing
her training as a silviculturist. She led us to the Dukes
Experimental Forest and gave us a tour of the cutting trials
established there in 1926. Several approaches to tree selection were
demonstrated. First, we looked at diameter-limit cuts, in which all
trees above a certain diameter were removed. We also looked at
stands reduced to different basal area levels. The treatment that
led to the recommendation for northern hardwoods was the removal of
overmature and defective trees, leaving 70 square feet per acre of
basal area. MFA board member Bill Cook and his wife, Betsy, were
with us for the Dukes tour; they brought pasties for lunch, along
with some homemade salsa and local wines.
After leaving the Dukes Forest, we drove up to Baraga with a stop
at Canyon Falls. The fall color was good, but not quite at its best.
Still, Roland and Roland were impressed – they evidently don’t see
the reds and oranges in Europe. We ended the day Sunday in the
company of MFA board member Chris Hohnholt, who welcomed us with a
wonderful steak dinner provided by the School of Forestry and
Natural Resources at Michigan Tech’s Ford Center – on his birthday,
I might add.
Monday morning we returned to the Ford Center for a tour of
Michigan Tech’s cutting trials. Before the cutting trials, however,
we looked at a study of root growth in a sugar maple stand related
to soil temperature and the effects of increased temperature.
Graduate student Mickey Jarvi has set up plots with infra-red
lighting warming the soil by 4 degrees C during the growing season.
This is intended to simulate conditions if global warming should
continue for a century or more. After two years of study, there are
some changes showing up – increased microbial activity in the soil
and increased plant respiration. These effects could be stressful to
the trees, but sugar maple handles those conditions in the southern
part of its range. “It will be interesting to see whether these
maples can adapt and how they will do it,” Jarvi said.
Our tour of the Michigan Tech northern hardwood cutting trials
was led by graduate student Wilfred Previant. This is a study begun
in 1956 on a site harvested 20 years earlier by then-owner Ford
Motor Company. Findings tend to support those of the Dukes trials –
removal of overmature and defective trees is the best way to
maintain stand quality. Studies of tree ages in the Michigan Tech
trials suggest they may not be getting the regeneration of maple
that is needed for true stand sustainability. Thus, the need for
further study.
Michigan is fortunate to have these two research sites where
studies have been going for 85 and 55 years, respectively. These are
good places to visit to dispel any doubts one might have about the
effectiveness of forest management.
After lunch with the students at the Ford Center, we began our
return trip to Escanaba. On the way we stopped at Gwinn, where
Department of Natural Resources foresters Jim Ferris, Kevin
LaBumbard (Lauri’s husband), and Ben Travis led us to a northern
hardwood stand on state forest land where extensive deer browsing
has destroyed all forest reproduction and led to an understory
carpet of Pennsylvania sedge. A lively discussion ensued as we stood
in the rain listening to the recommendations of the French forester
and landowner. Their suggestion was that we should shorten our entry
cycle from the current 15 to 20 years down to 6 or 7 years. That,
they said, would allow less light to penetrate to the ground and
would offer less encouragement to the sedge. How to deal with the
sedge that’s already there is another question.
Monday’s activities ended with a whitefish dinner at the Buck Inn
in Wells, near Escanaba, sponsored by MFA. Bill and Betsy Cook
rejoined the group for dinner. On Tuesday morning Roland, Roland and
Si boarded a plane for Boston. It was a very enjoyable and
enlightening visit; we hope it is the first of many such exchanges.
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