OUR TOWN FORESTER
Alex passed out maps identifying trees, soil, and areas of planned harvest to members of the Walpole Conservation Commission. © Whitney Barrett
In my role as the Town’s forester, I work with the Conservation Commission to plan and then implement thoughtful forest management projects that try to meet as many of the Town’s goals as possible. I start by asking lots of questions of the Conservation Commission and other stakeholders. Then, I try to weave together what I hear with what I see as possible on the ground- this is usually determined by the inventory of the biophysical characteristics of the place, the lingering effects, good and bad, of past management, and my professional judgement and management philosophy. Increasingly, I try to think how a changing climate will impact the woods and what we might do to help forests be adaptive and resilient. Since we clearly don’t know everything, we have to be humble in this effort and pay close attention along the way and change course as needed.
Common Winterberry, also known as Black Alder, Swamp Holly, Fever Bush, Deciduous Winterberry…(Ilex verticillata)
HARVESTING TREES
Harvesting trees from the forests and putting them to good human use is one part of this bigger management effort. It is also often the part that people see and experience the most.
10 year growth increments on a red pine log. Increased growth in the early 1980’s when the forest was thinned can be seen. © Alex Barrett
A PREVIOUS LOGGING
All photos, © Alex Barrett.
From left to right: 1. Signage asking people to stay away until the harvest is complete. 2. Landing set up with the loader and chipper. 3. The feller buncher working. 4. Note the reserve trees in the patch cuts. There is a lot of wood on the ground! White oaks were left for wildlife and seed sourcing. It will be fun to see these trees flourish. 5. Bridge mats are used to armor a smushy area along the haul road. These will be removed after the harvest. 6. A hitch of wood being hauled away. 7. This is what the spacing will largely look like in the irregular shelterwood (red pine) area. Note: The bunches of felled wood have not been picked up yet.
WALPOLE TOWN FORESTS
The Walpole Town Forests represent a wide array of forest types from tupelo swamps, to oak-hemlock forests, and on to areas that the Townspeople planted with productive conifers decades ago, there is something for everyone in these forests. There are also, unfortunately, lots of non-native exotic plants that threaten the forest ecology here as well as non-native insects that threaten individual species like beech, ash, and hemlock. Management, trail building, and logging in these forests has to be keenly aware of these forest health threats as well as the land use history of each forest. And, we have to be clear that we are a part of the bigger, connected forest ecology here.
Done well, logging sustainably harvests an amazing renewable resource from our land and meets human material needs with something that isn’t plastic, concrete, or steel. In some cases, logging also allows us to improve wildlife habitat for species we care about or improve the resilience of a forest to intense storms or pest outbreaks. Done poorly, it can be unsustainably extractive and lead
to degraded forest ecosystems.
PLANS FOR 2025
This year, we are planning a timber harvest in the Fanny Mason Forest along Route 12. This work picks up on a harvest that Forester Peter Rhoades oversaw for the Town over a decade ago. The focus is on regenerating an oak-pine-birch forest. Peter’s work produced a nice group of saplings and left an array of higher quality overstory trees. It is now time to harvest some of the overstory trees, let more light onto the regeneration, and also recruit some new seedlings. The project works adjacent to a nice recreational trail that the Conservation Commission has developed and also creates a long-term, no-harvest reserve area in some impressive pine in the center of the work area.
Photos © France Menk. From left to right: 1. chatting about specifics; 2. Hunting for red oak seedlings amongst the ferns; 3. Ganaderma mushrooms on hemlock; 4. counting tree rings to age black birch regeneration from the most recent harvest; 5. Long View Foresters, Hale Morrell, and Alex Barrett, talk with the Conservation Commission; 6. Alex Barrett points out a proposed haul road that connects the harvest area to the landing; 7. Heading across the old landing site. Walpole Conservation Commission Co-Chair, Peter Palmiotto, and Forester, Alex Barrett, discuss management access.