Management Blog

View Larger Map The area highlighted in red is the Alpha management stand in the Waynesboro watershed located in Hamiltonban Township Adams County, Pennsylvania. This area is a wet site below the spillway giving way to an upland oak hickory forest type on the hill side above the reservoir. For the time being the best management option is to do nothing. Since the stream flowing from the reservoir feeds the water treatment plant for the town of Waynesboro any logging in the lower area will increase sediment in the reservoir. Likewise, any logging on the hillside above the reservoir will lead to runoff and possiable erosin which would increase sediments in the water. Also there is not adequate regeneration already present to enable a healthy stand to grow back. Our crew decided that since there is limited to no desirable regeneration present the best option is to remove 30% of the basal area in a 1st stage shelterwood harvest. This will hopefully allow for enough light to reach the forest floor to allow for the stand to start regenerating through natural means. Also, a 30% basal area reduction will increase the amount to stream flow.

Since the area is open to the public any logging haul roads and skid trails will be remarked as hicking trails. Also some trach recepticles will placed around the parking lot to alleviate the litter in the area. The log landing itself will be retired as a permanent opening for wildlife. Some trees, such as service berry, will be planted around the retired landing. 

On April 10, 2008 Dr. Finley from Penn State gave a presentation at Mont Alto about the effects of forestland parcelization, high gradeing and oak regeneration in Pennsylvania. he stated that 2002 was the first time in the past 35 years that the amount of forestland in Pennsylvania decreased. This was due almost entirely to parcelization. However, the amount of volume of timber has increased due too the matureing, even-aged forests in PA.

The issue of high gradeing on private land was a key point of the presentation. According to Penn State 11% of private forest landowners have harvested timber, and most of these harvests were high grades in some sense. Most of these landowners however reported that they were happy with the harvest. Dr. Finley refered to this mentality as "if its green its good" refering to a lack of knowlege of forest ecology and silviculture. Also, only 20% of these timber sales were regulated by certified foresters.

To determine wheather or not a stand is ready to harvest Dr. Finley recomends looking at the following key factors: Species composition, seed source, residual trees, average stand DBH, role of interfearing plants and the impact of deer. For adequate oak regen the recomended number deer is 11 to 18 per square mile. Dr. Finley also uses what he calls the ASID test which is four more questions to consider before makeing a silvicutural decision, they are : is there advanced regen present, seed source, interfering plants, and deer impact. For more information on regenerating the red oak species i found an article published by the University of New Hampshire,  http://extension.unh.edu/forestry/Docs/NRORBS.pdf .

 

The Presenter for the sescion on carbon credits was Paul Roth who is employed by the PA DCNR. Carbon credits are considered a commoity trade item and as of now are only traded by the Chicago Climate Exchange. Units for trade are measured in Carbon Sequestion Units (CSUs) and Carbon Finiancial Index (CFI). CSUs are a measur of tons of carbon sequestered. Recently the pacififc forest trust brokered a deal to sequester 60,000 tons of carbon. The minimum unit that can be traded in the market is 100 tons of sequestered carbon. the main buyers of carbon credits are utility companies and industrial companies. The reason the carbon tading market was developed was to provide a financial incentive for companies to reduce emssions. Government regulation has had the results that was hoped for so this system was devised useing the same blueprint that was used to reduce acid rain in the early 90s.

Even though I have my doubts about the carbon tradeing market, I have been won over by the argueument that it gives business some financial incentive to reduce emmssions and they by sell carbon credits to increase profit margins. I do not feel that government has been very effective at doing anything to fight emmissions and other alternatives need to be looked at.

Carbon Credits are a fairly new trend in forestry. In theroy carbon credits are sopposed to help reduce the amount of carbon emitted by industry. For x number of tons of carbon produced a company can pay for that carbon to be stored in the wood of trees in a managed forest. Supporters of this program say it will help reduce emmissions and stop deforestation. However, opponets point out that carbon credits are essentally a license to pollute and most of the money spent to save the rainforest id often skimed off by corruption in foriegn governments. Also, all carbon tradeing in North America goes through one company, The Chicago Climate Exchange. The leading public spokesmen about climate change and carbon credits is Al Gore. However, Mr. Gore is chairman of a London based carbon tradeing company. This is defineatly a conflict of interest and cast a shadow on the entire carbon credit market.

                                                       The blue line is the property line for my parents farm in York County , PA.
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GIS class waypoint map
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The first stop we made for this lab was at a point where the meeting of the pines Natural Area meets the Penn National development. At this area we discussed how the attitudes of the future residents of the development might have an impact on the management decisions adapted by the Bureau of forestry. One of the things that might drive these choices is an opposition to logging and the log truck traffic and the use of the state forest ground for recreation such as hiking trails. We also discussed how the forest will change over time. Over the years the hardwoods will replace the eastern white pine plantation. Forest health could also be affected by the gypsy moth which has defoliated huge tracts of ground very close by.
The second site we visited was at pond bank. here we looked at a man made pond that has been turned into a recreational area. Here we discussed the possible past land use and the source of water for the pond. The area surrounding the pond looks very similar to the old quarry ground around the Mont Alto campus. Since there is no stream flowing into the pond it must be either spring fed or be a run off collection point.

Forest and agricultural land can sequester carbon in three different ways; they came maintain existing carbon, expanding planted ground can increase the amount of carbon storage and bio- based fuels can be made off the products grown to be used as a substitute for fossil fuels. An example of how effective forests are at sequestering carbon can be seen in the fact that a 90 year old plantation pine stand in the south-east U.S. can sequester up to 100 metric tons of carbon per acre. Forests also off set about 10-20% of fossil fuel emissions world wide. recently companies have been buying and selling amounts of sequestered carbon, theses are known as carbon credits. For more information visit http://www.epa.gov/sequestration/faq.html