Silviculture Terminology

Marcella Windmuller-Campione

1 What is Silviculture? It is the art and science of controlling the establishment, growth, composition, health, and quality of forests and woodlands to meet the diverse needs and values of landowners and society on a sustainable basis. Forest policies and timber market studies

Forest administration General economy Forest law studies Forest history The working economy (incl. forest valuation

Forest management incl. Intermediary forest mensuration

Forest protection (forest Forest utilization (timber health studies) SILVICULTURE extraction, work studies) Technical

Forest yield studies incl. Wildlife Forest Site Biological timber timber mensuration (forest management pathology studies studies biometrics) Basic

Soil science incl. soil Mathematical Zoology Botany Meteorology Fundamental biology statistics

Assmann 1970 3 parts of a silvicultural system

regeneration tending regeneration harvesting Regeneration

Seedlings or saplings existing in a stand; or the act of establishing young trees naturally or artificially. Tending

A collective term for any treatment designed to enhance growth, quality, vigor, and composition of the stand after establishment or regeneration and prior to final harvest. Regeneration harvest

A cutting method by which a new age class is created. Components of a Silvicultural System

Regeneration Natural Artificial (seeding or planting)

Releasing cuts Pruning Tending Thinning Intermediate cuts

Clearcutting method Regeneration Seed-tree method Harvest Shelterwood method Selection method Adapted from Nyland 1983 Regeneration Harvest What are the 3 age categories? How many age classes in each category?

Age class: A distinct aggregation of trees originating from a single natural event or regeneration activity, or a grouping of trees. ADD Citation Rotation and cutting cycle Rotation and cutting cycle

Rotation

Cutting cycle Rotation

In even-aged systems, the period between regeneration establishment and final cutting. Cutting cycle

The planned interval between partial harvests in an uneven-aged stand. Even-age regeneration harvests A cutting method by which a new even- age class is created.

15 Clearcut

http://forestry.sfasu.edu/faculty/stovall/silviculture/index.php/silviculture-textbook-sp-9418 Coppice versus clearcut

Doug Page, USFS/BLM, Bugwood.org Eli Sagor Seed tree Cutting of all trees except for a small number of widely dispersed trees retained for seed production and to produce a new age class in a fully exposed microenvironment. Seed tree

http://forestry.sfasu.edu/faculty/stovall/silviculture/index.php/silviculture-textbook-sp-9418 Shelterwood

The cutting of most trees, leaving those needed to produce sufficient shade to produce a new age class in a moderated microenvironment. Shelterwood

http://forestry.sfasu.edu/faculty/stovall/silviculture/index.php/silviculture-textbook-sp-9418 Uneven-age regeneration harvests Uneven-age regeneration harvests

Group selection

Single tree selection Cutting cycles in uneven-age stands

harvesting regeneration tending Thinning What are the 5 types of thinning? What trees are you taking out in each type of thinning? Types of Thinning

1. Low or thinning from below 2. Crown or thinning from above 3. Selection or diameter-limit thinning 4. Mechanical or geometric thinning 5. Free thinning Low Thinning Removes trees of lower crown position, leaving the larger and more free-to-grow trees more or less evenly spaced over the area. Crown Thinning Removes some of the codominant and dominant trees to favor the best of those classes. Selection Thinning Removes trees larger than a prescribed diameter limit to favor smaller trees of good growth form and conditions. Mechanical Thinning Removes trees within a fixed spacing interval, by rows, or by strips with fixed distances between them. Free Thinning Removes trees using a combination of thinning criteria without regard to crown position. Regeneration

What are the 3 parts of the regeneration triangle? Regeneration triangle

seed supply Types of Regeneration Natural Regeneration The establishment of a plant or a plant age class from natural seeding, sprouting, suckering, or layering. Natural Regeneration Low forest (or coppice): a forest produced from vegetative regeneration.

High forest: a stand of trees, generally produced of seedling origin; normally develops a high, closed canopy. Artificial Regeneration A group or a stand of young trees created by direct seeding, planting seedlings, or cuttings. Adaptive management A dynamic approach to forest management in which the effects of treatments and decisions are continually monitored and used, along with research results, to modify management on a continuing basis to ensure that objectives are being met. Adaptive management

http://www.cmar.csiro.au/research/mse/images/adaptive_cycle.gif Parts of a prescription • Determine goals and objectives  desired future conditions • Evaluate existing stand conditions • Identify the options • Quantify likely outcomes of each option • Drop unsuitable options • Describe the viable alternatives • Aid the landowner in making a decision • Implement the prescription • Evaluate the results Desired Future Conditions Describes what the stand will look like after the management plan is implemented. • trees per acre • relative density • BA per acre • average diameter • stand structure • average height Summary

Silviculture has its own language which is foundational for both theory and implementation. Questions or Comments email: [email protected]