at Oregon State University spring199o Spring 1990 n this issue of Focus on Forestry we illustrate the variety of backgrounds, work experiences, and interests that I College of Forestry students bring to our classrooms, laboratories, and student associations. This variety is paralleled by the wealth of opportunities our students enjoy in the Forest engineering student Jeff Wiese educational experiences provided by our curricula. checks pilings under a wooden Forest One of the great things about our College is that we offer four major Service bridge. Story on page 6. undergraduate curricula-forest engineering, forest management, forest products, and forest recreation. But within these majors, we also offer a dual-degree program in forest engineering and civil engineering, over 25 well-planned options for students in forest management and forest recreation, and three areas of professional emphasis for forest products majors. Why all the variety? The reason is that we've tailored our educational program to prepare students to enter a profession with enormous scope and complexity. Forestry has evolved into one of the most complex and exciting natural-resource professions in our country. While this evolution Spring 1990 has forced professionals to specialize more than they used to, it has opened up the profession to people with a broad array of interests and ( Volume 3, No. 2 skills. As you read through this issue of Focus on Forestry, I hope you'll begin to get some idea of the excitement that the profession is experienc­ College of Forestry ing right now. Oregon State Our students are keenly interested in what they are learning, and University they're putting that knowledge to work in summer jobs and in field laboratories on our 14,000-acre research forest. They're also broadening their professional growth and education by taking required College of George W. Brown Forestry courses outside their major departments. Not only does this add Dean variety of subject matter, but it puts students in touch with different points of view from faculty with other professional backgrounds, and Gail Wells students with different professional and educational objectives. For Editor example, forest engineering students take 13 courses with forest manage­ ment students, seven courses with forest recreation students, and seven Postmaster: Send address changes courses with forest products students. This is the beginning of a profes­ to sional life filled with interdisciplinary work and cooperation. For those of our readers who are considering a career in forestry, we College of Forestry hope this issue of Focus on Forestry will encourage you to take the next Oregon State University step. Call us if you have questions. Better yet, come visit the College and talk with an advisor and with our students. The variety you'll read about Peavy Hall 154 in the following pages is just the introduction to a highly rewarding Corvallis, OR 97331-5704 profession and lifestyle-and an opportunity to serve our country's people and the natural-resource systems on which we all depend. Focus on Forestn1 is published three times each year (Fall, Winter, Spring) by the College of Forestry, Oregon State University. Any or all ~~ parts of this publication may be G~eBrown reproduced with credit to the Dean, College of Forestry College of Forestry. Oregon State University

2 Focus on Forestn1 Spring 1990 woods. "I've worked on developing my communication skills," he says, "because I can see myself giving lots of presentations to the public." He hopes to go to work for the state forestry department when he graduates this December. "There are no promises," he says, "but I've gotten my foot in the door for a permanent position."

Tony Dixon's path to a forestry career came by a circuitous route. At 19 he was a second-class machinist's mate in the Navy, two years into a nuclear-propulsion program and headed for four years of sea duty. "I actually had orders to Norfolk, Virginia." Instead, he landed in the naval hospital at Bremerton, Wash., after a motorcycle accident that nearly cost he says. "Composition board- that's went there for one term, and then him his life. He received a medical the general term fo r products like transferred to WOSC (Western discharge and, with his Oregon-born particle board, oriented strand board, Oregon State College) and spent two wife and stepdaughter, moved back chip board, and that kind of thing-I years studying secondary education." to his native North Carolina and think it's the wave of the future. Our But she'd spent summers working went to work as a machinist. "I was large trees are getting scarcer, and at BLM and state parks near her Coos trying to raise a family on $5 an hour, I'm trying to think ahead about how Bay home starting right after gradu­ and I was mad," he says. "Then I got the industry is going to react." ation from Marshfield High School in a job in the post office, and the money Tony appreciates the warmth and 1984. That experience, she realized, started coming in, but I still wasn't support he's found here. "I've quit was really what she was looking for: happy." Even though "everybody college in my head a hw1dred times," "I was getting paid for something I said I was crazy," Tony quit his job he says. "But now, the closer I get to loved to do." and enrolled at the University of the end, the more excited I'm feeling. Following the lead of her older North Carolina as a computer-science "People coming in as freshmen brother, who has an OSU degree in major. should realize that it's not easy. It's a forest management, Connie trans­ "But my wife was homesick," he long road-and it's okay to get ferred here in her junior year. says, in a soft Carolina drawl, "and I depressed about it. But it's best to just "With a forest recreation degree," was still disgusted with life." The pick yourself up and go on." she says, "I can use my educa tion family moved west again, and Tony background and still get out into the transferred to OSU-"still having no forest." She hopes to land a job as a idea I'd ever get into forestry." Connie Wright, a 23-year-old park ranger and interpreter for the Through a veterans' group he got senior in forest recreation, also came BLM or the Forest Service. "These involved with a Forestry Club into forestry through another door­ agencies are beginning to discover firewood-cutting project on the education. "I had a scholarship to the that there's money in tourists, too," McDonald Forest. University of Oregon," she says. "I she says. "The fella running Connie is secretary and fiscal agent the chain saw was in of Xi Sigma Pi, the forestry honorary forest engineering, society. She and some other students and we talked about are organizing a recreation students' forestry all day." association. One item on their That conversation agenda: A trip to Steens Mountain in stayed with Tony. He enrolled in the College of Forestry in the spring of 1988. Today Tony, 29, is Coming in t11roug'1 another door. a senior in forest To11y Dixon (nbove, right) wns n Nnvy products, looking forward to graduat­ 111n11 before co111ing to OSU. Connie ing in December. "I'd Wriglit wns hended for n teaching cnreer. like to go into prod­ Both nre now OSU forestry students. uct quality control,"

4 Focus on Forestn; Spring 1990 Harney County. inserting some of its own DNA into about forestry there-about what a "We have an excellent program the poplar's chromosomes. big subject it is; more than just here at OSU," she says. "Everybody "What I do is alter that bacteriwn cutting down trees." She earned her is so supportive. I'm glad to see more by inserting genes of interest into it, bachelor's at Humboldt State Uni­ students coming in, because the jobs and then allow it to insert these genes versity in Arcata, Calif., and her are out there." into poplar." master's here at OSU. The gene that's being "carried" by Glenn, 34, was raised in Scotch the agrobacterium is the insect-killing Plains, N.J. He earned a bachelor's Valerie Hipkins and Glenn Howe gene from another bacterium, Bacillus at Penn State and a master's at are studying trees at their most fun­ thuringiensis (B. t.). The ultimate goal Michigan State. Both of them damental level. Valerie and Glenn are is to develop insect-resistant trees. anticipate a career in research, doctoral candidates in genetics and Glenn was attracted to the OSU probably at a wuversity but perhaps students of the noted OSU forest College of Forestry by "its reputation, in private industry. geneticist Steven Strauss. of course. And by the sheer size of the "I think it's an exciting time to be Valerie is studying the recombina­ place, the sheer critical mass of it." in forestry," says Valerie. "We've tion of genes-the process by which With its high-caliber faculty, up-to­ been seeing a lot of change, a lot of they break apart and come back date facilities, and tie-ins with the opportunities for studying a range together. "Plants' genes recombine U.S. Forest Service, the college is big of issues-from the social and naturally; it happens all the time," enough to handle the whole range of economic aspects of forestry, right down to the level that includes my work. All these areas are going to make a substantial impact on the future."

Markus Tiling has the economics of forestry much on his mind these days. The 30-year-old forest­ products jw1ior leads another life as an international trader. Markus has a job with Bohemia, Inc., where he

Cutting-edge 1·esearc11. Valerie Hipkins uses n light table to rend the sequence of Douglas-fir ONA. Glenn Ho we inspects poplar seedli11ss that linve been altered through genetic e11gi11 eeri11g. says Valerie. "It's the way they stay forestry education and issues, he resilient to small changes in their en­ says. vironment. Recombination is one "Besides," says Valerie, "it had one reason why, for example, you don't of the earliest forestry molecular­ look exactly like your parents." genetics programs in the country, one Genes occur along a molecule of of the first that ltired faculty ex­ DNA in a particular order. "Some­ pressly for that p urpose. I think it's times the order changes, and some­ very fortunate-for me, certainly, and times the length of the molecule for Oregon State as well- that the changes. I look at how and why these department decided that this was a changes occur." worthwhile area to pursue." Glenn's project deals with improv­ Valerie, 27, is from Fresno, Calif., ing trees through genetic engineer­ where her fa ther worked for the ing. "There are different ways of Weyerhaeuser Co. in wholesale inserting genes into trees," he says. lumber. "I became exposed to for­ "One of them is to use a bacterium estry through my father's work and that is a natural genetic engineer." through numerous trips into the Agrobacterium, as it's called, has been mountains. I also worked for the known for years to cause crown gall Youth Conservation Corps while in disease in poplar trees. It does this by high school. I learned a lot more

Focus on Forestn1 Spring 1990 5 -

is in charge of developing the Euro­ advantage. But we are going to have assistant and a teaching assistant. pean market for the firm's manufac­ to learn to think globally." Leslie was awarded a $3,000-a­ tured wood products-specifically, year Dorothy D. Hoener Memorial its glue-laminated beams. Scholarship for two years as an Bohemia took the young German The hands-n11l way Leslie Powell, Forest Management undergraduate. She also received the on as an intern last summer. Markus' master's candidate, jokes that her $500 Hart Scholarship last fall. familiarity with the territory, his schooling has been "real continuing At 32, Leslie is older than the contacts there, and his gift for think­ Whether planning, planting, or papermaking, forestry students get their education. It's taken me 15 years to average student, and that suits her ing big have paid off for both his education in an agreeable blend of theory and practice catch on to what I want to do." just fine. "This is where I've wanted employer and himself. The talented d aughter of two to be all these years; I just didn't "Europe," he says, "is a very Portland music teachers, Leslie first know it," she says. "It's never too interesting place on this planet right John Tappeiner's silviculture class studied music at age 3. She began late. Most employers are looking for now. So many things are happen­ takes its lab section at the College's performing at 4, studied flute and people who have lived a little." ing-more than I ever expected in my McDonald Research Forest. Students viola, grew up and earned a music­ lifetime." Both the opening of Eastern team up to devise plans for managing education degree, and began teach­ Europe and the forthcoming unifica­ an actual stand on the forest. They'll be ing. "But it wasn't what I wanted. My Tim Truax's education took him tion of Western Europe in 1992, he evaluated on their ability brain felt like Jell-0." In 1983, at 25, from winter to summer in 13 hours. says, will result in "a huge market­ to analyze what's there, she went back to school at Mount Tim, a junior in forest management, much larger than the U.S. in popula­ prescribe for multiple- Hood Community College to study departed for New Zealand just after tion. There are great opportunities use objectives, and make math and science, subjects her music Christmas to spend a year as an their recommendations Leaming by over there, if the energy and will are doing. John education hadn't covered. exchange student at Lincoln Univer­ sufficient. easy to understand and Tappeiner's Always at home in the outdoors, sity, Christchurch, in New Zealand's "It's important for us in the timber practical to carry out. Leslie began volunteering her week­ South Island. industry here not to miss the boat." The students' silvicul­ silviculture ends on the Mount Hood National Markus first visited America in tural prescriptions may students Forest, surveying spawning salmon. 1976 as an exchange student from spring from one of a prescribe She spent the summer of 1985 on the Kiel, a city on the Baltic Sea near number of perspectives, managemen f Kootenai National Forest in Montana, Hamburg. After a year of high school says Tappeiner: "It plans for a helping to enhance habitat for raptor in Seattle, "I knew I was going to be makes a difference real stand birds. This taste of the forestry back." whether you're manag­ of frees. vocation gave her an appetite for He served two years of mandatory ing for both wood and inore. military service in Germany and then wildlife habitat, and it In 1986 she enrolled in the College kept his promise, traveling to Alaska makes a difference of Forestry as a postbaccalaureate in the summer of 1981. He cut trees, whether you're a public student to complete the requirements built himself a log raft, floated down agency, a forest industry firm, or the Today, visiting lecturer Irv Mahugh, for, say, a visit to a grove of giant red­ of a forestry bachelor's degree. She the Yukon River, and wrote a travel owner of nonindustrial private forest facilities engineer on the Wallowa­ woods, or how far they' re willing to book about his experience. The book land." Whitman National Forest, is showing travel for the experience, "can give us sold briskly in Germany. Student teams must present their them how it's done. some clues that we can use in a model plan orally to the professor and to their Under Mahugh's direction, they take to determine what these resources are Next, he and a partner started a Forestry down unde1'. Forest construction firm, building custom classmates, defending their decisions measurements both above the super­ worth," says Johnson. manngemenf junior Tim Truax is log homes. The homes, targeted at with hard data and sound logic. This, structure and beneath it, as well as core Her students will test their learning the luxury market, sold well, and the says their professor, gives them valu­ samples and measurements of internal on some real-world events: This term spending the year in New Zealand. business expanded. The boom able practice in applying classroom moisture of the wood. Then they'll take they are evaluating the costs and continued until 1986, when a down­ c011.cepts to real forest stands. the numbers back to class, run them benefits of the proposed Salt Caves turn in oil prices triggered an eco­ through the appropriate formulas, and diversion project on the Upper Klamath started work on her master's last fall. nomic slump. Undaunted, Markus deliver a verdict on the soundness of thel River. She's in the Forest Service coopera­ and his partner turned to Europe, Two young men in hard hats stand at bridge. tive-education program, too, so she Because it interrupts the sequence landing two lucrative contracts there. either end of a wooden bridge and "There's nobody else in the Univer- J knows there's a job waiting for her of his studies, the exchange year will Both jobs went well, "but it was time stretch a length of tape measure be­ sity," Kramer says, "who teaches this "We can start with a tree trunk and when she finishes school in 1991. delay his graduation by two terms. to do the schooling I'd always tween them. Seven classmates stand by, type of practical engineering experi­ end up with a bleached piece of paper," She hopes to work in the public­ "But it's worth it," says Tim. He is wanted to do," Markus says. frowning thoughtfully. ence." says Chris Bierma1m. The students in relations arena. "I'd like to be a emolled in Lincoln's agricultural­ He emolled at the University of These are students in Brian Kramer's his pulp-and-paper-technology class do liaison between the Forest Service resource program, and will probably Alaska in Fairbanks in 1987 and Forest Engineering 462 class, and just that-they start with wood chips at and the public." also take courses at New Zealand's transferred to OSU in 1988. Though they're studying bridges and other What's a good fishing stream worth? the beginning of the term and end up The energetic Leslie carries a forestry school, 15 miles from Lin­ he had considered other forestry structures. The bridge they are measur­ A nice stretch of white water for rafting? with something that resembles a paper formidable load of extracurricular coln. schools, he says, "I was favorably ing today is a multi-span wood struc­ How about a scenic hiking trail? Stu­ towel at the end. activities. She's co-editor of Hi-Lead, He'll have a chance to spend six impressed with OSU. It has a reputa­ ture built by the Forest Service on Rock dents in Becky Jolmson's class on the OSU's lab has everything a commer­ the forestry students' newsletter, weeks at New Zealand's Forest tion all over the country." Creek, west of Corvallis. The exercise is economics of recreation resources learn cial paper mill has, only on a smaller which doubled its frequency of Research Institute studying radiata The Northwest, he believes, is in a part of a class assignment to inspect the to estimate the value of such intangibles scale. Students learn the processes of publication- from once to twice a pine, a non-native plantation species. good position to take advantage of a bridge for vehicle damage, water in terms of dollars and cents-the better pulping, bleaching, refining, forming of term-under her leadership. She's And for fun, he'll do some bicycle growing global market for manufac­ damage, rot, insect infestation, or to compare them with commod' st •, testing, coloring, coating- past "Forester" -president- of Xi touring during school breaks. tured wood products. "We live in an anything else that might make it resources like timber or mineraL ev 1 thing they'll need for a career in Sigma Pi honorary, which went from "This experience is going to area where we can grow trees, and unsound. How much visitors are willing to pay pulp and paper. a treasury deficit to a surplus while broaden my perspective on forestry," that's going to be our comparative • she was there. She's both a research he says. "Living in Oregon, having a

6 Focus on ForestnJ Spring 1990 Focus on Forestry Spring 1990 7 forester for a father, you get a certain mindset. Forestry is becoming more international, more public-oriented. The more you understand p eople, the better forester you're going to be."

Rick Balfour has done Tim Truax's trip in reverse: He first came to the U.S. as an exchange student from New Zealand. Rick was a practicing forest ranger on the Whakarewarewa Forest Park in his native Rotorua when a change in government in 1987 sparked an agency shakeup that left him- at least temporarily- without a job. He could have re-applied for it, but instead decided to enroll in a three­ year course in parks management. The course was offered at Lincoln University, Christchurch, and that's where Rick came across the exchange program with OSU. He was chosen to come here in 1987, during his first year at Lincoln. Student activities? He studied forest recreation during the week and spent practically every weekend traveling around the Take your pick Northwest. Also that year, he met the young woman who was to become his fiancee. "It was in the back of my Some are just for fun. Others look mind that I wanted to come back," he mighty good on a resume says, "and she was a major incen­ tive." Students here are an active In sum, forestry students have Rick finished the course in New bunch- inside and outside the their pick of extracurricular activities. Zealand in 1988, did some contract classroom. At any moment, depend­ There's a host of opportunities for research involving New Zealand's ing on the weather and the time of students to get involved in projects system of hiking trails, went to year, an OSU forestry student might that are worthwhile, fulfilling, and Europe to hike for a while, and then be found fun. came back to OSU in the fall of 1989. • In earnest conversation with a Many of them are offered through Right now he's a "special under­ graduate of the class of '29 at the Forestry Club. This 75-year-old graduate student." He intends to Fernhopper Day (alumni are called organization is as old as the school begin graduate studies as soon as he "Fernhoppers," for reasons that have itself. Forestry Club students help gets some undergraduate require­ been obscured by time) host Fernhopper Day, the annual ments out of the way. • Planting Chrishnas-tree homecoming event for alumni. His career goal? "I'd like to work seedlings The Forestry Club also organizes as a consultant in recreation planning • Scheduling a harvest operation and sponsors the logging-sports and communication. I'd like to help • Throwing an axe and (if prac­ team. These men and women hone bridge the gap between the public ticed or lucky) hitting the bull's-eye their skills with axes, chain saws, and the agencies controlling public • Racing atop a fallen log with crosscuts, and chokers. Then they land." choker in hand compete at the College's annual Fall Rick knows that with his creden­ • Impressing visiting high-school Frost and Spring Thaw, two Satur­ tials and experience he could have a students with tales of logging-sports days set aside for some picnicking well-paid ranger's job in New Zeal­ exploits and exuberant fun at Cronemiller and. Why is he here instead? • Skinnying out along a springy Lake in McDonald Forest. "Because this is the best possible horizontal flagpole an instant before Another Fall Frost/ Spring Thaw place to do the study I want to do. plunging into the frigid waters of event-open to team members and The people who have contributed to Cronemiller Lake any bystanders brave enough to try the major fund of knowledge on • Listening to visiting profession­ it-is called the Limber Pole. Contest­ recreation management-they're als tell about the state of their art ants clamber cautiously out over right here. I feel privileged to be •Wolfing down pizza at midnight Cronemiller Lake on a pole that's amongst them." while putting the student newspaper, about the diameter of a bowsprit on a • the Hi-Lead, to bed. sailboat, and set at about the same

8 Focus on Forestry Spring 1990 angle. The object is to see how far out Society can attend dinner meetings of prospective students, and have you can go before you fall in-which the Willamette Valley FPRS chapter hosted an open-house information all contestants do, with no exceptions. for half price-$6. At the May FPRS session at Peavy Hall-though both , The Jogging-sports team also meeting each year, graduate forest these events have been snowed out competes with teams from other products s tudents are invited to for the past two years. Northwest forestry schools. This year present their research results to the There's an amrnal study tour, too. the region-wide competition, called professional members. Last spring members took a three-day Conclave, was held in April at Student members also take field trip to Washington's Olympic Penin­ Humboldt State University in Arcata, trips, like last year's visit to Bellfoun­ sula, visiting with owners of small Calif. tain, Oreg., to see a sawmill powered sawmills and Forest Service and other Forestry Club students work on entirely by steam. "It's a good way agency managers to learn about the for students to get both professional issue of timber supply from several and social interaction" with people in perspectives. The tour was sponsored Tree planters and timbei- beasts. the field, says Phil Humphrey, forest­ by the Hoehner scholarship fund, as products faculty member and FPRS is this spring's tour; students will Forest 111n11ageme11t ju11ior Amy McCort student advisor. visit the Weyerhaeuser refores tation (fnr left) plnnts Christ111ns trees. Greg The professional association project on Mount St. Helens and George gives his nil to tlie two-mnn TAPPI (Technical Association of the other points of interest in southwest b11cksnw-the "misery whip." Below, log Pulp and Paper Industry) also has a Washington. birling 011 Cronemiller Lnke. student chapter at OSU. The Pacific New members of Xi Sigma Pi were Northwest chapter of T APPi awards initia ted in January with a ceremony a full in-state tuition scholarship held at the Forestry Club cabin at such fund-raisers as the Timber every year to an OSU s tudent. It also Peavy Arboretum. The program Project, managing the harvest of two sponsors an annual research paper included a potluck supper and a talk acres of McDonald Forest timber in competition for students and indus­ by political writer Russell Sadler. exchange for some of the profits. The try professionals under age 35. Just Hi-Lead, the forestry s tudents' site was harvested last fall and was for fun, the student chapter holds newspaper, is published twice a term. just replanted this spring. Other pizza feeds for its members and It covers all kinds of in-house news money comes from the sale of fire­ sponsors an alumni picnic in the fall. and activities-scholarships and wood cut by students from the Xi Sigma Pi is a na tional honor awards, club activities, job-hunting McDonald Forest. Club funds pay society to w hich both students and strategies and leads, volunteer for, among other things, ski and raft faculty may belong. Its purpose is to opportunities, field trips, and the like. trips for member students. recognize excellence in academic The paper also runs some interes t­ The Society of Am erican Foresters achievement in the field of natural­ ing topical pieces. A recent issue offers a bridge between student and resources management. Membership features the response of a timber professional life in the form of a is by invitation; undergraduate industry spokesman to OSU's re­ student SAF chapter at the College of candidates must have at least a 3.0 cently published report, "Timber for Forestry. The Mary's Peak Chapter, grade-point average and graduate Oregon's Tomorrow: The 1989 Up­ as it's called, operates a six-acre candidates a 3.5 GPA. d ate." A similar statement from the Christmas tree farm at Peavy Arbore­ Xi Sigma Pi members have tradi­ environmental side is scheduled to tum. Student SAF members sold 322 tionally been on duty at the College appear in the next issue. Both authors trees last Christmas. The trees fetched of Forestry table at Beaver Open are College of Forestry graduates. $1,500- all of which will go back into House in February, the University's the tree-farm budget. ("Just like real welcoming event for incoming and life," says Jeannette Williams, student • tree-farm manager.) Students gave away another 200 trees to a charitable organization. They also donated Christmas trees to each College of Forestry department office and to OSU President John Byrne's office. Twelve student members attended the national SAF convention in Spokane last September. Members plan to go to the state convention in May. They also visit local elementary schools during Arbor Week, April 1- 7, and they plan campus activities to commemorate Earth Week, April 15- . 22. Members of the student chapter of the national Forest Products Research

Focus on ForestnJ Spring 1990 9 months after those first classes proved successful, Babb hired Neil Phelps, another OSU graduate (he got contract forestry work. an education master's in 1988) to The She has worked for the Forest expand the program and bring it Service as a project forester and in the completely in-house. Portland regional office. She earned Today the company offers a wide her d egree in enviromnental law at range of educational opportunities Rising Lewis and Clark in 1987, serving as both to its employees and to m em­ student extern and then judicial clerk bers of the community. Adult basic for the U.S. District Court under education, GED certification, techni­ Judge Owen Panner. cal training, management training, Generation Working for the District Court employee personal development, and gave Craig a wide-ranging exposure even a four-year degree program are to the practice of law, and her available. Today's young forester's expertise gave her a spe­ The program has had some far­ forestry graduates enjoy cialty. "All the judges in the district reaching effects. One immediate used me w hen a NEPA (National benefit, says Babb, was the surge in diverse opportunities Environmental Policy Act) case cam e morale, creativity, and competence in up." Today her practice has to do employees who dared to take advan­ "You put a forester in the same almost exclusively with forestry tage of that first room with an attorney," says Barbara issues. "I wouldn't be happy as an literacy class. Craig, "and there's a big language attorney," she says, "if I weren't There were gap." dealing with forestry." five of them in That's not a problem when Craig is the original around, for she speaks both lan­ group, including guages. The one man who Portland attor­ When Mike Babb was hired in was 62 years old. ney is a forester 1986 to create a quality-control "It was damned too (OSU, class of program for Gregory Forest Products' difficult for them '80), and she two veneer plants and one plywood to come for­ finds that her mill, he did what every wise new ward," Babb specialized employee does. He kept his eyes and says. "Who's Babb. He opened background ears open. going to admit the doo r of literacy. comes in very What he saw and heard at the he can't read? handy these days Glendale, Oreg., firm was disconcert­ But I believe we provided a comfort­ as forestry issues ing. able atmosphere here at the plant, become, inevita- "I spent a lot of time on the floor, and we were fortm1ate to have an in­ bly, legal issues Craig. A lawyer observing how things went," says structor who was friendly and sup­ as well. who ca n talk timber. Babb, who earned a forest-products portive." "I can be the master's at OSU in 1985. "Som e jobs The class vastly improved the interpreter," she seemed to take an inordinate amount men's self-confidence. "Before, these says. of time. Or it would take two people guys would sit and not say a word at Craig, 37, is with the Portland law to do a job that should have been team meetings. Now they speak up. firm Stoel, Rives, Boley, Jones & done by one person. They're not afraid to question the Grey. Her expertise helps her clients "So I investigated." The problem, way things have always been done." bridge the gap between the remote Babb fow1d, was not incompetence, For that, they can thank one abstractions of the law and the imme­ carelessness, or willful misconduct. It person with a sharp eye, a good idea, diate and practical problems of was illiteracy. Some of the workers and the commitment to act. What forestry on the ground. "You can simply could not read, write, or count prompted Mike Babb- who's now research the law, and it's spelled out well enough to do their jobs effi­ been promoted to veneer-plant for you," she says. "But it's the ciently. manager-to take that first step? factual application and analysis of the Babb took the problem to the "Well, I'll tell you," he says. "I sit up situation at hand that brings the law company's owner, Bill Gregory, and here in my office, and I see the men to life. That's what's pertinent, and suggested bringing some basic educa­ dow n there on the floor. And the only that's what I do all the time. tion right into the mill. Gregory gave reason I'm up here and they're down "I often feel like I'm practicing him the go-ahead. Babb got in touch there is that I have an education. That forestry more than I'm practicing with Umpqua Community College in is the only thing that separates us." law." Roseburg and arranged for an adult Craig has solid credentials for basic education class and some both. Before earning her forest­ technical instruction, to be offered in After Bob Wagner earned a management degree, she was a a makeshift classroom in the purchas­ bachelor's in forest management from member and officer of Hoedads, Inc., ing department. Utah State University and a master's a cooperative in Eugene that does That was in the fall of 1986. Six in forest ecology from the University

10 Focus on Forestrt; Spring 1990 of Washington, he thought his school as vegetation-management specialist management doctorate in 1989, was days were over. for the province's Ministry of Natural attracted to the program's interdisci­ Then he went to work as a re­ Resources. plinary possibilities. '1t was forestry search assistant in 1981 for the Among his objectives there will be in the broad sense," he says. '°' )fledgling CRAFTS research coopera­ to fashion a research cooperative Today Rasker is a resource econo­ tive here at OSU. The CRAFfS similar to CRAFTS. His experience mist for The Wilderness Society in program-Coordinated Research on with this model of public-private Bozeman, Mont. H e's working on a Alternative Forestry Treah11ents and cooperation-virtually unknown in two-year study of the economics of Systems-was Canada-was one reason he got the the communities that surround the formed to job, he says. Yellowstone ecosystem-the complex address some of "Cooperatives are an outstanding of public lands belonging to Yellow­ the problems of way to do forestry research. As a tool stone and Grand Teton National vegetation for technology transfer and continu­ Parks and seven contiguous national management in ing education, they're unma tched. forests. Northwest "The beauty of such research," Historically these communities forests. Wagner says Wagner, "is not only that it have depended heavily on extractive found himself provides useful tools for forest industries like mining and logging. doing cutting­ managers, but that it forces us to Lately, however, other elements of edge research on assemble what we know, and fashion the economy have been expanding. how competition it into a working hypothesis about For example? ''There are a lot of from hard- Wagner. Doctorate how these systems operate." 'footloose' industries around today hi111 woods, shrubs, took to Canndn . that do business via phone, modem, and herbaceous or satellite. These firms can locate weeds gets in anywhere they want to, but they the way of successful reforestation. Ray Rasker was in his junior year choose to locate here. "One thing led to another," he at the University of Washington, "The question is, are our public says, "and I ended up back in studying wildlife biology, when it land-management policies too school." Smiling, he adds, "Work and occmred to him that "no matter how heavily weighted toward the extrac­ a Ph.D. program were more than I good a biologist you are, land­ tive industries, and what is the bargained for. But I kept chipping management decisions are often opportunity cost of managing this away at it." economic decisions"-pa rticularly on way? Are we losing some opportuni­ It was a long and sometimes private land. ties when we, say, clear-cut the side ) difficult road for Wagner, but one "That," he says, "was when I of a mountain? In our study, we hope ,, that brought him to an agreeable realized that one of the most valuable to offer some transition strategies that destination. Last December, a week tools for wildlife managers is a are consistent with the long-term after he turned in the final draft of his knowledge of economics and how well-being of both the economy and doctoral dissertation, he departed for inarkets work." the ecosystem." Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, to take a job Rasker, who earned a forest •

vigorous stands of Douglas-fir, shows detail. Help the land forth the fruits of Mealey's intensive Because of management. "It's a pretty piece of his meticulous land," he allows, with characteristic work, Mealey grow trees, understatement. is getting good Mealey, 77, was honored last fast growth. says year's top November as Oregon Tree Farmer of He put in his the Year. The award was presented first seedlings tree farmer by the Society of American Foresters, in 1980, and the World Forestry Center, and the today some of Portland Chamber of Commerce. It's them are 18 When Bob Mealey, '36, bought his part of the nationwide American Tree feet tall. M ealey. No first 110 acres of timberland back in Farm Program promoting effective "Growth on exc11se for brns/1. 1947-48, the land was "a mess," he private tree farming. growth," he says. There's no excuse, in Mealey's says. "You "There were no reforestation mind, for good timberland to be can't make that requirements in those days, and no covered with brush and ferns. "If the kind of interest in a bank." slash disposal requirements," he land wants to grow trees, and does Mealey devotes much time to explains, "and, too often, the attitude grow trees, then you ought to help it forestry-related volunteer work. was 'cut out and get out.' The land grow trees," he says. He's active in Oregon Small , had just been logged and left." Today, his 580 acres are a model of Woodlands Association, SAF, and Today the Linn County acreage, careful planning, intensive College of Forestry affairs, and covered with young, fragrant, and management, and loving attention to many other organizations. •

Focus on Forestry Spring 1990 11 Michigan. He was one of the first group of students from behind the Weed ecologist Iron Curtain permitted to study in America. honored as lecturer Polensek earned his master's Steven R. Radosevich, professor of degree in 1968 and his Ph.D. in civil forest science, delivered the third engineering in 1972, both from OSU. annual David W. Staniforth Lecture He was a faculty member and late last year at Iowa State University research engineer in the College of at A1nes. "It's a nice honor" to be Forestry for the past 24 years. asked to deliver the lecture, says During 1985-86 he was a Fulbright Radosevich, an authority on weed Scholar to Yugoslavia. He received ecology and the director of the OSU the George G. Marra Award of research cooperative CRAFTS. Excellence from the Society for Wood In his lecture, titled "Weeds, Science and Technology in 1988. He Crops, Competition, and Herbicides: was twice honored with the Mark­ A Modern-Day Neckriddle," Ra­ wardt Wood Engineering Research dosevich discusses the larger social Award from the Forest Products and economic implications of manag­ Research Society, in 1972 and 1977. ing the ecology to produce goods for Polensek was known for h.is human beings. "We as scientists are Anton "Tony" Polensek mastery of wood structural theory currently in a debate with society," he and his original approaches to says. "For the past 30 years we have engineering problems. "He worked a been developing the technology. FP professor Anton lot with three-dimensional problems, Now we are being asked significant with major structural components questions by society, in the form of Polensek dies such as roofs, floors, and walls made environmental impact statements, up of wood products," says Bob pesticide regulations, and outright Anton "Tony" Polensek, professor Ethington, chairman of the forest confrontation." of forest products, died of cancer on products department at the College Such questions constitute a "neck­ January 5. He was 53. of Forestry. "He tended to work on riddle" -after the medieval practice Polensek was born in Ljubljana­ the forefront of extending engineer­ of confining visiting minstrels in the Sentvid, Yugoslavia. In 1962 he ing concepts." His many publications stocks if they couldn't answer a earned a degree in civil engineering are acknowledged to be a significant riddle put to them by village elders. from the University of Ljubljana and contribution to the literature. "It's a question you have to answer to came to the United States to do save your neck," says Radosevich. graduate work at the University of • •

College of Forestry Non·Prolit Org. Oregon State University U.S. Postage PAID Peavy Hall 154 Corvallis. OR 97331 Corvallis, OR 97331-5704 Permit No. 200

12 Focus on Forestrtj Spring 1990