National Association of Conservation Districts

National Association of Conservation Districts

NACD's mission is to serve conservation districts by providing national leadership and a unified voice for natural resource conservation.

Forestry Notes

October 2011
Volume XX, Issue 11
| PDF version | Archive of Previous Issues |

  1. Keeping forests a priority
  2. Thousand cankers disease: on the move
  3. NACD supports Farm Bill letter sent to Congress
  4. Forestry Briefs
  5. Conservation Calendar

1. Keeping forests a priority
Districts in several states are assisting the New England/New York Forestry Initiative

Conservation districts are playing an important role in NRCS’ New England/New York Forestry Initiative. Through the Initiative, NRCS has committed to improve forest stewardship and wildlife habitat, and conserve the value of the region’s forest landscape for future generations. The region contains more than 52 million acres of forestland (80 percent privately owned) and includes the largest block of intact temperate broadleaf forest in the country.

“One of the real concerns about the New England forests at this point is that there’s been a lot of fragmentation, so the initial large forest holdings have been broken up into smaller pieces and the ability to provide habitat for some species of concern is at risk,” says Christopher Hartley, NRCS Conservation Initiatives Coordinator for the New England/New York Forestry Initiative. “Similarly, the ability of landowners to manage those smaller pieces economically as working forests is also at risk.”

The Initiative provides a combination of technical and financial assistance to landowners and land managers in Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, Rhode Island and Vermont. Some of the eligible Initiative practices include: forest stand improvement, the restoration of rare and declining habitats, early successional habitat management, riparian forest buffers, erosion control on forest trails and landings, stream habitat improvement and fish passages.

Since the Initiative began two years ago, more than $10 million in targeted funding has been provided to landowners to install practices or develop management plans. In 2010 alone, the Initiative assisted more than 300 landowners and almost 50,000 acres of forestland.

New Hampshire’s Carroll County Conservation District has already helped to coordinate five riparian buffer plantings through the Initiative. Buffers are not an easy sell in a state where there is little agricultural land to spare, but District Manager Joan Richardson says landowners recognize the benefits. “One particular landowner gave up 14 acres to install a 450-foot buffer along a river,” Richardson says. The district enlisted students from a nearby middle school and high school to help plant more than 6,000 shrub and tree species in the 2010 planting.

According to Richardson, the district also has incorporated the birdhouses it sells as a fundraiser in some of its riparian buffer plantings.

Local working groups in each of the seven participating states help determine the Initiative’s grant priorities by sharing information with the state technical advisory committee. Application ranking and screening is also conducted at the state and local levels. “Districts are very involved in the process,” Hartley says. “Districts convene the local workgroup meetings where the discussion takes place.

“And if the district has the technical capacity to do the forestry work, they may be the ones doing it.”

In Maine, districts will soon help organize meetings for projects in the Salmon Falls Watershed, which according to NRCS State Conservationist Juan Hernandez is the most threatened watershed in the region. Adds Hernandez, 100 percent of all forestry activity plans in the watershed will be funded.

Rhode Island’s conservation districts are helping to educate landowners on available forestry incentives. According to Gina DeMarco, district manager for Northern Rhode Island Conservation District, the districts have completed outreach to woodland owners in seven towns. The districts worked with tax assessors to get a mailing list of all landowners with more than 10 acres of land, then mailed each landowner information about NRCS programs, including EQIP and WHIP. In September, the districts held a workshop to explain the benefits of having a forest-management plan.

Says DeMarco, the contract has 18 months remaining, during which time the districts plan to reach landowners in another eight towns.

Moving forward, Hartley believes district involvement will only grow in the Initiative. “Districts are our link to the local community,” he says.

Adds Richardson, “It’s a great Initiative. We’re looking forward to doing many more projects.”

The NE/NY Forestry Initiative is one of 15 NRCS Initiatives, and one of just two ecosystem-based initiatives. It was established following the 2008-09 New England Governors’ Conference, which led to the creation of a task force to identify the most urgent land-conservation issues facing New England. The idea of “Keeping Forests as Forests” was one of five principles identified by the task force.

To learn more about the New England/New York Forestry Initiative, visit the NRCS homepage at http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/wps/portal/nrcs/home. Click on Landscape Initiatives Overview, and select New England/New York Forestry.



2. Thousand cankers disease: on the move

For several years, thousand cankers disease (TCD) was a problem only in western states, where eastern black walnut is common. In July 2010, however, it was discovered in Tennessee, and this summer identifications were made in Virginia and Pennsylvania – suggesting that wherever there is walnut, TCD could soon follow.

In late September, Noel Schneeberger and Manfred Mielke of the U.S. Forest Service Northeastern Area travelled to Knoxville to examine some of the sites where TCD made its first appearance east of the Mississippi River and to confer with scientists at the University of Tennessee, and state forestry and agriculture specialists who are working on the problem.

TCD is the combined forces of the walnut twig beetle and a fungus which produces cankers in the bark of the tree. Those cankers make the tree vulnerable to further beetle infestation. The twig beetles initially attack what Mielke describes as “sausage-sized” branches. Eventually the tree will start to exhibit symptoms in the crown including: “bronzing” of foliage; wilted leaves attached to dead branches; and eventually more extensive dieback leading to tree mortality.

“In its native setting in the Southwest, the twig beetle attacks small twigs as the name suggests – twigs that are stressed by shade or drought. It’s really a secondary, inconsequential insect,” says Mielke, a plant pathologist. “But in eastern black walnut, it tends to attack larger branches. Repeated attacks over time, we think, enable enough fungus to infect the tree, weaken it, and eventually girdle it.”

It’s a slow process, and early on scientists didn’t know where to look for the disease. “Typically pathologists shave through the bark to get into the cambium, which is the actively growing part of the tree. They’d go right past the insect,” Mielke says. “Instead, (we learned) to very carefully shave away some of the outer layers of the bark and expose the beetle within the bark itself.”

Unlike Emerald Ash Borer – often identified three to five years after it infests trees – TCD may take up to 20 years to express symptoms in walnut trees sufficient for identification.

Eastern black walnut was brought to the western United States by pioneers in the mid-1800s. For more than a century it thrived wherever it was planted: such as, along the Platte and Arkansas Rivers; throughout the Front Range; and into California and Oregon. Scientists began to notice decline in the early 1990s and it wasn’t until about 2004 that TCD was identified as the cause.

Mielke and Schneeberger speculate that the sudden appearance of this insect and disease complex may be related to periods of drought conditions in the West. “The fact that it takes so many years for a tree to die suggests that the tree needs to be sufficiently weakened in order for the fungus and beetle to kill it, and drought certainly plays a role in that,” Mielke says.

There is also some debate as to how it spreads. Its movement through the Front Range could be the result of natural dispersal, while Mielke and Schneeberger believe the recent discoveries in eastern states are most likely due to human transport. “Just because we’ve only found it in these three places (in the east) doesn’t mean those are the only places it is. It’s probably in a lot of other states already,” Mielke says. Natural dispersal would limit its movement to possibly a mile or two a year, he adds.

The discovery in Doylestown, Pa. this summer may offer more answers. According to Schneeberger, the Forest Health Program Leader for the Northeastern Area, it was found in a commercial woodworking lot, possibly part of a shipment of walnut sent from California.

Both men agree it’s too early to discuss potential treatment options, although various methods are being explored in different parts of the country.

As is true with any forest pest or disease, a key component to combating the disease is education. In fact, Schneeberger points out that one reason TCD was identified in Tennessee was because a state Division of Forestry employee saw the Forest Service’s TCD Pest Alert and made the connection to a local tree he’d recently observed.

Conservation districts are encouraged to help educate landowners about the disease, and to assist in identification efforts. Suspect trees should be reported to the state department of agriculture or state forester.

To learn more about TCD, visit http://www.fs.fed.us/r8/foresthealth/forestpests/tcd.



3. NACD supports Farm Bill letter sent to Congress

Last month, NACD offered its support for the Forests in the Farm Bill Coalition’s 2012 Farm Bill priorities. NACD is one of 70 organizations listed in a letter that was sent to Congressional leaders.

The Coalition is a diverse group of conservation, forest landowner, industry, academia and community organizations that first came together in preparation for the 2008 Farm Bill.

In its letter to Congress, the Coalition identifies a number of issues threatening America’s private forestlands, including parcelization, invasive species, insects and wildfire. The letter states: “As you may know, the 2008 Farm Bill included significant improvements for forest owners, supporting more forest conservation and agroforestry practices and activities across the country. In the 2012 Farm Bill, we hope to build on the success of the 2008 Farm Bill and make further improvements, while respecting the budget situation.”

The Forests in the Farm Bill Coalition has outlined four priorities for the 2012 Farm Bill: (1) including strong provisions for forests in conservation programs, (2) strengthening forestry outreach, education, research, and inventory programs, (3) combating forest-related invasive species, and (4) improving forest market opportunities.

To read the full letter, visit http://www.nacdnet.org/policy/input/letters/Final_FIFB_Letter_9-19-11.pdf.

4. Forestry Briefs

Budget cuts impact Texas wildfire fighting efforts
The Texas Forest Service has battled record wildfires this summer, with only roughly 70 percent of the budget it had from a year ago, according to officials. "Because so many fires are burning across the state, our resources are spread pretty thin," Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst told reporters in early September. Texas relies primarily on volunteer fire departments to protect rural areas, but also has 330 Forest Service firefighters available for larger fires. That hasn’t been enough. In recent years, the Texas Forest Service has outspent its budget. According to officials, most of the extra money has paid for out-of-state help that can cost up to four times more than comparable in-state resources. As of August 31, the agency spent $182.5 million beyond what the Legislature had originally budgeted, said Robby DeWitt, the Forest Service's associate finance director.

Earthworms a threat to hardwood forests?
Earthworms native to the Great Lakes region were wiped out by the last Ice Age. Europeans brought earthworms back to the region, but those non-native earthworms are now affecting forest ecosystems, according to local ecologists. "The native forest ecosystems in the western Great Lakes region adapted to earthworm-free conditions for 10,000 years or so, since glacial retreat, and all of the ground rules of these forests are based on the premise that there are no earthworms that rapidly consume, mix and decompose organic material," says Cindy Hale, a research associate with the Natural Resources Research Institute at the University of Minnesota in Duluth. "As a result, all of the nutrient dynamics and organic matter recycling dynamics were controlled by fungi and bacteria; so, (there was) a very slow turnover, that resulted in the accumulation of a forest floor." Earthworms cause the rapid incorporation of organic material into the soil, changing its structure, chemistry and nutrient dynamics. When the duff of the forest floor is removed, it impacts the rooting zone for most plants, as well as the habitat of insects, bacteria and fungi. "What's really the biggest negative effect on the plants directly is the removal of their rooting zone,” says Hale. “It can cause mortality of adult plants but, furthermore, it can cause a loss of reproductive potential.” To help educate the public, Hale helped to establish the Great Lakes Worm Watch website, with support from the National Science Foundation. The site hopes to help stop the spread of non-native earthworms and to clear up the common misconception that they're harmless. "Earthworms are just earthworms,” says Hale. “They do what earthworms do, and what they do in agricultural systems, we like, and what they do in these native hardwood forests, we don't like. The reason for that is those two ecosystems are completely different."

Enviva plans second wood pellet facility in North Carolina
Enviva LP, a leading manufacturer of processed biomass fuel in the United States and Europe, announced in August its plans to build a wood pellet manufacturing facility in Northampton County, N.C. The new plant received grant support from the state’s One North Carolina Fund and could be operational as early as October 2012. This will be Enviva’s second wood pellet facility in North Carolina and will bring 62 jobs to the area. The Northampton plant is designed to produce 400,000 metric tons of wood pellets annually. When completed, it will bring Enviva’s production in North Carolina to more than 750,000 metric tons annually. “Worldwide demand for biomass energy continues to increase,” said Enviva Chairman and CEO John Keppler. “Our growing manufacturing footprint in North Carolina, the Southeast U.S. and beyond is a key part of meeting that demand with sustainably manufactured solid-biomass resources. The state’s timber industry has been hard hit by forest-product facility closures in the last decade, but new and emerging opportunities in the renewable energy sector are revitalizing the market.”



5. Conservation Calendar