Region Archives: US East

GEORGIA — Amid drought conditions and larger fires, Georgia Forestry Commission Director Johnny Sabo told lawmakers the cost to put out the blazes in south Georgia cost more than half of his annual department budget. “We’re looking about $35 million between these two fires,” Sabo said about the cost of putting out the Pineland Road and Highway 82 fires in south Georgia. “To put that in perspective, my annual budget is $52 million.” Those figures don’t include the costs of helping communities recover from the damage and losses afterward. …Sabo said Georgia has experienced a more active fire season than in previous years, with the number of fires up 88%. It was made more dangerous by drier conditions. …The data from Sabo showed the yearly average acreage of fires was 5.6 acres in previous years. The size of the fires made it so smoke was even visible to residents in the metro Atlanta area.

In fall, hoards of winter ticks latch on to New Hampshire’s moose — sometimes upward of 50,000 per adult animal. Over the course of the winter, the ticks drink their fill of blood, weakening adult moose and sometimes killing calves. …a team of New Hampshire researchers has a new hypothesis: Could the way forests are logged make moose more or less likely to encounter parasites? …Winter ticks are the driving force behind years of decline in Northeastern moose populations. …In recent decades, parasitism of moose by winter ticks has boomed… major driver was a boom in the local moose population… The sheer abundance of hosts helped tick populations in the region reach the high levels they remain at today. …One option is raising hunting quotas to reduce the number of moose… Another line of attack is the use of pesticides. …But there’s another idea … that has not been extensively studied: managing their habitat.

Metairie, LA  – The Southern Forest Products Association (SFPA) today announced that exhibit space is now available for the Forest Products Machinery & Equipment Exposition (EXPO), set for August 18–20, 2027, at the Savannah Convention Center in Savannah, Georgia. Equipment manufacturers, technology providers, and service companies serving the forest products industry can now reserve their place on the show floor. Hosted biennially by SFPA, EXPO is the longest-running tradeshow in the forest products industry, tracing its roots to the 1950 Logging and Sawmill Machinery Exposition in New Orleans. The 2027 event marks the show’s first appearance in Savannah, placing it in the heart of the Southern Pine lumber community while keeping the event accessible and cost-conscious for exhibitors and attendees alike. …Space is assigned using a priority points system for SFPA members and returning exhibiting companies. 

©Wiki

“American elm is a foundation tree species in floodplain forests,” says Leila Wilson, an ecologist with the U.S. Forest Service. “They are facing severe threats from non-native pests and pathogens…” Wilson knows these trees well. Each one comes from a seed she harvested from a tree whose flowers she isolated with little plastic bags, then hand-fertilized using pollen collected in the lab. … “We’re going to be infecting them with the Dutch elm disease fungus,” she says as she drills the first hole. …She and her colleagues will look for survivor trees by rating the lushness of their canopies. …The ones that survive will have their seeds harvested to be used to grow a nursery stock that can be planted as part of floodplain restoration projects around the region.

The history of a forest might be measured by the trunks and branches looming overhead. But for some MSU researchers, a forest’s future lies in what’s growing under their feet. Every summer for nearly three decades, a team led by Ecology, Evolution and Behavior core faculty member Richard Kobe has made its way to Manistee National Forest in northwestern Lower Michigan to look for new trees that have sprouted. At less than a year old, the youngest seedlings growing in the understory aren’t much taller than their toes. But now, the team’s annual counts of 10 common tree species are starting to reveal clues to what the region’s forests might look like in the 20, 40 or 100 years to come. …In a new study published in Global Change Biology Communications, McNichol and Kobe compared years of seedling data collected at 12 sites spread across a 370-square-mile area in Michigan’s Manistee National Forest.

Chris Reeves

When Procter & Gamble adopted an ambitious new pulp and paper pledge in early 2021, it hired a forester to convince suppliers to get on board. Officially, Chris Reeves is director of scientific communications for P&G’s family care business, which makes Charmin toilet paper, Bounty paper towels and Puffs facial tissues. That title downplays his master’s degree in forestry and 12 years of experience managing Kentucky forests, but Reeves spends at least one-third of his time among the trees with land owners or in meetings with the Society of American Foresters and nonprofits with big forestry practices. …In particular, Reeves is responsible for helping suppliers see value in becoming certified by the Forest Stewardship Council …Reeves’ first corporate job was for IKEA, where he was responsible for wood purchasing processes. …“This is a new thing in that world,” said Sarah Billig, president of FSC’s U.S. operation. 

NAPLES, Maine — The New England Forestry Foundation (NEFF) is giving out grants to landowners to help preserve some of Maine’s oldest trees. The organization got $4.3 million from the U.S. Forest Service in 2024 to pay loggers to put off cutting late-successional and old-growth forests, which are typically over 100 years old. The first grant was awarded to Chaplin Logging Inc. in Naples to conserve 23 acres of late-successional forest and improve other parts of their land. This type of forest is rare for southern Maine. The one on the Chaplins’ property has been mostly untouched for likely more than a hundred years. According to Brian Milakovsky, senior forester of NEFF, these trees provide a unique habitat for many important species and they’re good for the atmosphere. …Since these trees are being taken out of production, part of the grant is going toward timber stand improvement, removing undesirable trees in landowners’ other, younger forests.

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BENSON — Elm trees in New England were nearly wiped out by disease more than 50 years ago, but a small number of the majestic trees survived. Now researchers are hoping to restore the trees to the landscape and even limit flood damage in the process. A decade ago workers with the U.S. Forest Service and The Nature Conservancy planted around 5,300 elm trees in a 28-acre orchard in hopes of restoring the once-abundant tree to New England’s landscape. Elm trees suffered a mass die-off in the 1970s… The tree is tied to the region’s history and is integral for future flood resilience, he said. Researchers identified 53 “survivor” elm trees in New England … that survived around outbreaks of Dutch elm disease, said Chris Hansen, a research technician with the University of Vermont. This experiment will test if the trees are truly resistant. 

©VirginiaForestryDept

Longleaf is a crucial part of Virginia’s natural and economic heritage… At the Department of Forestry’s nursery in Sussex County last week, a small group of staff and volunteers formed an assembly line along a large machine, manufacturing longleaf pine seeds. About 200,000 of them, which will eventually be planted throughout southeastern Virginia. The annual “seed sowing” is part of a long-term effort to restore longleaf pines to the region. The iconic species once dominated the Southeast landscape… But longleafs were decimated by years of logging and development. The Longleaf Cooperators of Virginia, a coalition of state agencies, nonprofits and universities, has been working to bring back the trees. “It’s amazing to see those seeds and know some of them could become trees for 400 years,” said Brian van Eerden, director of the Nature Conservancy’s Virginia Pineland Program. “We have the ability to control the fate of the forest.”

The Trump administration is drastically cutting the budget, and reorganizing the U.S. Forest Service, moving its headquarters and research facilities to western states. In Pennsylvania, four research sites are on the chopping block. As forest ecologist Richard Bowden walks through an old growth section of the Allegheny National Forest, he points toward the ground. It’s barren of young trees. “There’s nothing,” said Bowden, a professor of environmental science and sustainability at nearby Allegheny College. “And that’s because of deer.” Deer overpopulated this area, called Heart’s Content, and much of the Allegheny Plateau, for decades; they eat whatever vegetation they can reach. …While the ideas behind this deer management demonstration might seem simple, it’s taken decades of research to understand the problem, and do the work to actually keep the deer population in balance with the forest.