Region Archives: US East

Environmental officials want you to start checking your trees for adult Asian longhorned beetles because the invasive beetle starts to emerge this month. Checking for the beetle and the damage it leaves behind is one way you can protect trees and fight an invasive species. Michigan environmental officials are asking residents to take 10 minutes this month to check trees around their homes. Although the beetle has not yet been discovered in Michigan, officials say it’s “crucial we keep an eye out for it.” Discovering early signs of infestation can prevent widespread damage to the state’s forest resources, urban landscapes and maple syrup production. It’s an invasive wood-boring beetle that attacks 12 types of hardwood trees, including maples, elms, horse chestnuts, birches and willows. It doesn’t have any predators or diseases to keep the population down. 

WINNFIELD, Louisiana — Starting this Fall, students at the Huey P. Long Campus of Central Louisiana Technical Community College will have the opportunity to earn an Associate of Applied Science degree in Forest Technology. “Forest technology and timber management are critical components of our local economy,” said Huey P. Long Campus Dean Jeff Johnson. “This new associate degree program will offer our students an opportunity to expand their skills in this vital and growing field.” Initially launched as a technical diploma to meet the growing demand for skilled forest professionals, the Forest Technology Program has achieved tremendous success over the years, explained Forest Technology Instructor Jordan Franks. The program has now received official approval for elevation to an Associate of Applied Science degree. …Local industry partners have applauded the creation of the new program. 

CHARLESTON, West Virginia — The West Virginia Legislature has answered Gov. Jim Justice’s request to flood more money into the Division of Forestry to bolster wildfire fighting. The tragic death of a forester brought attention to issue earlier this year, leading lawmakers to pass the governor’s call to allocate a supplemental appropriation totaling $4 million to protect the state’s forests and wildlife. In April, forester Cody Mullens died while fighting a brushfire. …Chief of staff Brian Abraham worked with the state department of commerce and said when the expected special session focused on corrections took place, money for forestry would be on the agenda. …Under the Tomblin administration, a nearly $2 million budget deficit forced the division to lose more than 40 positions. A lower timber severance tax passed by lawmakers was blamed for the money problems.

In a rare and possibly unprecedented move to ensure that Minnesota complies with federal environmental laws when selling timber on state hunting lands, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) has placed a hold on $22 million in wildlife habitat grant money. …He outlined the demands in a letter he wrote Monday to Department of Natural Resources Commissioner Sarah Strommen. …The letter states that the DNR violated wildlife habitat management grant conditions over an unspecified period by selling logging permits on federally aided lands without first documenting to FWS the wildlife purpose of the logging.   …It was in the summer of 2019 when 28 DNR field employees wrote to Strommen saying that a new logging program — established at the behest of the forest products industry — was hurting wildlife habitat on hunting lands and it was “scientifically dishonest” for the agency to say otherwise. 

PITTSBURG – A loss of logging revenue from the Connecticut Lakes Headwaters Working Forest could be a significant blow to taxpayers in Pittsburg because revenue from those sales made up close to 10 percent of this year’s tax revenue, said one member of the town’s Selectboard. …More than $45 million in state and federal funds along with private donations secured protections for the land 20 years ago when it was sold by International Paper to ensure it would be used in perpetuity for forest products, stay part of the private tax base, provide for recreation and wildlife management rather than being sold for development or as conservation land. The money was spent on an easement which permanently protects it from development and was intended to be forever logged sustainably to help support the local economy and traditions of the Great North Woods.

A mysterious parasitic worm that infests trees has experts concerned about forests along the East Coast. Beech leaf disease was the first detected in Ohio in 2012. How it got to the state is unclear, as is how it rapidly spread as far north as Maine, as far south as Virginia and to parts of all the states in between. It has also been found in Canada. Large numbers of foliar nematodes are the culprit behind the disease, which interferes with chlorophyll production and starves beech trees to death… The parasite, which is invisible to the naked eye, has also become more widespread in European cultivars often used for landscaping. Considered a “foundational species” in northern hardwood forests it provides long-term habitat and sustenance for numerous types of birds, insects and mammals. …There is no known way to control or manage this disease, but research efforts are underway to fight it…

Tropical forests often harbor hundreds of species of trees in a square mile, but scientists often struggle to understand how such a diversity of species can coexist. Researchers at The University of Texas at Austin have provided new insights into the answer by uncovering a key characteristic of the spatial distribution of adult trees. The researchers discovered that adult trees in a Panamanian forest are three times as distant from other adults of the same species as what the proverbial “the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree” would suggest. …The researchers discovered the distance that the trees are from one another is much greater than the distance that seeds typically travel. …The team wondered why there would be so much repulsion (repelling) of the juvenile from its parent tree. They found each tree species is much more negatively affected by its own kind than by other species, probably because species suffer from species-specific enemies.

Spiders are some of the most environmentally friendly pest regulators. Because they actively feed on flies, moths, mosquitoes and roaches, spiders eliminate parasites and many other vectors of disease—protecting both humans and plants from harm. A new University of Maryland-led study published online in the journal Ecology found one simple way to take advantage of this natural ecosystem service: give tree-dwelling spiders a more diverse habitat. “We found that there’s a strong link between the species diversity of tree habitats and the population density of the spiders that live in them,” said Karin Burghardt, senior author of the study and assistant professor of entomology at UMD. “Spiders really like complex habitats, so having a large variety of tree species with different structural features like height, canopy cover and foliage density will help increase spider abundance and also the natural pest regulation they provide.”

When agencies burn Indiana forests, they hope to see oak rise from the ashes. But environmentalists believe the solution for the oak problem is costing the climate, clean water and wildlife. For decades, Hoosier activists have been fighting what they view as improper forest management plans by government agencies like the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) and the Indiana Department of Natural Resources (DNR), even as both agencies and activists claim to be doing what is best for the state’s forests. The latest controversy involves massive clearing projects in the Hoosier National Forest, fueled by a belief that oak and hickory trees … require disturbances like burning or logging in order to regenerate. Local environmental groups like the Indiana Forest Alliance and Heartwood disagree with this idea, arguing the oaks will naturally regenerate if they’re left alone, and maintaining that the proposed projects will do more harm than good.

Environmental advocates Wednesday filed official notice of a pending federal lawsuit against the U.S. Forest Service’s management plan for the Nantahala and Pisgah national forests. T…Since 2014, the federal agency has been working on a 30-year management plan for the future of the land. The forests, which stretch along North Carolina’s western state line and include parts of the Appalachian Trail and Blue Ridge Parkway, drive recreational tourism in the 18 counties they touch. The land is also a key resource for the state’s forestry industry.  Officials with the U.S. Forest Service released a draft management plan last year that generated more than 22,000 objections, a record. The final plan was released in February.  …Environmental groups widely panned the final plan for opening too much of the forest to logging, including 44,000 acres of old-growth forest, while failing to protect the endangered and threatened species that live in it.

The American Forest Foundation is piloting a new program aimed at planting 3,000 acres of loblolly pine trees in Georgia by spring. The Field to Forest program benefits landowners looking to reforest their properties. “If a landowner is interested in transitioning their field into forest land, the American Forest Foundation will pay for them to have that process done,” said Natalie Omundson, director of Product Implementation for the American Forest Foundation. “By working with us, the landowner will receive $30 per acre a year for the duration of their contract with us. The American Forest Foundation is also covering the cost of a forester coming to visit the landowners property and (developing) a planting plan … .” “Loblolly pine trees is a tree species that’s very common in the Southeast,” said Omundson. “It provides habitat for game species like the white-tailed deer, turkey, quail, squirrels and a handful of different bird species.”

As heatwaves intensify and weather patterns swing between periods of heavy precipitation and prolonged drought, New York’s favorable, wildfire-stifling conditions may soon turn. Some argue that the present lack of fire increases the risk of deadly blazes in the future, and that intentional controlled burns are the best preparation. Others find the prospect too destructive, too risky. …Forest managers like Benedict and Raspitha see controlled burns as a useful tool, yet they remain off limits in the Catskills and Adirondacks. Ryan Trapani, Director of Forest Services for the nonprofit Catskill Forest Association, said “I wish we were burning more.” Not all environmentalists agree. …Other states, including California, Florida, Vermont, and Pennsylvania, liberally employ prescribed burns to mitigate the risk of wildfires.

AUSTIN – Effective Sept. 1, 2023, the timber industry will be better protected buying and selling timber in Texas. Due to a rising occurrence of timber theft cases, members of the 88th Texas Legislature passed The Timber Asset Protection Act, to improve and clarify Texas’ forestry bill of sale laws, required documentation for mills and landowners and to apply the same penalties to fraud as has been applicable for unauthorized harvest of timber. Current forestry bill of sale laws have been effective in the past, but …certain legal changes are needed, as well as adjustments to penalties for illegal behavior. The intent of this new legislation is to deter theft by requiring a more transparent timber transaction starting with an accurate bill of sale from the forest to the mill and delivery documentation for pay-as-cut timber sales to the forest landowner within 45 days. 

A team of researchers prove they can edit tree genes to significantly amp up the amount of fiber pulp extracted from trees by 40%, making the pulp industry more efficient and even slashing its greenhouse gas emissions. This genetic breakthrough was built on previous research that identified lignin as a hurdle to plentiful fiber production. …Using machine learning, they mapped out almost 70,000 potential ways they could edit these poplar tree genes to achieve the lignin-reducing and carbohydrate-boosting features they were looking for. This process resulted in 174 new poplar variants, which the researchers then raised in a controlled greenhouse environment. …Certain variants also showed a 228% increase in the ratio of carbohydrates to lignin in the wood, compared to regular poplar trees. This was a hint that the trees would be highly productive in pulping mills too—an idea the researchers wanted to test out.

URBANA, Ill. — Over half of forests in the United States are privately owned, especially in the Eastern part of the country. This can make control of invasive species challenging, as efforts need to be coordinated among many different landowners. A new study from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign looks at how family forest landowners in Maine and New Hampshire approach invasive species management and what factors influence their decisions. “We have mostly public land on the West Coast and privately owned family forestland in the Midwest and the Eastern Seaboard. Private landowners are going to have different preferences, so what will happen when collective action is required to manage invasive species?” asked Shadi Atallah, associate professor in the Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics, part of the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences at Illinois.  There are three main categories of private family forest landowners, Atallah stated.

Colorado has such dire workforce shortages in early childhood education, education, firefighting, law enforcement, construction and forestry that if you want a job in those fields, the state will pay for your college education to get a job. Gov. Jared Polis officially launched the program “Career Advance Colorado” on Tuesday. It will provide tuition, fees and course materials to students on those specific career training paths. “We’re excited to save Coloradans money and train people for good-paying jobs by offering free community college education for in-demand positions at the state’s 19 community and technical colleges,” Polis said. …The goal of the program is to help fill significant shortages in certain areas of the state’s economy. The state currently has two job openings for every available worker. …Starting in August, students may enroll in year-long certificate programs or two-year associate’s degree programs. 

The University of Virginia’s College at Wise, The Nature Conservancy  and the Cumberland Forest Limited Partnership are delighted to share the 2023 award recipients of the Cumberland Forest Community Fund (CFCF). This competitive local grant program is designed to support nature-based economic and community development projects in seven Southwestern Virginia counties: Buchanan, Dickenson, Lee, Russell, Scott, Tazewell and Wise, as well as the City of Norton. Friends of Southwest Virginia, Appalachian Voices, The Town of Cleveland, Clinch River Valley Initiative, The Town of Wise, The Town of Lebanon, The Town of Pennington Gap, Breaks Interstate Park, SWVA Sportsmen and The Town of St. Paul will receive a total of $140,000 from the 2023 CFCF award for projects ranging from an outdoor education area to a solar array installation to a trail network expansion for rock climbing access.

For decades, people have driven past the U.S. Forest Service Northern Research Station laboratory on Highway K without really knowing what research was taking place inside. …Dr. Cynthia West says that research is critical for the years ahead as people deal with more extreme weather patterns, struggles with water resources, and works to clean up man-made pollution. …“So how do we look ahead to the future to anticipate the set of challenges that will face us?” …West is the director of the Northern Research Station and National Forest Products Lab. Her region covers Minnesota to Maine south to Maryland and back west to Missouri. …Recent upgrades were made to the molecular genetics’ laboratory and the ‘wet lab’ for aquatic research. Funding for the upgrades comes from the Great American Outdoor Act passed in 2020.