Canada’s unkempt forests setting new environmental standard

[ Canada ] With dead trees helter-skelter on the ground and scrub bush hither and yon, many Canadian forests look as ”messy” as they are. This was once described with disdain by the Finns whose tidy, high-yield forests created wealth and set the standard for forestry-dependent jurisdictions. But now, with thousands of species on the endangered list in Scandinavia , the Finns and others are rejigging their practices and looking to our messy woodlands and Canadian research for better forestry practices. The Triad concept seeks to encourage ”a dynamic forest” and satisfy myriad human interests, said Messier, whose project has garnered the support of industry, government and environmentalists. Between 10 to 20 per cent is subject to intense harvesting. It will yield about 50 to 60 per cent of the wood that would be pulled out of the entire forest under the old regime…Between 60 to 70 per cent of the test forest is subject to ”new forestry practices” that emulate nature. And about 10 per cent of the forest will be off limits to human intervention. Although the Triad zoning strategy has been bandied about in the U.S. for decades, it hadn’t really been applied and studied, Messier said.

News notes are courtesy of Southern Forests Network News Notes
www.southernsustainableforests.org