Presentation 2.2: Opportunities Realized Through Interface Forest Management

1. Presentation 2.2:Opportunities Realized Through Interface Forest Management

2. Outline • Introduction • Interface management products • Variety of products besides timber • Timber can pay for further management of the land • Challenges to multi-managing the land • Summary

3. Introduction • Avoid “timber” versus “nontimber” • Income generation is just one of many opportunities available on interface forests • Timber harvesting is compatible with many other forest products and can help pay for management needed to provide these products

4. Multiple objectives • Variety of reasons to manage the land: • Income generation • Fire risk reduction • Amenity resources • Forest health • Wildlife • Water management

5. Alternative forest products • Decorative • Herbal • Medicinal • Edible • Enhance property value

6. Business venture Marketing nontimber forest products website http://www.sfp.forprod.vt.edu/special_fp.htm Poaching Nontimber forest industry

7. Timber and pulp income • Longer rotation ages • Processed timber • Forest certification • Christmas trees • Biomass

8. Property value • Universal technique used to value tree • Increase or decrease based on the trees Aggregating across the South, the total compensation value for residential trees approaches one trillion dollars.

9. Conversion harvests • Increased amenity values on residential property • Facilitate silvicultural management • Aesthetic trees increase property value

10. Tourism income • Hunting leases • ATV trails • Wildlife viewing areas • Eco-tourism • Bed and breakfast lodging • Hiking • Retreats

11. Liability and Marketing • Liability is an issue if people are invited on property • Avoid negligence • Obtain liability insurance • Successful business requires planning • Understand customer • Understand competition • Develop marketing plan

12. Exercise 2.5:Interface Moneymakers

13. Exercise 2.5 Discussion Questions • What resources and information should your agency provide to encourage successful ventures? • What perceptions and constraints are barriers to landowners launching these enterprises? • Marketing and liability concerns are important to any successful business. Do you have examples of landowners that have successfully addressed these concerns?

14. Challenge of managing WUI fire • Common in southern ecosystems • South has most fire starts and acres burned • Objections to interface fire include • concerns about forest aesthetics and forest health • concerns about safety of structures • access and responsibility • negative impacts of smoke on human health and driving safety

15. Firewise solutions • Firewise communities • Large fire breaks (golf courses, farms) • Firewise structures • Nonflammable material, gutters, windows, driveways • Firewise landscaping around structures • Lean, clean, green

16. Firewise plant characteristics • High moisture content • Broad and thick leaves • Low chemical content • Open and loose branching patterns • Deciduousness • Low amounts of dead materials

17. Plants to avoid in defensible space • Saw palmetto • accumulate dead leaves (fronds) • Juniper • resins in leaves and branches • Mountain laurel • dense leaves and branches close to ground

18. Fuel reduction • Mechanical thinning • Herbicides • Prescribed burning • Animal grazing

19. Exercise 2.6:Firewise Conversations

20. Exercise 2.13:Juggling Multiple Objectives

21. Case Study 21:Wildfire Preparedness in Mississippi

22. Case Study 11:Life on the Edge: Interface Issues in Bastrop, Texas

23. Amenity resources • Scenery • Trails • Privacy • Shade Typically the MOST important product of interface forests

24. Scenery sells • Park-like stands with large trees and low ground cover • Low or no downed wood, trash, waste • Open vistas and meadows • Thinning creates depth of view, larger trees • Ephemeral features

25. Naturalness • Value natural appearances • Minimize human intervention • Careful design

26. Picnic, park, and camp • Soil compaction kills older, sensitive trees • Use young, deep rooted trees • Parking lots • should drain away from water source • or have a swale to hold water and allow pollutants to settle

27. Trail creation • Add loops • Create diversity • One-way traffic • Single entry point • Interconnected • Plan skid and logging roads to become trails • Consider use conflicts

28. Trail building considerations • Soils • Trail size • Trail grade • Trail alignment • Streams, lakes and trails

29. Privacy and Shade • Vegetation visual buffers • Vegetation performs poorly as an acoustic buffers • Shade can significantly reduce • temperature (10-15 degrees) • cooling costs (10-80%) • Shade can direct/block cooling breezes

30. Regional amenity • Visual character of a region • Transformation of lands • Visitor perceptions • Recreational activities

31. Practicing visiblestewardship • Public perception • Visual screening • Cues-to-care • Forest management • Environmental impacts • Terminology

32. Cues-to-care • Waste and damage • Neatness • Schedule and duration • Planning and safety • Communication • Re-vegetation • Appearances • Community commitment

33. Screen/hide management • Add visual buffers • Keep aesthetics in mind • Limit downed wood • May create negative perceptions • Communicate with the public

34. Exercise 2.7:Scenery and Trails

35. Exercise 2.7: Discussion Questions • Which suggested aesthetic timber harvesting techniques are most feasible? Why? • Which techniques are least feasible? Why? • Which techniques are least costly? Why? • In addition to laying out skid trails and logging roads with a future trail system in mind, what other work is needed to finish a trail system? • What other techniques exist to increase scenery and trails in the wildland-urban interface?

36. Forest health • Historically narrow in scope • Expansion of definition • Influenced by people • Investment • Environmental safety • Personal opinion and values • Experience is the key

37. Site management • Construction damage • Roots and stems • Toxic chemicals • Tree-friendliness • Species selection • Nursery personnel

38. Insects and diseases • Bark beetle and wood borers • Defoliating insects • Sap-feeding insects • Girdling insects • Canker diseases • Tree decline • Leaf diseases

39. Abiotic factors and invasives • Abiotic factors • Lightning strikes • Drought • Flooding • Invasive plants • Kudzu • Invasive animals • Coyote • Armadillo • Nuisance animals

40. Exercise 2.8:Promoting Forest Health

41. Case Study 1:The Challenge of Controversial Resource Issues: Southern Pine Beetle

42. Wildlife • Approximately 87 million people participate in wildlife-associated activities each year • Approximately $108 billion is spent on these activities per year • Managing for wildlife is a challenge due to • forest fragmentation • development • landowners opinion about wildlife

43. Effects of human expansion “What are the likely effects of expanding human populations, urbanization, and infrastructure on wildlife and their habitats?” • Non-native species threaten the survival of some sensitive wildlife species. • Urban and agricultural land uses have created forest islands. • Disturbed areas facilitate the spread of non-native species.

44. Human-wildlife conflicts • Vectors for disease • Lyme disease • West Nile virus • Car accidents • Property damage • Control strategies • Species diversity

45. Managing nuisance wildlife • Human-wildlife conflicts • Exclusion • Habitat modification • Repellents • Toxic baits and pesticides • Glue boards and traps • Scare tactics

46. Limit amount of lawn Increase vertical layering Leave snags and brush piles Provide water source Plant native vegetation Put up feeders and houses Remove invasive exotics Manage household pets Reduce pesticide use Expand scale of habitat Attracting wildlife

47. Exercise 2.9:Wild Stories

48. Case Study 4:Deer Debate in Hilton Head, South Carolina

49. Effects of urbanization on the water cycle • Forests intercept precipitation. • Approximately 2/3 of incoming precipitation is released back into the atmosphere. • Remaining water recharges the groundwater and contributes to streams. • Forest clearing generates more storm-water runoff, reduces amount of water that soaks into the ground.

50. Strategies to minimize threats • Watershed management plan • Forest protection • Land acquisition • Conservation easements • Reduction of impervious cover • Minimize paved surfaces • Clustering development