wisconsin forestry center

Foresters often encounter stand trees that have been “degraded” by past land use practices, whether that is destructive cutting, over-grazing, invasive species, insects and disease, or other impactful disturbances.  How do foresters begin to manage these stands in a way that restores productivity and function?  What are some the silviculture techniques to consider in these highly variable forests with mostly low-quality growing stock?  And how do you motivate a landowner to make these long-term investments in the health of their forest?  Today we talk with Tom Hill, a Wisconsin DNR forester who has worked on both public and private forest lands in southern Wisconsin for more than two decades, to find out some approaches he has tried to put these stands on a better track. 

On this episode, we discuss all things oak with Dan Dey, a research forester with the US Forest Service Northern Research Station.  Nationally, Dan is one of the leading voices in conversations surrounding oak.  In particular we delve into what we get wrong about oak regeneration and recruitment and what we could do better to secure a sustainable future for oak.

More information on this episode can be found on our website: https://www.uwsp.edu/cnr-ap/fedi/Pages/Oak_Cheeseheads_DirtForesterToolkit.aspx. 

In this episode we sit down to have a chat (virtually that is) with Jed Meunier, a research scientist with WDNR – Division of Forestry, to discuss how frequent low to moderate intensity fires shaped Wisconsin's mixed conifer forests in ways we never realized and how foresters today can learn lessons from these historic fire-dependent ecosystems to design silvicultural treatments that increase forest resilience.  Our conversation will touch on some of the important findings in Jed's recently published research papers on this subject.

Visit the episode's website for more inforamtion: https://www.uwsp.edu/cnr-ap/fedi/Pages/RedPine_Fire_OhMy.aspx.

When it comes to regenerating a forest in eastern United States, most foresters know that deer browse will often be part of the equation.  But assessing the severity of browse and ultimately its impact on successful recruitment of trees is not always easy.  We continue our conversation with Dustin Bronson, a Research Plant Physiologist with the US Forest Service, Northern Research Station and Casey Menick, Forest Regeneration Program Specialist with Wisconsin DNR, Division of Forestry to learn how good regeneration monitoring can help us answer some of these challenging questions.   

Ensuring forests regenerate well following a harvest is a basic element of sustainable forestry and that is why good monitoring is so important.  In this episode we introduce a new natural regeneration monitoring method and program being implemented in Wisconsin, the Forest Regeneration Metric or FRM.  What is FRM, how can foresters use it effectively, and what do we hope to learn about regeneration success and failure in Wisconsin?