Forests in the olden days

[Sedalia Dave]

 

 

 

[Stump Water]

If you're ever in Western NC try to take a day hike in Joyce Kilmer Memorial Forest. It is one of the last remaining old-growth forests in the country.

 

 

 

[watab kid]

those old growth forests were great to hike in , its tuff going in the areas that have been clearcut and replanted here , 

[Warden Callaway]

My dad did timber cutting most of his life. I helped when I was a kid. We got into one patch of virgin timber. About 20 acres on this farm that had been in the same family since the area had been settled in the 1820s.  One old descendant maintained the timber.  He would rake around the trees and burn the forest litter each year.  A little quark, he wore a denim jacket buttoned up to chin and gloves in the summer time. An old man with great big ears. We only cut a few trees that were damaged.  There was no understory trees or brush. Mostly white oak 4' or more in diameter and 80' to first limb.  The old man past away and the people that inherited the property promptly had the giant trees cut. 

[John Kloehr]

Native Americans tended the forests on the east coast, they cut brush, took weak trees for firewood, and even burned out the brush over time. They also moved from place to place as they hunted out game, leaving the area to recover.

 

They also planted crops in clearings and returned later for harvest.

 

Early diaries from the first colonies reflect this. They found beautiful virgin forests. They also found bountiful planted crops which they harvested. What they did not know was that it was not God clearing out the natives from the land, it was Smallpox.

 

The next fall, those same diaries contained questions of what they (the settlers) might have done to fail God. The forests were choking with thorny brambles and when they went got through that to take the next bountiful harvest, there was nothing there for them.

 

On edit: The plains Indians burned out the Aspen forests entirely to have more buffalo. This was a different approach to stewardship of the land. It took many generations to accomplish and likely took place about 10,000 years ago.

 

Both of these are examples of terraforming, In neither case was the forest in a natural state.

Edited February 17 by John Kloehr

[Pat Riot]

My great grand-dad was a wood cutter in the Sahara Forest in Africa. 

[Hardpan Curmudgeon SASS #8967]

And then you have the california approach:  Ignore centuries of forest management wisdom and practice because it's not "natural." 

 

Result...?  Tree densities to the point you cannot walk between them (personal observation), and choking undergrowth resulting in disease, infestation, death of an unimaginable number of those trees, and then - fires.  Over thirteen million acres burned, along with countless individual structures - not to mention entire towns and small cities.  And, of course, the deaths of people and wildlife. 

 

Ignore the professional foresters - obviously, the latte-shlurping denizens of San Francisco and Oakland (where the Sierra Club is headquartered) are much more enlightened.  

 

Way to go, Sackamenna.    

 

 

[Pat Riot]

4 hours ago, Hardpan Curmudgeon SASS #8967 said:

Ignore the professional foresters - obviously, the latte-shlurping denizens of San Francisco and Oakland (where the Sierra Club is headquartered) are much more enlightened.  

 

Way to go, Sackamenna.    

It all got solidified under the Clinton Administration and didn’t leave CA. 
Did you know that the Army personnel at Fort Hunter-Liggett in California could not perform mock tank battles within the fort without getting approval from the civilian run Environmental Office installed on the base? 
The Fed model was based on the maxi dress wearing California model, which is still endangering lives today.