"Silviculture" is the art and science of growing and tending forests. It's an interesting, interrelated, interdependent set of knowledge and processes. When managing and planning the future for a forest stand, the following topics are important silviculture considerations: Stand...
As part of two outdoors site visits, the Forest Stewardship Program lent everyone in the class a good set of basic forester tools to later use on our own land. Already packed into pockets of a fluorescent orange safety vest, the following tools were loaned out:
Google Earth is just plain cool. I am now able to overlay my site map directly into Google Earth via a personalized image overlay. By doing this I can view all of the site locations relative to everything around it and the underlying satellite photo landmarks. More importantly, I can tilt, pan, and...
The detail available from free online satellite imagery is getting progressively more amazing. Google Earth (www.google.com/earth) first raised the bar with its integration of aerial photography onto 3D...
The Forest Stewardship Site Plan is a map of our property that includes both current and future projected forest/usage characteristics. It's one of the more important parts of a Forest Stewardship Plan since it tells a story and includes lots of information at a quick glance. I used Adobe...
Our land has the beginning characteristics of later old growth forest, though technically it may not occur on the site for another 500-1000 years. Forest succession is where a forest goes from post-disturbance bare ground to plants fighting to get higher than everything around...
I started a 10 session course called the Forest Stewardship Coached Planning Program, offered in King County through the Washington State University Extension. We meet every Tuesday evening for up to 3 hours, and there is also a Saturday field trip to local private forested properties for the...
Due to the forest on our property, calculating sun angles is critical data for selecting which trees would potentially need to be cut down for solar energy access and which trees beyond that southerly triangle can live on into the future. I researched how to create a solar path chart for wherever...
We harvested stinging nettles from the land, since the plants are springing up and are at their tender best as young shoots. We later hung them upside down in bunches in our basement, keeping them in a dark, dry location. Nettles have a pretty amazing sting from even the slightest touch. A light...
We walked along the beach of Long Point twice this weekend, once in the evening and once in the morning. It's a great beach along the north pointing, driftwood-strewn land. Because of its unique projection out into the mouth of Penn Cove, it offers unobstructed views east, north,...