Treesearch

The rapid assessment of damage caused by natural disasters is essential for planning the appropriate amount of disaster relief funds and public communication. Annual Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) data provided initial estimates of damage to timberland in a timely manner to State leaders during the 2007 Georgia Bay Complex Wildfire in southeast Georgia. FIA plots were selected from within the shape file (a polygon outline of the fire perimeter) of the burn area and processed with the National Information Management System. Forest area and total volume by stumpage products were...

Tools for analyzing data collected by the U.S. Forest Service's Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) program are available in Microsoft Access© format. Databases have been created for every state, except Hawaii, and are available for downloading. EVALIDatorReports is a Visual Basic Application that is stored within each Microsoft Access© database containing FIA data for each state. EVALIDatorReports can generate reports for over 40 different types of estimates including forest area, number of trees, growing-stock volume, growth, removals, and mortality. The code for this Visual Basic...

Kenai National Wildlife Refuge (KENWR) has a legislative mandate "to conserve fish and wildlife populations and habitats in their natural diversity". To improve our understanding of spatial and temporal variation at the landscape level, we are developing the Long Term Ecological Monitoring Program (LTEMP) to assess change in biota on the sample frame used by the USDA Forest Inventory and Analysis program (FIA). Through a formal agreement with the FIA, we completed our baseline inventory of 259 permanent terrestrial plots systematically distributed at 5-km intervals across the 805,000-ha...

The primary purpose of the Kenai National Wildlife Refuge (KENWR) is to "conserve fish and wildlife populations in their natural diversity," where "fish and wildlife" explicitly includes arthropods. To this end, we developed a Long Term Ecological Monitoring Program (LTEMP), a collaborative effort with the USDA Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) Program. In 2004 and 2006, we sweep-netted terrestrial arthropods on 255 100m2 circular plots systematically distributed at 5-km intervals over the 805,000 ha KENWR. These samples yielded 15,136 specimens, which were sorted to families and to...

Fertilization is one of the most critical components of producing high-quality nursery stock. Seedlings rapidly deplete mineral nutrients stored within seeds, and cuttings have limited nutrient reserves. Therefore, to achieve desired growth rates, nursery plants must rely on root uptake of nutrients from the growing medium. Plants require adequate quantities of mineral nutrients in the proper balance for basic physiological processes, such as photosynthesis, and to promote rapid growth and development.Without a good supply of mineral nutrients, growth is slowed and plant vigor reduced....

To promote survival and growth following outplanting, nursery stock must undergo proper hardening. Without proper hardening, plants do not store well over winter and are likely to grow poorly or die on the outplanting site. It is important to understand that native plant nurseries are different from traditional horticultural systems in that native plants must endure an outplanting environment in which little or no aftercare is provided.

Plants are ready for harvest and delivery to clients after they have reached target specifications (see Chapter 2, The Target Plant Concept) and have been properly hardened (see Chapter 12, Hardening). Originally, nursery stock was grown in soil in fields; nursery managers would "lift" those seedlings out of the ground to harvest them. That traditional nursery term is still used today, and we refer to the traditional "lifting window" (usually late autumn to very early spring) as the time period during which plants are at maximum hardiness, most tolerant to stress, and therefore in the best...

The web of life depends on microorganisms, a vast network of small and unseen allies that permeate the soil, water, and air of our planet. For people who work with plants, the greatest interest in microorganisms is in the complex communities that are part of the soil. Beneficial microorganisms are naturally occurring bacteria, fungi, and other microbes that play a crucial role in plant productivity and health.Two types of beneficial microorganisms, mycorrhizal fungi and nitrogen-fixing bacteria , are considered beneficial to plant health. Mycorrhizal fungi and nitrogen-fixing bacteria are...

As any experienced grower knows only too well, nursery management is a continuous process of solving problems. Murphy's Law of "anything that can go wrong, will go wrong" sounds as if it were meant for native plant production. One recurring problem is pests. Nursery managers have traditionally talked about "controlling" a pest. This approach usually involves waiting for an insect or disease to appear and then spraying some toxic chemical on the already dead or dying plants. Instead of a knee-jerk reaction to a specific problem, pest management should be a series of interrelating processes...

This handbook provides an overview of the factors that go into starting and operating a native plant nursery. Management includes all aspects of working with plants in all their phases of growth as described in Chapter 3, Crop Planning and Developing Propagation Protocols. Management also includes working with the community; organizing materials and infrastructure; planning educational activities and outreach; maintenance activities, such as watering and pest management; and much more. Each of these elements will become part of the day-to-day and year-to-year aspects of managing the...