Forest regeneration

I have a lot of large 30inch dbh maples a good number of 12 and larger maples but just a hand full of trees smaller then that. None smaller in diameter then baseball. The canopy is not super dense and a lot of areas will receive full sunlight around noon for a few hours. The ground is littered with sugar maples seedlings all about 3 inches high. Problem is that how it stays year after year after year. You can pull them out of ground easy and they appear like they are just that year old. So what gives

 

I am not a forester, but I would say you need more open space in your crown. There is an old saying in logging, "the more light you get on the forest floor, the faster your trees grow." It is a true statement.

Since you mention having maples, IF you are cutting them, and NOT getting off shoots from the cut stumps, then there is the proof that your crown spacing is too tight. With any other type of wood, I might be inclined to have a different answer, but maple really set out the shoots on stumps, but they need sunlight to do so.

Now if you are not cutting any trees and do not have stumps to go by, keep in mind old growth forest takes a long time to naturally regenerate. I am currently logging an area on our forest that to my knowledge has never been logged. I live in Maine and rock walls here date between 1830 and 1850 and this spot of woods there are none. It is also a considerable distance from any road and requires going through a bog to get there. Only because I bulldozed a deep fill across a stream am I able to log it now. The mineral content in the ground is also an indicator of never been logged, as the iron in the soil soon rusts after it is exposed; something that would not occur if it was tilled or churned by logging or the hooves of animals. In any regard, the trees are just as you say; big in diameter with little regeneration on the ground.

If I was you and you have not harvested, I might at least test bore a tree or two. What I thought would be limitless loads of mat logs and the big pay out I was envisioning has turned into lots of loads of wood going to a few paper mills. I might also contact the state forester for where you live. In Maine they won't write forest management plans and that sort of stuff, but gladly walk through your woodlot and give you great advice. I am a certified logger, have my own prvate forester under contract, am part of the American Tree Farm System and, yet I still have a great working relationship with my state forester...and he is always glad to come out and assist me. Because of him I have made a lot of good decisions because of him. I encourage you to see if one in your area can help you.

 

I have. Few large open canopy areas by road intersections and few trees that I cut that were very large and lightening damage on a few and that was 5 years ago. All there is the same seedlings and ironwood. I keep pulling the iron wood out it gets sickening.

 

Do you have anyIt would help visualizing it.

 

Sounds like my woods. It was high graded many moons ago cutting all the "good" out.

Nothing but 90 perceny maple and beech now. Its also a North facing hill so that means less sun.

Without pics, my guess is you need to get the saw out to open canopy or have a prescribed burn to expose the soil.

 

Pictures will help, but pictures of trees are hard to take because of their size. Taking a picture at ground level gets you a nice picture of the terrain, forest floor and tree diameter, but turning the camera upwards into the crown just shows lots of leafs and doesn't give you an overall picture of what is occurring.

Opening up a crown is actually hard to do and on many fronts; and I will admit that even I have a hard time doing it proper and still suspect this is your issue. That is because just as soon as I start making a decent opening in old growth canopy, I get scared and stop and move on to another area not really fulfilling my mission. I love trees, love logging and want to continue to do this for a long time, and it down right scares me to think about removing so many trees at once and putting big holes in the canopy. This is self defeating because it takes a lot of light, and many hours of sunshine on the forest floor to warm it up. Add in years of slowly decaying leaf litter and you seeds from seed trees land upon leaf matter instead of soil, ultimately dry out, and do not germinate. Eastern hemlock really struggle with germination, but that is a topic unto its own. Where I have done this though; oh my, the regeneration has been amazing. All that logging has not only let daylight into the forest, scarifying the soil has created prime soil for seed to take root and germinate. I suspect that what seedlings you are getting, are only taking root in the decaying leaf matter and not really driving roots where they can get nourishment. Without that they grow small, wither and die.

But trees do not live forever either, and in this regard a forest is like an old country church. The old duffers don't want to change, don't want to give in to the younger generation and let them take over, and so the younger generation no longer thrives. Soon it is a church of only the elderly generation and that is a church without a future. Just as empty churches dot the landscape of our great country, I have seen large swaths of private land be hoarded to the point of being nothing but acres of dead fall after the eve of a great east wind.

 

This is not a very good picture but it shows what I mean by having old growth forest. What a mess...thick as hair on a dogs back and no regeneration.Then regeneration after some logging.

 

I'll get some pictures today if I go out cutting. One of the maple Grove is maple hemlock few basswood and few ash on the very edge near the wet lands. Bad winds few years ago blew down a bunch of birch now I have a 40 acre long path about 150 feet wide of no trees. Got some birch seeds and red maple to plant there before the popples take over. But the maple Grove I'm worried about regenerating is the pure sugar Grove with a few beeches. Cutting the iron wood out now as I feel that's the biggest problem. Lots of little maples bent over trying to poke out in field to get sunlight.

I have quite a few maples that are two that fused together and a few maples that have Burl's and open spots on he bark that will rot but I'd like to have a bit of regeneration starting before I open the canopy up and have nothing take and then my woods be empty and ugly.

To deal with all the iron wood seedlings should I continue pulling or give it a good burn

 

There

 

No popple In that maple Grove the other one there is but it's to thick at the moment to worry about growth I'd have to cut down a lot of hemlock to open up that canopy.

The one pictured has maybe 20 Ironwood's left but boy is there alot of seeds on them and nothing eats them never saw signs of browse on it. But they sure eat my beech down

 

Everything else on the forest floor will also grow faster with more sunlight, which can be a double edged sword. There was a 15 acre section at the west end of the 77 I manage that was logged about 10 years ago. It's mostly overrun with multiflora rose right now, which is choking out all the saplings trying to fill in the gaps. That stuff is like concertina wire. The trees may eventually win out, but they've got a lot of competition for that sun down there near the forest floor.

A good seedling bank is how a forest naturally regenerates. When old trees die and open holes in the canopy, the awaiting saplings already have a well established root system and they're ready to spring into action and take their place. If you're pulling them out, you're uprooting mother nature's plans for regeneration, so what's yours? Before you go trying to make changes, first come up with a plan.

I see some grass growing at your feet there, so I'm thinking light is not a major issue. I only get grass on my forest floor where there is an opening in the canopy. What kinds of trees do you want there in the future? Are the ones there nice enough to leave growing? Personally, I have enough woods where I can just harvest dead or dying or windfallen stuff and have enough firewood for a lifetime. So these are easy decisions for me. I let them grow as long as they can.

 

I want sugar maple in that area. All that seems to grow and regen is iron wood, hophorn beam. Would much rather it be beech but the ironwood is so thick by the beech and edge of forest you can't see where one ends and one begins. If I pull a maple sapling the root system is that of a one year old tree. Not well developed t all. If you dig under the leaves the soil is black and moist and nice and aerated from the worms. I have some oaks in there in a clearing about 20x20 with just one maple sharing it but they arnt very big. Just look like year old ones. I have caged in several maple and red oaks to eliminate possibility or deer browse causing this. I cut 14 cord of dead standing this year. Got maybe that much left but I'd like to get some new trees growing so I can cut the larger trees with flaws down but I don't wanna rid all of the seed producers yet

 

By "ironwood" do you mean blue beech? If so, are you sure on the ID? A couple of my beech in my back yard get so thick with root suckers that Ive given up mowing around them. I'm not really sure what else to do, so that part of the (woods edge) lawn is just going back to nature right now. If they're arranged in a 10-20' radius around the beech, it might be Am. beech - the shape of the leaves are very similar, but blue beech are smaller.

If you want sugar maple there, let them saplings grow! Get rid of the stuff you don't want. The "first wave" trees like poplar can outcompete them early on.

 

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/05/110510161809.htm

In a sweeping study of a huge swath of Michigan's Upper Peninsula, researchers documented that in many places, the sugar maple saplings that should be thriving following harvesting are instead ending up as a deer buffet. This means the hardwood forests are not regenerating.

 

I believe I said earlier post. But it's hophorn beam ironwood

 

Escanaba is 30 miles away so that'll do it. Save a tree kill all the deer. Useless rats that bring the trolls up here