Renewable ?

[sdt7618]

So we all know that wood burning is a great heat source, is carbon neutral( the burning bit! not the cutting etc) but who actually plants trees to renew the ones cut.

Personnally don't have the land, but do ensure( pay to have trees planted ) to ensure that what I burn is replaced.

Oh and did plant a fruit tree for each of my kids on the day they were born! 3 kids 3 trees

just wondering.

 

[pipe76]

renewable vs renewed

renewable is different than renewed.... right? I agree we should plant more tree's, my kids will someday need firewood!! And clean air, and shade etc. etc.

 

[woodguy105]

If wood is cut from a single age forest or comes from selective / thinning programs, the canopy is opened up and sun light can reach the forest floor and start the new growth process (saplings) naturally.

 

[allthegross]

i actually do replant. when i get the garden stuff starting in the spring i plant acorns from the oak trees in pots. I let them get going good and then plant them around the property. I planted 5 last year and plan on doing it again this year. I like to grow alot of stuff for the kids they really enjoy watching things grow and eating from the garden.

 

[sesmith]

Around here (Northeastern US) most firewood cutting is used to improve the forest stand. Cull trees are cut for firewood during forest stand improvement. The better trees are selected for and left for future uses (ie, lumber, wildlife, or just for aesthetic reasons). The good seed trees are also left to reseed the forest, so no replanting is necessary. It's when poor forestry practices are used such as diameter limit cutting (aka, high grading) when harvesting saw logs, that the the forest is negatively effected.

Scott

 

[HUSKYMAN]

My woods replants itself, and mostly I am burning dead standing wood or fallen trees anyways. The only trees I cut for firewood are the ones I removed to clear for my house

 

[Octane]

Theres no need for me to replant. Where I get my firewood from, Mother Nature replants more trees than I could ever cut, split and burn in my entire lifetime.
We are pretty selective about which trees we take. We only cut down trees that are already dead or have recently fallen/been knocked over by storms.

 

[mranum]

Mother nature has a way of taking care of that in most cases. 3 years ago there was about 80 acres near me that was cut taking basically every tree that was larger than 6", today you can't see half way across the piece because of all the new saplings that popped up.

 

[RatchetJaw]

they replant here all the time

I cut up old thinned out reprod for my wood and they always replant when they logg around here usually about 4 years later to give the soils and other plants time to get back in good working order.

 

[AOD]

3 D's

Almost everything I cut up is one of the three D's, Dead, Damaged or Down. A friend of mine does tree work and I get alot of stuff from him, most of which is from hazard or dead trees. Some tree-huggy folks get mad when I tell them I cut up trees, saying how terrible it is, I have to tell them I rarely cut up healthy trees, most everything I cut is going to rot otherwise.

 

[bowtechmadman]

I cut 99% dead and down or dead standing. I do however love trees and have planted 40 spruce trees in my front yard that I grew from saplings...now about 5' tall. Planted 100 saplings oak/maple/black walnut in old horse pasture a year ago. This year I planted 24 fruit trees apple/pear/cherry. Starting to run out of places to plant.
Don't so much plant to replace what I burn...just love trees.

 

[AOD]

Yes trees are your friend. If I had more property I would plant a small forest. I only own 3 trees right now, but my grandmothers property has lots more.

Hey Bowtech, wasn't there a sighting of the Michigan Dogman out by you last year?

 

[cityevader]

I'm no landowner.
I've got almost a half acre in the redwood/oak/madronne Santa Cruz "Mountains".
I've cut down a few trees to improve the sunlight/skyline. I can't keep any of the stumps from regrowing...and I don't need chemicals because the deer keep it all at small bush size.
However, there are many many many many new oaks growing from acorns it's not even funny. And the deer only hit the new growth from the stumps, not the new acorn growth.
So if it's possible to outlast my mortgage, the entire lot will be apocalyptically dark if I don't thin in the future!

 

[abohac]

Ma Nature

I let mother nature do it. I just do the funeral services (take care of her dead trees). She will put a tree in place of the dead one you remove.

 

[sdt7618]

Thanks for all the replies, it great to see so many peeps actuall have an interest here other than cutting trees.

Left to her own device's mother nature will prevail. I am sure I seen or read somewhere that if man dissapeared it would only take her 500 years to pretty much remove any trace of us. With the exception of the hoover dam( built to be as hard as the surrounding bed rock and Mount Rushmore... actual bedrock.

Again thanks for the insight.

Steven

 

[Zodiac45]

It's a good post and a good subject. The problem I see is that most people just say oh well let mother nature take care of it, she does better that I ever can. That seems to be the prevailing attitude and may or may not be true? Like SDT I also plant trees on my property (fruit mostly) and work in the industry where we are required (in some cases) too replant tracts that have been stripped. If done correctly and thinned and culls taken, It's fair too say that the forest takes care of itself.
We just had a situation up here where the landowner wanted a couple of large tracts (larger than the law states) stripped and chipped. He had told the state that he was replanting for the balsam wreath industry. Well we did the logging but he never came through for the replanting and after 2 years had passed, he was taken too court and fined some pretty big bucks. Not sure if he had planned it all along and covered the fine (doubt it) but todays day and age with giant chippers feeding wood fired powerplants it's NOT sustainable without replanting.

 

[fletcher0780]

I'd plant some trees, but there are too many trees in the way of said planting. Every spring I cut back at the edge of my lawn/woods, and every Summer it fills back in. Now, when I lived in Kansas; that's a place that could use some trees planted, not to mention they'd be much easier to plant there as I think rocks are an endangered species in the Midwest.