What are these tags?

[slowp]

Just a thought. The tag seems to be next to a wound or possibly a diseased spot. Maybe they are watching its progress if diseased. Might check other tags to see if they are placed similarly on the live trees.
If 3852 is the tag # in sequence, there's a lot of tags out there somewhere. lol OT

When we did inventory plots, tags were placed so they faced the plot center. And yes, there are a heck of a lot of tags, flashers, flagging, paint, etc. out there.

In the PNW, there may even be reflectors on trees. Those were placed on trees to help wildlife folks find their way to owl habitat spots so owl surveys could be done at night.

Much of this work is no longer budgeted for. I suspect that the Forest Inventory work has been contracted out.

 

[Wyoming_Outback]

So i asked the FS about the tags, said they were a permanent way to mark trees so different stuff, like for beetles or how they fall, etc.

 

[RADeHaven]

As some others have mentioned, this is part of continual forest management inventory where the plots are remeasured on periodic basis. The state of the forest is determined from permanent plots of a fixed radius. Growth of trees, recording of trees taken in harvest, death of trees, progression of rot and volume loss are part of determining the health of the forest over time.

Aluminum tags and nails are used to avoid / minimize damage to saws as aluminum is soft and supposedly cuts like wood. I am not so sure that is the case, but aluminum is certainly better than iron.

As mentioned above, tags are to be placed at the DBH point and on the stump below where the felling cut is made. The tag / nail at the DBH point is there so that a remeasure of the tree will take place at the exact same place each time the tree is measured. The tag is the ID for the tree. The stump tag is there in case the tree is harvested. In that case the board food volume of the plot will be reduced by volume of the harvested tree and reflected in the overall growth statistics for the forest.

Interesting problems occur with this activity. Trees push out the nails or wood grows over the tags even when space was left on the nail to allow room for growth. These are supposed to be replaced, but assigning a tag to the tree with the correct ID is not always easy. Imaging the problem when you return to the office and find that the tree you relabeled with an existing ID was for a pine and you recorded the species as a fir because there where just too many lost tags and deciding what number goes with what tree gets confusing when you're out in the woods. Or some goof ball has come into the plot and pulled out all the tags. Also, new young trees get added to the plot as they reach a minimum size. These young trees are easy to miss on re-visits to the plots.
.

 

[vt4ster2]

CFI plot (Continuous forest inventory)

 

[056kid]

When we did inventory plots, tags were placed so they faced the plot center. And yes, there are a heck of a lot of tags, flashers, flagging, paint, etc. out there.

In the PNW, there may even be reflectors on trees. Those were placed on trees to help wildlife folks find their way to owl habitat spots so owl surveys could be done at night.

Much of this work is no longer budgeted for. I suspect that the Forest Inventory work has been contracted out.

Tags mean priority sport falling, right?

 

[RADeHaven]

Hmmm, posted comment 'tags were placed so they faced the plot center.' although this may have been done this way, this his is actually an incorrect way to tag the trees. Tags at the DBH (Diameter at Breast Height) point are ALWAY on the uphill side where a proper measurement is made ( but on flat ground, it seems logical to place them facing the plot center to aid in locating the trees ). DBH in the USA is at 4.5 feet above the ground. Tags on the stump portion are on the tree below what would be a normal felling undercut; this usually means on the most downhill side of the tree.

For further details on DBH refer to 'Forest Mensuration' by Hush, Miller, Beers. Or 'Log Scaling and Timber Cruising' by Dilworth. 'Forest Mensuration' text also has a brief description of the CFI methodology. There is a more recent edition of this text, but the content on this topic, I am sure, has not changed.

 

[slowp]

Hmmm, posted comment 'tags were placed so they faced the plot center.' although this may have been done this way, this his is actually an incorrect way to tag the trees. Tags at the DBH (Diameter at Breast Height) point are ALWAY on the uphill side where a proper measurement is made ( but on flat ground, it seems logical to place them facing the plot center to aid in locating the trees ). DBH in the USA is at 4.5 feet above the ground. Tags on the stump portion are on the tree below what would be a normal felling undercut; this usually means on the most downhill side of the tree.

For further details on DBH refer to 'Forest Mensuration' by Hush, Miller, Beers. Or 'Log Scaling and Timber Cruising' by Dilworth. 'Forest Mensuration' text also has a brief description of the CFI methodology. There is a more recent edition of this text, but the content on this topic, I am sure, has not changed.

Tags were put facing the plot center below stump height a million years ago when I worked at it. We placed an aluminum nail where we took the diameter and on the correct side of the tree (timber cruising rules make it the uphill side). This nail allowed folks ( I'll not call them cruisers) to check our work. At that time, we used a prism and put in ten subplots. I forget how many chains apart the subplots were. It was a big project with a lot of funding at that time. Smokejumpers were even put to work to get into some very isolated spots.

Since the plot method had changed from the previous time, we redid them. I'm sure things have changed since then and a different configuration used.

If you really want a good book on log scaling, which is NOT to be confused with timber cruising, the Idaho Bureau of Log Scaling has always had an excellent manual with color pictures. I believe it is online now and free for the viewing.

 

[slowp]

Tags mean priority sport falling, right?

It's kind of like the timber crew game of Touch That Cow. You touch the cow or calf, which is difficult with range cattle, and the points awarded for this equal the number on the ear tag of said cow or calf. It's a bit trickier than PC baseball. Success was very rare.

We did run into a few cut over areas and we were able to find the tags on the stumps. Areas that had burned up were extremely hard to locate again so we ended up establishing a new plot, with just a few plants and seedlings on the plots. That made for quick work since there were no measurements to be done. Just counting and writing...