Forest Management
- stephanieandjosh
- Jan 12, 2017
- 1 min read
The forest here seems a bit disheveled and reminds me of a twenty-something year old with its whole future ahead of it and too many choices to decide wisely or coherently what it will become...
We're not sure what has caused so many of the trees to bend over, and perhaps this is a perfectly natural phenomenon for this region or forests in general, but not being biologists we're not sure what to make of this trait. Some of the trees have become complete archways with their tops buried in the ground, others have unrealistically large branches thrusting skyward for the sun, and in some places many mature trees have all fallen over together. So I am worried about the forest and want to make sure it knows our intention is stewardship and conservation.
Josh is keen to make it accessible for us so that we can harvest recent deadfall for firewood and use open areas for planting shade-favouring edibles. I said we'd need to befriend the forest before we could bring in a chainsaw so we're removing what we can by hand for a while until I feel it can trust us... I want to make sure it is healthy and our activities support its growth and decision-making rather than hindering it.
I had also assumed that we were on some small patch of untouched ancient woodland, and was reminded by my aunt at Christmas that everything in the area would have been burnt to the ground to make way for fields for agricultural production so the forest really is in the young adult stage of its development.
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