Litter raking: From prohibition to restoration
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- Опубліковано 12 тра 2024
- “Litter raking” was once common in many mountain and upland areas where alternative sources of bedding, such as straw, were scarce. This material was used as bedding for livestock in winter, and beech leaves were even used in the Alps to fill mattresses for human use. With the advent of alternative sources, this practice has largely been abandoned. However, the use of litter raking now appears to be very suitable for restoration and maintenance management to conserve the biodiversity of open forests.
Credits:
Manuscript: Norwegian Institute of Bioeconomy Research, Institute of Botany of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Czech University of Life Sciences Prague, Pamadillo
Animation: Pamadillo - www.pamadillo.com/
Intro/ending music: Gregor Quendel www.gregorquendel.com/
Middle music: Andreas Raad / @baltimus9000
Project: ROTATE: Application of traditional knowledge to halt biodiversity loss in woodlands
Funding: Technology Agency of the Czech Republic and Norway Grants 2014-2021
Contact: NIBIO researcher Fride Høistad Schei, fride.schei@nibio.no
References:
1. - (0:25) Cutout: Women gather needles and herbs www.waldwissen.net/de/lernen-...
2. - (0:54) Historic photograph: Litter collecting day in Betlis www.researchgate.net/figure/L...
3. - (0:56) Historic photograph: Extraction of beech leaves www.waldwissen.net/de/lernen-...
4. - (0:58) Historic photograph: Litter collecting day in Betlis www.researchgate.net/figure/L...
5. - (01:00) Cutout: Woman and boy with filled leaf baskets www.waldwissen.net/de/lernen-...
6. - (1:02) Cutout: Lady www.life.com/history/true-gri...
7. - (1:03) Cutout: Sheep cartorum.fr/carte-postale/720...
8. - (01:10) Cutout: Horse and carriage www.alamy.com/harmony-communi...
9. - (01:42) Cutout: Lady and leaves / 1774065544066425111 - Наука та технологія
litter raking also helped with fire prevention and allowed cattle grazing, and the wood grew slower and was higher density and thus quality
Ah thats very Interesting points!
One would think slower grown wood would be stronger, but from the evidence I have read faster grown oak is stronger than slow grown oak, pine also I think. Counterintuitive, but apparently true.
@@anthonybailey7628 I was thinking of yew :) ... slower growth yew has narrower rings, better for bows :)
@@anthonybailey7628 so it looks like you're right, the wood which has porous rings is more fragile if there are more rings the wood is less strong (oak, ash); the opposite is supposedly true for maple where the slow growth wood is stronger
Thanks for the awesome video! Just found this channel and look forward to watching your previous ones!
Many of the trees - oak, chestnut, beech, hazelnut,etc. - provided nuts that would feed wild boar which could be very damaging to cultivated areas. Removing that food source and providing it as bedding for domestic pigs would give the pigs food, bedding and fun as they rooted for treats. That's how we get Jamon Iberico. The very best driest leaves could be used for human mattresses but that would require relatively small amounts of leaves.
Thanks for the video.
There was a phase when I was living in an apartment with two cats, and I decided I didn't want to buy cat litter anymore. I went outside in the woods, and I dug up a bunch of leafy mulch and used it as cat litter. I'm sure the cats were surprised, but they did use it. Obviously, it wasn't as convenient and easy as just buying litter from the grocery store. But I would just go ahead and dump it over the hill into the woods, although I didn't mention this to anybody because I'm sure somebody somewhere would have freaked out about, OMG, animal poop in the WOODS! End of world! These are the same people who would rather put poop into a non-biodegradable plastic bag, and leave the plastic bag sitting there, thinking that a non-biodegradable plastic piece of garbage is LESS bad for the environment than the poop itself, drying out in the open air and then decaying.
Fire does the same thing. Removes litter and debris. Prescribed burns are common in many parts of the U.S.A. In parts where they are banned, litter builds up to the point where a lightning strike causes huge catastrophic forest fires that cause billions of dollars in damage.
I guess the best option would be to rake the leaves on big piles, thus leaving most parts of the ground bare while still keeping the nutrients in the forest.
Generally the leaves should be left around trees, it protects the soil from drying out and the top layer from being sterilized by sunlight. However, the leaves which land away from any tree roots can potentially be raked and used as mulch or fertilizer bulk (as suggested in the video. such leaves will usually be beyond a tree's canopy). That will typically happen around where forests come to an end. Having more "nutrient demanding" plants around the trees is a sign of good soil health, it means there are nutrients in the soil. In reality these plants are sourcing nutrients and using them, releasing them when dead in bioavailable forms above and beneath the soil. The demand of nutrients of these plants results in those nutrients being available later. Pioneer species pop up in raked areas because the lack of leaves converts forest soil into grassland soil. You want to be careful where you choose to do that because forests obviously like having forest soil.
In the US, oak trees are known for getting big and then falling on houses. But an oak tree in a forest environment has a ~900 year life expectancy, without it they seem to fall over in about 1 human lifetime. The growth stage of an undisturbed oak can be 300 years long.
The leaf litter also supports a ton of diverse insect life that in turn supports animal life. There are many species of birds, insects, and plants evolved specifically to thrive in leaf litter of particular types of trees. The trees in turn have evolved to rely on these companion species for balancing the ecological forces in their ecosystems. An oak tree supports over 16,000 species of bugs, plants, and animals. Native growth doesn't have a biodiversity problem, it is the source of biodiversity. A balanced ecosystem is inherently diverse! The long term effects of raking to move more species in would usually to push out many more. Moreover, pollinator decline is not due to forests, it's due to humans leaving virtually no land outside of forests for native growth. Everywhere we have not set aside as a forest or farm is someone's property and we compel eachother to prevent it from living by mowing to keep the area "clean". There's no pollinators because there's nothing to pollinate except for the few crops we grow and the few plants which can survive in human habitat.
Combining forests with grassland/meadow ecosystems could be interesting and productive, but we should probably start with having more of grasslands and meadows that are then semi-forested, not converting forests into hybrids of them which may very well turn out to be a mistake. There's so little forest area left anywhere in the world, we really shouldn't be playing games with what remains.
If these ideas interest you, you should read about permaculture which aims to establish productive semi-native low-maintenance ecosystems that produce loads of food for humans as well.
Those piles would blow around and spread out quite a bit again. And removing nutrients is exactly what allows many small, less competitive species to thrive.
@@rusty6172 Lol, 16 years in, I have yet to achieve the “low maintenance” stage of permaculture…
@@mlindsay527 Then just imagine if you were doing a normal farm where every plant was begging to die every day
@@mlindsay527😂
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