My neighbor mows his 2 acres with a bagger. I mulch instead. His pasture looks like a vacant lot in Detroit....mine looks like a pasture. Turns out, when you work very very hard to remove all the nutrients from an ecosystem, nothing grows in its place.
If you want flowers, it is beneficial to remove the clippings to make the soil poor in nutrients, less competition from grasses for the herbs. There need to be seeds though...
For a number of reasons I haven't baled the hay in my fields and let the material return to the soil. I do try to remove the encroaching brush. It's been over 20 years since the last harvest. There is an excess of hay production locally. Similarly I leave all the wood falls in my forest to return to the soil. I'm a bit too old to try to put up firewood. I hope this leaves a richer land for my family.
Mr.Wilson you are a genius. I cannot wait to explain this to my wife. I can see a lot less grass mowing, leaf mulching, even snow shoveling in my future. “ honey, by piling up the snow in un natural piles, it could greatly effect the local ecosystem “ Brilliant!
The great part is that it's actually true. Leaves are best left on the grass. They are future plant and animal food. Same goes for twigs and logs. If you constantly remove all the leaves from your yard and send it to the landfill, you are depleting the nutrients in your soil. It probably won't affect you, but when everyone is doing it future generations will not be happy
"Bio-dens"-- taking the larger logs for a base and stacking smaller on top, Lincoln log style -- are a great way to use up woody debris. Throw the slash on top and "Viola!" (as Wilson says) one has built some critter habitat, which will last for years. A thousand "thumbs-up" for leaving the big, standing snag for the birds! Well done, sir. Cheers! From your bio-den building neighbor in Linn County.
You and your overpaid oath-breaking order followers are the problem. Keep extorting Americans on frivolity hypocrite. Union cronies that serve the beast corporation will be held accountable. Woke ideology pushers, like you have destroyed Americas food supplies watersheds and forest through neglygents, greed and power trippin egos. Americas forest are joke and your precious bureaucracies have run amuck with pride in sexual debauchery. Your agencies are worthless and have done nothing but show extreme incompetence.
You and your agencies approve of citizens getting their insurance dropped. Americas forests look like tinderboxes of death and disease, because they are. Invasive vermin is the only wildlife your agencies protect, bet you're happy about California and all the other fires and floods that destroyed homes and livelihoods across America. Cant see the writing on the wall A, pride is real blinder.
I leave 30% of my felled volume in the woods. Some I cut to make habitat (for bugs), the rest just gets laid down flat where they lay. It adds soil depth, and improves both the ecology and capacity of the soil to support better trees.
Couple more reasons (not that you need more): others have mentioned water and soil, and I will add that woody debris is a moisture sink, releasing its moisture as the soil dries out and hanging on to it when it's rainy. Also: as a nursery for regeneration. A couple years ago, a forester suggested I make low piles of slash surrounding the seedlings & saplings I want to keep, to prevent deer browse and rubbing. Works like a charm. Thanks for another great video.
I used some slash to lean against trees I planted to prevent the Bucks from trashing their bark. Bucks tend to pick trees that don't have debris around them to rub. It worked well...
@@michaelgroves3460 That is a actual forestry technique in Europe where deer would otherwise make growing oak and other hardwood forests very hard. They'll rub and eat the bark off anything you are trying to grow.
The property I just bought has a few big dead fir in one area that would be hard to get to for firewood. We noticed this summer that the acorn woodpeckers were stashing their nuts in those trees. Watched them go after the squirrel who was trying to steal them. We can now leave them without feeling bad about leaving dead standing trees.😊
Good, eye-opening thoughts! Thank you. I would offer one additional thought for a reason (in balance) to harvest some of the trees...to give away to the poor, handicapped and elderly. I don't see people talk about this nearly enough, yet it is just basic neighborliness. We don't need to always sell the wood on our land. It's okay, and very loving to meet the needs that others have. My comment though does not take away from the great insight and appeal of this video!
In Louisiana it’s recommended that bottomland loggers leave tops and what have you on the ground for natural brows growth for wildlife. The deer population in those areas double in 5 years or less. Fun show like always, Mr. Wilson.
A little over 2 years into my adventure of being a forest owner I figured out I HAD to "Let it go" There's simply not enough TIME to accomplish all the big stuff if you are continuously spending time on the little stuff.
I agreeI, good show. keep it natural where you can. I have a 300' defensive space around my home. My trees are larger 18" to 30" at the butt. Spaced about 8' to 16' abart. Trimmed up 20'. Beyond that it gradually turns into thick natural fall. Some places you can't enter very easily. Very beneficial for deer and turkey nesting. I did fence about 3 acres around the house to keep my dogs in. Thanks for telling it like it is.
When we're doing "maintenance" cutting the main goal is ground contact, keep it moist by touching the ground and it'll rot away. Feeding the forest floor.
I am from the southwest desert but now live on wooded land. Your videos always leave me with a new idea or prospective. As somebody new to that environment, it’s very helpful. A lot of the woods here in Ohio is high graded and otherwise left un managed, I wish more people had the respect and understanding of their land that you do.
Well said, when you feel the urge, I would like to know your story. Your work in I suspect, wildland fire fighting? Sericulture, Forestry and logging. I too have some knowledge, but I bet yours comes not only from life experience but past work history. Maybe I'm wrong but I think it would be interesting to hear more of your woodland background. Great insights as always, JeffinMaine
The way you said lengths, sounded just fine to me... the string of words you had wrapped around each other like pretzels, still sounds way more coherent than someone we all know... Allowing the fallen trees to rot and return to nature is a perfectly good thing... take what you need and let nature have the rest. 👍👍
Once I get my Summer Camp old growth forest under control, I'll leave a couple of wildlife slash piles in an area thats treeless and mostly mineral soil and rocks. That should help critters, and erosion.
I totally give you the credit to clean up the slash and wood that is too far gone. I set up the pile, cover with a piece of plastic. I burn when it is raining. I don’t worry about setting the woods on fire. Thanks a bunch.
This is a beneficial video, not many people realise that it’s good to leave a little wood behind as it’s beneficial for the ecosystem as a whole. There’s a balance that can be found between management and wild areas.
HI Wilson, been watching your videos for the last 6 or so months. Awesome. I will one day own a logging company, because you've inspired me. I want to make sure that the forests are hearty and healthy, and not all chopped down to their last bits like The Lorax. I'd love to hear what you think about farm land and how to keep the nutrients from drying up and being extracted.
#6 Carbon storage! And that's a big one. I really enjoyed your video. It's so refreshing to hear this from a private owner. This type of forest management including ecological principles that also save up work and fuel, I think is the future of forestry. And that's exactly what I'm trying to do on my stand here in France. Interestingly we also have a fair share of Douglas fir (very popular in plantations) and pines here too, mixed with beech, birch and some oaks. Greetings from the other side of the pond! Edit: #7 water storage as well!
I dealt with some wood like that today. I took down a dead tree along one of the farm waterways. Once I cut it up, it was clearly starting to rot from the inside. Satisfied that it wouldn't be suitable for the beavers that cause all sorts of issues on that waterway, I left it in a pile on the ground.
Down here in southern Oregon, on the small scale of 7 acres on my father’s property, I feel good about achieving that park like setting to protect the land from fire with what it’s surrounded by. The wildlife can always go next door even tho it clearly feels safe on our land. It started with trying to prevent the pine beetles but clearly that’s a lost cause
I only cut dry standing or recently falling blow downs. Everything dead. No green wood, takes to long to season where we live. Some standing dead trees are hard dry ,not rotten at all. Great for starting fires.
I just bought about 7 acres, with about 30% wooded. I suspect that over the long term I'll get a get a park-like setting between using the brush to improve the soil in the parts that aren't wooded, harvesting firewood, and using it as silvapasture. I was seduced by the view to get parcel that is on the bottom edge of the range that I was looking for. Or maybe I'll grow old and just not be able to keep up a few acres.
I needed to see this! We recently moved onto 5 acres of woods (that were completely untouched by the previous owners) and there is so much downed debris that you can barely walk back there. We’ve been here for 3 months and I’ve been working to cut up and clear downed stuff in my free time, but starting seriously break my back and feel never ending. It’s hard for me to let downed stuff go to waste as wood is our primary heat source (and I had it in my mind that I’d be heating our home with wood directly from our backyard). Needless to say, I’m going to focus on processing the standing dead ash in the near vicinity, then bring in the skid steer with a grapple for a weekend with the fellas to clear a couple walking paths in the woods. Got in touch with a local tree company to get 10 cords of logs delivered that I can easily cut and process myself without the labor of dragging everything out of the woods, just isn’t worth the headache!
I recently did a video called 'give and take' which addresses this. I have been utilising much of the dead wood to lay along contours to break down creating natural swales to slow water and allow soaking. I plan to add mulch and bio mass along the contours to assist in the breakdown process and plant a variety of trees along the contour later. Great videos, thank you for sharing.
Here in New Zealand's now protected remnant old-growth native forests 30 years ago I noted that a small fireplace in a hut ate ALL the fallen timber within carrying distance. Fireplaces now gone, forests recovering lushness. Thank you for your work. 🙃
If you had a large enough surface wood stove you could cook with wood and use waste heat for your hot water. Or just burn some wood to run a steam generator. Though if you wanted to make money furniture may be better than fire wood.
I've been a fan of your for som time. I like your way to looking at things. Watching this video about leaving wood in the woods. I wanted to say I cut fire wood for my house for 25 years. I burned 10 to 15 cords in a winter. Any way I was cutting wood on this farmers farm. Anyway he wanted me to leave the small logs (4 to 6 inch) on the hill sides making sure to leave them cross ways to the hill. The logs would catch leaves and forest trash. This inturn slows the erosion down. Just thought I'd pass on this little bit of info.
Great video! great points! I like woods that have wildlife habitat in them. Yes that left wood decays and feeds the plants, including the trees. I understand ecology and ecosystems.
I have many logs down mostly red oak post oak and Hickory, I leave trees stand until they become a danger or an obstruction. We have a borer or two the emerald ash beetle and the red oak borer. I lose mostly 100 -185 year old trees trees in the oaks, but the ash trees are being destroyed at sapling on up. I have talked with arborists and they say cutting and burning is the best way to control these. There are ways to do burning without destruction but it requires man power.
I like the way you have thinned out the forest and taken lumber selectively. It seems similar to the old ways and leaves a decent habitat for animals, in a way that clear felling a forest never would. I imagine it's slower and harder sometimes because you can't use as much machinery to get the job done. I admire you and thanks for sharing.
Great woodland video topic! Not leaving wood to rot in the forest for all the critters would be like the woodland critters coming in your home and removing your fridge and cupboard! Just wondering Michael would you have any interest in placing a trail camera by that moss covered oak pile you showed in this video to see what kind of animal utilize it?
I dropped an oak a while back and it was about 14" round but hollow for about 9' in length. I cut that part into rounds and placed them in several spots as "critter condos". All sorts of nature is using them by now.
Do that as well -- they also make great Owl or larger cavity-nesting bird houses. Add a thick slab roof and a removable slab floor, don't worry about a tight/waterproof fit, what standing snag/hollow log is waterproof? Mama Owl don't care, and you get the adding bonus of watching apex predators control the rodents without using poisons.
The ecological value grows exponentially with the thickness of the log left in the forest. I agree with your points about not taking the wood if you don't need it.
Tell that to California. prescribed burns would be a big help to prevent building up a lot of extra undergrowth that will eventually provide too much fire load and then you get a canopy fire instead of a scrub brush fire.
This is just an absolutely fantastic video full of wonderful ideas. I hope everyone who has ever thought about cleaning up their land a little bit too much watches this. I've been one of those and I'm trying to correct that behavior. We have 10 or 11 acres of mostly forest. We Harvest all of our own firewood. In the past we've burned our brush piles but that's extremely time-consuming. Last year we did a restoration on a mid-70s Mackissic chipper shredder. That's now mounted to the front of one of our Wheelhorse tractors. I'll be using that to clear the brush piles that are near to the house but try to remember to leave some in the forest. Brush and slash equals food for the plants. Trees are plants. And of course you go uphill in the food chain from there. Thanks for this video. A lot.
I watched this video all the way through to and understand the balanced approach he is speaking about here. This forest is pretty spacious and the slashing technique used appears to be suitable for this type of trees and climate.
One late spring almost a decade ago , our neighbor decided to “clean up “ his woods by creating huge burn piles in windy conditions. After receiving a stern lecture from our son who happened to be visiting , we invited him over to our neck of the woods where we chip and spread small branches but leave a lot of the big stuff half buried . After I pulled up a half exposed chunk and squeezed water out as if it were a soggy sponge , his eyes popped open wide! No more stinky clouds of smoke from his side of the hill since .
You are great! Not only that, but you are smart and very aware of what makes for ideal wildlife habitat. Chopping and dropping is investing into the future of the forest by adding nutrients to the soil as you say. Wow! Great video. I like ‘just because’.
Great video! It certainly does create a habitat. Eventually it goes back to being dirt. Here in Australia we also have to look Bush Fires, probably Wild Fires to you guys. Fires burn much cooler and slower if they don’t have a huge amount of fuel lying around. Gum Trees in Australia also have a funny habit of dropping branches. Once the lower branches are shaded by the upper ones they unexpectedly drop off. They are often small but can easily be over 12” or 14”. I have never had to fell a tree for firewood. I find the large branches that have dropped and cut them into rounds. Helps keep the fuel load down as well.
There was a fire to the East of us last Summer and we were afraid we would have to evacuate. That motivated me to cut down, limb, and log the 3 dozen standing dead trees nearest to our house. I also trailered the debris to the collection point. It was a lot of work. We have a gas fireplace so have no use for logs. So I put an ad in Craigslist for $25 a truckload and they were quickly gone. Leaving the logs and debris would just have made the fire risk worse.
around here logs on the ground soon decompose back into the forest floor , a vital part of any system. when im clearing trees i pile slash in small heaps i call mice piles. many small critters use them as home, they start off 3 feet high but soon collapse into about a foot of good dense material. once they are covered in snow.
Forests require active management by selectively harvesting trees that will not improve the sylvan culture. My grandmother began a select cut program for her family’s Southern Yellow Pine forest. Various trees were left for seed, wildlife food and to improve growing conditions based upon the over-story & access to light. Really enjoyed your presentation and will miss our 130 year forest & wildlife management process.
Great video , lot of things anyone can do for a why and how-com for a footprint one your property. Your time is always more important. Leaving things to rot dose help everything.
I leave most of the smaller wood in place when i cut up fallen trees on my place, the bigger wood to sometimes, when i dont have any friends or relatives asking me for fire wood.
The mixed approach you take is great. The cleaned up forest may not be natural, but can become special habitats of their own. Many european countries have schemes to keep mowing or grazing certain pastures which through thousands or hundreds of years became the only habitat for specialist species
I’m not very bothered by appearances but the not wanting to waste wood speaks to me. One thing I hear more and more is humanity isn’t a great force of destruction, but a great force of change. Increasing the productivity of your local environment, by inoculating logs with mushrooms, or creating brush pile cover for the smaller critters could definitely be considered more in our managed forests.
"A forest grows on a fallen forest." Nature doesn't do "waste" - everything gets recycled eventually. If you were to take away everything, the wood land would die due to all the nutrient lost in all that timber taken away. Another thing that can be done with the slash is to make "dead hedges". In an open woodland I don't see a need, but you might put one around a garden, or, even in the 'open' woodland if you put in an area of extra special plantings you wanted to protect for a while to get them started.
After some remarkable flooding (very locally) here in Maine a couple years ago, the wood I choose to leave behind is left broadside to the hill if on any incline. After that flooding it was amazing to see where water had been running (almost everywhere) when it never would have normally.
Work smart and hard! More soil and animals in the forest from leaving behind some wood, is a beneficial thing for the forest, for the health of the trees, and for the value of the forest! Sometimes less is more when it comes to work and nature.
I’ve been doing more and more of that, especially in the nearby hinterlands of my forest. But probably 80% of my forest I’ve never touched. But I want to, I want to venture out there and thin it, but it’s not economical and I always have something better to do. I often think about heading out there with my saw and just chop and drop. The forest needs it. The understory is crowding out the old growth and becoming a fire hazard.
Advice: consult your State University Extension Forester or a local Master Woodlands Manager, get someone with experience to help you get a management plan before venturing forth.
Yes. You need a whole bunch of different forest arrangements. The taller and older trees here also provide heaps of nesting sites for birds and bats. But overall the number of trees in any given area must be equal to the resources those same trees require in the worst year - not the best, or even the average. And have you noticed that those fallen logs contain heaps of moisture, even in the driest summer conditions? Cheers. Chris
One of the big problems in planning this kind of work is getting the balance between too much limb wood on the ground and not enough. In the west, fire suppression has created a huge backlog of unburnt small material that can lead to the rapid and uncontrollable spread of hot ground fires which will damage standing trees at their base even when the fires don't crown. I have been creating open areas around our house and next our neighbours and have observed that within a few years, there will be an accumulation of broken limbs shed by the remaining trees. I generally leave that material as long as it doesn't pile up around the base of the tree. The other local prescription is to remove the ladder fuels on the standing live trees so that a ground fire can't burn up into the crown.
Couple of acres of my property had never been maintained so it became impassable, so I been clearing it and loving how it looks now, I will let my next door neighbor's forest be the home for freeloaders.
On my little farm I’m trying to combine a small forest that goes along a gully from a bigger forest with an orchard of nut trees. Sometimes I’d like to clear the trees along the gully but then I think about how much work that would be.
I agree that leaving some behind gives back to the soil. However it is also fuel or the next fire. I seems like leaving large logs that soak up moisture and burn slowly would be better than leaving the branches that flare up in a fire.
Love this vid and will share for educational purposes. I'm going to drop many invasive trees (Norway Maple) on my property and can (in my case) just let them lie. Perhaps I section a bit and create brush piles for cover and critter habitat. We need critters of all sorts as part of the food web! As the canopy will open up, I'm going to plant some natives to take their place (oak, willow, tupelo.) Another reason I love this video is the last sentiment: "Just let it go." Humans think they have to tidy up everything. They shouldn't. Real nature is actually messy.
My neighbor mows his 2 acres with a bagger. I mulch instead. His pasture looks like a vacant lot in Detroit....mine looks like a pasture. Turns out, when you work very very hard to remove all the nutrients from an ecosystem, nothing grows in its place.
If you want flowers, it is beneficial to remove the clippings to make the soil poor in nutrients, less competition from grasses for the herbs. There need to be seeds though...
For a number of reasons I haven't baled the hay in my fields and let the material return to the soil. I do try to remove the encroaching brush. It's been over 20 years since the last harvest. There is an excess of hay production locally. Similarly I leave all the wood falls in my forest to return to the soil. I'm a bit too old to try to put up firewood. I hope this leaves a richer land for my family.
i rent a small place in the city. neighbors bag their leaves, i just mulch everything. lawn looks very healthy and its less work lol
Sometimes it's just ok to leave an area alone and not mow it at all.
I have happily mulched for decades. Have bag for mower and only bag when I want something to cover bare dirt.
Mr.Wilson you are a genius. I cannot wait to explain this to my wife. I can see a lot less grass mowing, leaf mulching, even snow shoveling in my future. “ honey, by piling up the snow in un natural piles, it could greatly effect the local ecosystem “ Brilliant!
The great part is that it's actually true. Leaves are best left on the grass. They are future plant and animal food. Same goes for twigs and logs. If you constantly remove all the leaves from your yard and send it to the landfill, you are depleting the nutrients in your soil. It probably won't affect you, but when everyone is doing it future generations will not be happy
Tell her "A hedgehog lives in it. Do you want to make the hedgehog homeless?"
@@amosbackstrom5366 I have a beautifully green lawn that has not seen any fertilizer in decades. Just left everything I cut on it.
@@domtweed7323 Works every time. For us, it's raccoons, opossums and chipmunks.
You don't have unkept grass. You have a meadow.
"Bio-dens"-- taking the larger logs for a base and stacking smaller on top, Lincoln log style -- are a great way to use up woody debris.
Throw the slash on top and "Viola!" (as Wilson says) one has built some critter habitat, which will last for years.
A thousand "thumbs-up" for leaving the big, standing snag for the birds! Well done, sir.
Cheers! From your bio-den building neighbor in Linn County.
As a wildlife field agent, I 100% approve of this video. Keep it weird, Wilson. We love it
You and your overpaid oath-breaking order followers are the problem. Keep extorting Americans on frivolity hypocrite. Union cronies that serve the beast corporation will be held accountable. Woke ideology pushers, like you have destroyed Americas food supplies watersheds and forest through neglygents, greed and power trippin egos. Americas forest are joke and your precious bureaucracies have run amuck with pride in sexual debauchery. Your agencies are worthless and have done nothing but show extreme incompetence.
You and your agencies approve of citizens getting their insurance dropped. Americas forests look like tinderboxes of death and disease, because they are. Invasive vermin is the only wildlife your agencies protect, bet you're happy about California and all the other fires and floods that destroyed homes and livelihoods across America. Cant see the writing on the wall A, pride is real blinder.
I leave 30% of my felled volume in the woods. Some I cut to make habitat (for bugs), the rest just gets laid down flat where they lay. It adds soil depth, and improves both the ecology and capacity of the soil to support better trees.
Me too.
@@gorrister2977 Amen brother
Couple more reasons (not that you need more): others have mentioned water and soil, and I will add that woody debris is a moisture sink, releasing its moisture as the soil dries out and hanging on to it when it's rainy. Also: as a nursery for regeneration. A couple years ago, a forester suggested I make low piles of slash surrounding the seedlings & saplings I want to keep, to prevent deer browse and rubbing. Works like a charm. Thanks for another great video.
I used some slash to lean against trees I planted to prevent the Bucks from trashing their bark. Bucks tend to pick trees that don't have debris around them to rub. It worked well...
@@michaelgroves3460 That is a actual forestry technique in Europe where deer would otherwise make growing oak and other hardwood forests very hard. They'll rub and eat the bark off anything you are trying to grow.
Balance. Don't have to take everything and leave nothing for the forest. A delicate balance
Exactly, everything in this universe is about balance...first find it, second follow it, third respect it.
In a way, don't be a dragon. You don't need to lay every single thing in hoard.
How refreshing to see a woodsman put something back into the system that supports him!
😂 you don't know how forestry works and it shows
The property I just bought has a few big dead fir in one area that would be hard to get to for firewood. We noticed this summer that the acorn woodpeckers were stashing their nuts in those trees. Watched them go after the squirrel who was trying to steal them. We can now leave them without feeling bad about leaving dead standing trees.😊
Well done! And you get endless entertainment watching the squirrel/woodpecker shenanigans! Win/Win.
good for the soil too, which is in turn good for the trees that remain
Good, eye-opening thoughts! Thank you. I would offer one additional thought for a reason (in balance) to harvest some of the trees...to give away to the poor, handicapped and elderly. I don't see people talk about this nearly enough, yet it is just basic neighborliness. We don't need to always sell the wood on our land. It's okay, and very loving to meet the needs that others have. My comment though does not take away from the great insight and appeal of this video!
In Louisiana it’s recommended that bottomland loggers leave tops and what have you on the ground for natural brows growth for wildlife. The deer population in those areas double in 5 years or less. Fun show like always, Mr. Wilson.
I leave piles of tops and logs crossed , i see lots of animals living in it. birds love the smaller branches. so i agree.
A little over 2 years into my adventure of being a forest owner I figured out I HAD to "Let it go" There's simply not enough TIME to accomplish all the big stuff if you are continuously spending time on the little stuff.
Join the Club! (We've got jackets!!) 80-acres, you?
I agreeI, good show. keep it natural where you can. I have a 300' defensive space around my home.
My trees are larger 18" to 30" at the butt. Spaced about 8' to 16' abart. Trimmed up 20'.
Beyond that it gradually turns into thick natural fall. Some places you can't enter very easily. Very beneficial for deer and turkey nesting. I did fence about 3 acres around the house to keep my dogs in.
Thanks for telling it like it is.
Good to hear you respecting and understanding the land. A good teacher and role model for people for sure.
When we're doing "maintenance" cutting the main goal is ground contact, keep it moist by touching the ground and it'll rot away. Feeding the forest floor.
I am from the southwest desert but now live on wooded land. Your videos always leave me with a new idea or prospective. As somebody new to that environment, it’s very helpful. A lot of the woods here in Ohio is high graded and otherwise left un managed, I wish more people had the respect and understanding of their land that you do.
Wilson your channel is so educational. Thank you for sharing your knowledge.
Wilson's National Park. I need to thin mine out but have so many down trees it's a never ending battle!!
Maybe a local neighbor would be happy to cut wood for you by retrieving firewood for themself. Maybe a win-win.
Well said,
when you feel the urge, I would like to know your story. Your work in I suspect, wildland fire fighting? Sericulture, Forestry and logging. I too have some knowledge, but I bet yours comes not only from life experience but past work history. Maybe I'm wrong but I think it would be interesting to hear more of your woodland background. Great insights as always, JeffinMaine
Suggestion seconded!
The way you said lengths, sounded just fine to me... the string of words you had wrapped around each other like pretzels, still sounds way more coherent than someone we all know...
Allowing the fallen trees to rot and return to nature is a perfectly good thing... take what you need and let nature have the rest. 👍👍
Once I get my Summer Camp old growth forest under control, I'll leave a couple of wildlife slash piles in an area thats treeless and mostly mineral soil and rocks. That should help critters, and erosion.
I totally give you the credit to clean up the slash and wood that is too far gone. I set up the pile, cover with a piece of plastic. I burn when it is raining. I don’t worry about setting the woods on fire. Thanks a bunch.
This is a beneficial video, not many people realise that it’s good to leave a little wood behind as it’s beneficial for the ecosystem as a whole. There’s a balance that can be found between management and wild areas.
You are gold.
Rarely you find a person that knows so much for forests.
Greetings from Greece!
HI Wilson, been watching your videos for the last 6 or so months. Awesome. I will one day own a logging company, because you've inspired me. I want to make sure that the forests are hearty and healthy, and not all chopped down to their last bits like The Lorax.
I'd love to hear what you think about farm land and how to keep the nutrients from drying up and being extracted.
Really glad to hear Mr. Wilson's emphasis on fungi. They are all part of that cycle!
80-90% of the soil is/was fungi it’s incredible
You’d know Mr. Fungi.
#6 Carbon storage! And that's a big one.
I really enjoyed your video. It's so refreshing to hear this from a private owner. This type of forest management including ecological principles that also save up work and fuel, I think is the future of forestry. And that's exactly what I'm trying to do on my stand here in France. Interestingly we also have a fair share of Douglas fir (very popular in plantations) and pines here too, mixed with beech, birch and some oaks. Greetings from the other side of the pond!
Edit: #7 water storage as well!
I dealt with some wood like that today. I took down a dead tree along one of the farm waterways. Once I cut it up, it was clearly starting to rot from the inside. Satisfied that it wouldn't be suitable for the beavers that cause all sorts of issues on that waterway, I left it in a pile on the ground.
Down here in southern Oregon, on the small scale of 7 acres on my father’s property, I feel good about achieving that park like setting to protect the land from fire with what it’s surrounded by. The wildlife can always go next door even tho it clearly feels safe on our land. It started with trying to prevent the pine beetles but clearly that’s a lost cause
Not so different in the Willamette Valley, we've got Ips Beetles in our Ponderosa pines.
Ya this is dumbass.
Nice vid man! I liked the time lapse at the end: nice touch😊
I leave a few snags for the woodpeckers but the forest in eastern Washington needs to be thinned for fire management and deer.
I only cut dry standing or recently falling blow downs. Everything dead. No green wood, takes to long to season where we live. Some standing dead trees are hard dry ,not rotten at all. Great for starting fires.
Lightning strikes are great.
Wildlife uses the brush piles I make for shelter and staying safe from predators.
I just bought about 7 acres, with about 30% wooded. I suspect that over the long term I'll get a get a park-like setting between using the brush to improve the soil in the parts that aren't wooded, harvesting firewood, and using it as silvapasture. I was seduced by the view to get parcel that is on the bottom edge of the range that I was looking for. Or maybe I'll grow old and just not be able to keep up a few acres.
Nice words of wit and wisdom from the true Wilson Forest Lands. Thanks Michael.
I needed to see this! We recently moved onto 5 acres of woods (that were completely untouched by the previous owners) and there is so much downed debris that you can barely walk back there. We’ve been here for 3 months and I’ve been working to cut up and clear downed stuff in my free time, but starting seriously break my back and feel never ending. It’s hard for me to let downed stuff go to waste as wood is our primary heat source (and I had it in my mind that I’d be heating our home with wood directly from our backyard).
Needless to say, I’m going to focus on processing the standing dead ash in the near vicinity, then bring in the skid steer with a grapple for a weekend with the fellas to clear a couple walking paths in the woods. Got in touch with a local tree company to get 10 cords of logs delivered that I can easily cut and process myself without the labor of dragging everything out of the woods, just isn’t worth the headache!
I like to make smaller brush piles in low spots. Along w small log piles in low spots. Reptiles and small critters, chipmunks enjoy them.
I recently did a video called 'give and take' which addresses this. I have been utilising much of the dead wood to lay along contours to break down creating natural swales to slow water and allow soaking. I plan to add mulch and bio mass along the contours to assist in the breakdown process and plant a variety of trees along the contour later. Great videos, thank you for sharing.
Here in New Zealand's now protected remnant old-growth native forests 30 years ago I noted that a small fireplace in a hut ate ALL the fallen timber within carrying distance. Fireplaces now gone, forests recovering lushness. Thank you for your work. 🙃
If you had a large enough surface wood stove you could cook with wood and use waste heat for your hot water. Or just burn some wood to run a steam generator. Though if you wanted to make money furniture may be better than fire wood.
I've been a fan of your for som time. I like your way to looking at things. Watching this video about leaving wood in the woods. I wanted to say I cut fire wood for my house for 25 years. I burned 10 to 15 cords in a winter. Any way I was cutting wood on this farmers farm. Anyway he wanted me to leave the small logs (4 to 6 inch) on the hill sides making sure to leave them cross ways to the hill. The logs would catch leaves and forest trash. This inturn slows the erosion down. Just thought I'd pass on this little bit of info.
Thank God you thru your matches away and are feeding your forest in a natural way from old know it all
Great video! great points! I like woods that have wildlife habitat in them. Yes that left wood decays and feeds the plants, including the trees. I understand ecology and ecosystems.
I have many logs down mostly red oak post oak and Hickory, I leave trees stand until they become a danger or an obstruction. We have a borer or two the emerald ash beetle and the red oak borer. I lose mostly 100 -185 year old trees trees in the oaks, but the ash trees are being destroyed at sapling on up. I have talked with arborists and they say cutting and burning is the best way to control these. There are ways to do burning without destruction but it requires man power.
Say it as you will, I love the humor you add into your very entertaining videos.
I like the way you have thinned out the forest and taken lumber selectively. It seems similar to the old ways and leaves a decent habitat for animals, in a way that clear felling a forest never would. I imagine it's slower and harder sometimes because you can't use as much machinery to get the job done. I admire you and thanks for sharing.
Great woodland video topic! Not leaving wood to rot in the forest for all the critters would be like the woodland critters coming in your home and removing your fridge and cupboard! Just wondering Michael would you have any interest in placing a trail camera by that moss covered oak pile you showed in this video to see what kind of animal utilize it?
I dropped an oak a while back and it was about 14" round but hollow for about 9' in length. I cut that part into rounds and placed them in several spots as "critter condos". All sorts of nature is using them by now.
Do that as well -- they also make great Owl or larger cavity-nesting bird houses. Add a thick slab roof and a removable slab floor, don't worry about a tight/waterproof fit, what standing snag/hollow log is waterproof? Mama Owl don't care, and you get the adding bonus of watching apex predators control the rodents without using poisons.
The ecological value grows exponentially with the thickness of the log left in the forest. I agree with your points about not taking the wood if you don't need it.
Tell that to California. prescribed burns would be a big help to prevent building up a lot of extra undergrowth that will eventually provide too much fire load and then you get a canopy fire instead of a scrub brush fire.
One of the best of your many great videos. Thanks for the knowledge!
Good to hear. People sometimes think if people don't use the wood, it's wasted.
This is just an absolutely fantastic video full of wonderful ideas. I hope everyone who has ever thought about cleaning up their land a little bit too much watches this. I've been one of those and I'm trying to correct that behavior.
We have 10 or 11 acres of mostly forest. We Harvest all of our own firewood. In the past we've burned our brush piles but that's extremely time-consuming. Last year we did a restoration on a mid-70s Mackissic chipper shredder. That's now mounted to the front of one of our Wheelhorse tractors. I'll be using that to clear the brush piles that are near to the house but try to remember to leave some in the forest.
Brush and slash equals food for the plants. Trees are plants. And of course you go uphill in the food chain from there.
Thanks for this video. A lot.
Nice to see someone practicing good woodland management. My best - retired PNW forester.
nature can take care of itself without you messing with it.
I watched this video all the way through to and understand the balanced approach he is speaking about here. This forest is pretty spacious and the slashing technique used appears to be suitable for this type of trees and climate.
I never expected a whole video on a question i asked in the comments a while ago😅 You are the best!
Good attitude and good advice for a rejuvenating forest to look after itself 😊
One late spring almost a decade ago , our neighbor decided to “clean up “ his woods by creating huge burn piles in windy conditions. After receiving a stern lecture from our son who happened to be visiting , we invited him over to our neck of the woods where we chip and spread small branches but leave a lot of the big stuff half buried . After I pulled up a half exposed chunk and squeezed water out as if it were a soggy sponge , his eyes popped open wide! No more stinky clouds of smoke from his side of the hill since .
Great video. Its beyond just the things that eat it, too. These return vital nutrients to the soil, preventing soil degradation
There are morels and few other things that only grow after a fire.
I think southern California disagrees with you right now😂
You are great! Not only that, but you are smart and very aware of what makes for ideal wildlife habitat. Chopping and dropping is investing into the future of the forest by adding nutrients to the soil as you say. Wow! Great video. I like ‘just because’.
Great video!
It certainly does create a habitat. Eventually it goes back to being dirt.
Here in Australia we also have to look Bush Fires, probably Wild Fires to you guys.
Fires burn much cooler and slower if they don’t have a huge amount of fuel lying around.
Gum Trees in Australia also have a funny habit of dropping branches. Once the lower branches are shaded by the upper ones they unexpectedly drop off. They are often small but can easily be over 12” or 14”. I have never had to fell a tree for firewood. I find the large branches that have dropped and cut them into rounds. Helps keep the fuel load down as well.
There was a fire to the East of us last Summer and we were afraid we would have to evacuate. That motivated me to cut down, limb, and log the 3 dozen standing dead trees nearest to our house. I also trailered the debris to the collection point. It was a lot of work. We have a gas fireplace so have no use for logs. So I put an ad in Craigslist for $25 a truckload and they were quickly gone. Leaving the logs and debris would just have made the fire risk worse.
around here logs on the ground soon decompose back into the forest floor , a vital part of any system. when im clearing trees i pile slash in small heaps i call mice piles. many small critters use them as home, they start off 3 feet high but soon collapse into about a foot of good dense material. once they are covered in snow.
Forests require active management by selectively harvesting trees that will not improve the sylvan culture. My grandmother began a select cut program for her family’s Southern Yellow Pine forest. Various trees were left for seed, wildlife food and to improve growing conditions based upon the over-story & access to light. Really enjoyed your presentation and will miss our 130 year forest & wildlife management process.
I stack the wood to slow the rain run off , to make more water soak in to help the water table . The best place to store water is in the ground .
At what point will there be too much biomass to create a forest fire conditions?
Thanks for the good advice, Elsa!
Decaying fallen logs are important enough to forest ecology that they're called "nurse logs."
Very selective harvesting is good. It opens up the understory for better light for younger trees. 🙂
Great video , lot of things anyone can do for a why and how-com for a footprint one your property. Your time is always more important. Leaving things to rot dose help everything.
Mushroom mycelium breaks down wood and the mushrooms basically digest themselves, some literally do. The wood loving mushrooms appreciate you
I leave most of the smaller wood in place when i cut up fallen trees on my place, the bigger wood to sometimes, when i dont have any friends or relatives asking me for fire wood.
The mixed approach you take is great. The cleaned up forest may not be natural, but can become special habitats of their own. Many european countries have schemes to keep mowing or grazing certain pastures which through thousands or hundreds of years became the only habitat for specialist species
I’m not very bothered by appearances but the not wanting to waste wood speaks to me.
One thing I hear more and more is humanity isn’t a great force of destruction, but a great force of change.
Increasing the productivity of your local environment, by inoculating logs with mushrooms, or creating brush pile cover for the smaller critters could definitely be considered more in our managed forests.
"A forest grows on a fallen forest." Nature doesn't do "waste" - everything gets recycled eventually. If you were to take away everything, the wood land would die due to all the nutrient lost in all that timber taken away. Another thing that can be done with the slash is to make "dead hedges". In an open woodland I don't see a need, but you might put one around a garden, or, even in the 'open' woodland if you put in an area of extra special plantings you wanted to protect for a while to get them started.
After some remarkable flooding (very locally) here in Maine a couple years ago, the wood I choose to leave behind is left broadside to the hill if on any incline. After that flooding it was amazing to see where water had been running (almost everywhere) when it never would have normally.
Slowing that water down with logs is a good practice. Just don’t go shoving trees into streams thinking you’re doing good.
The forest does need to be managed for sure. And you are doing an excellent job of managing to manage it , the forest, a wee bit. Thank you.
Work smart and hard! More soil and animals in the forest from leaving behind some wood, is a beneficial thing for the forest, for the health of the trees, and for the value of the forest! Sometimes less is more when it comes to work and nature.
Don't be lazy, pick up your mess! (He says as he leans over from the couch for another handful of potato chips)
Wow. Just found your channel. I really enjoy your energy, humor, and straightforward thinking. Looking forward to more! Thanks for doing these!
I must not be human😊...I love the look of those big old mis-shapen downed trees with the moss and ferns vrowing on them.
Your a good ma McGee I’ve always said don’t let your wood go to waste job well done🥳
I’ve been doing more and more of that, especially in the nearby hinterlands of my forest. But probably 80% of my forest I’ve never touched. But I want to, I want to venture out there and thin it, but it’s not economical and I always have something better to do. I often think about heading out there with my saw and just chop and drop. The forest needs it. The understory is crowding out the old growth and becoming a fire hazard.
Advice: consult your State University Extension Forester or a local Master Woodlands Manager, get someone with experience to help you get a management plan before venturing forth.
Good stuff.
Yes. You need a whole bunch of different forest arrangements. The taller and older trees here also provide heaps of nesting sites for birds and bats. But overall the number of trees in any given area must be equal to the resources those same trees require in the worst year - not the best, or even the average. And have you noticed that those fallen logs contain heaps of moisture, even in the driest summer conditions? Cheers. Chris
One of the big problems in planning this kind of work is getting the balance between too much limb wood on the ground and not enough. In the west, fire suppression has created a huge backlog of unburnt small material that can lead to the rapid and uncontrollable spread of hot ground fires which will damage standing trees at their base even when the fires don't crown. I have been creating open areas around our house and next our neighbours and have observed that within a few years, there will be an accumulation of broken limbs shed by the remaining trees. I generally leave that material as long as it doesn't pile up around the base of the tree. The other local prescription is to remove the ladder fuels on the standing live trees so that a ground fire can't burn up into the crown.
I really enjoy and understand your explanations. I don't get lost in your word sauce, maybe I am weird as well.
Couple of acres of my property had never been maintained so it became impassable, so I been clearing it and loving how it looks now, I will let my next door neighbor's forest be the home for freeloaders.
Be mindful of fire breaks or at least leaving wood behind with forethought.
True Forest Stewardship! Well done!! 💯👍🏻👍🏻
On my little farm I’m trying to combine a small forest that goes along a gully from a bigger forest with an orchard of nut trees. Sometimes I’d like to clear the trees along the gully but then I think about how much work that would be.
I like the way you think brother
I only take from previously burnt areas.Excellent firewood.
I agree that leaving some behind gives back to the soil. However it is also fuel or the next fire. I seems like leaving large logs that soak up moisture and burn slowly would be better than leaving the branches that flare up in a fire.
Love this vid and will share for educational purposes. I'm going to drop many invasive trees (Norway Maple) on my property and can (in my case) just let them lie. Perhaps I section a bit and create brush piles for cover and critter habitat. We need critters of all sorts as part of the food web! As the canopy will open up, I'm going to plant some natives to take their place (oak, willow, tupelo.) Another reason I love this video is the last sentiment: "Just let it go." Humans think they have to tidy up everything. They shouldn't. Real nature is actually messy.
That's a beautiful timber! We leave lots of tops and branches as well as some logs for rabbitat. 😊