HSC General Information



Prospectus Information

History
 The forestry community in the Pacific Northwest has an increasing interest in its native hardwood resource. This community includes small woodland owners, forest industry and public agencies. Small woodland owners are major hardwood owners, and they could benefit from obtaining income from forest crops with shorter rotations than those usually seen with conifers. In the sawmill, veneer, and paper sides of the forest industry, the use of hardwoods, especially alder, has increased greatly in recent years. The industry is also seeking to diversify, including into hardwoods, making management of hardwood sites more important as hardwoods are substituted into markets like plywood and OSB. The costs of restrictions on chemical vegetation management practices are causing many landowners to leave a larger hardwood component in plantations. Public agencies see hardwoods as an important component in their program to maintain ecological diversity. The federal limits on herbicide use will result in a larger hardwood component on these lands.

This increase in interest in hardwoods has increased the number of questions being asked about techniques of reproduction, management, harvesting, processing and marketing. Support of hardwood silvicultural research in the Pacific Northwest is small relative to the investment made in conifer silvicultural research and to the market value of hardwoods. Researchers in both public and private agencies are conducting limited research on hardwoods, but most questions of great importance to hardwood silviculture in the region are not likely to receive adequate attention in the near future without extra effort. Personnel and resources of any one institution are inadequate for the task. Many of these problems, however, can be addressed by the combined talents and resources of both managers and researchers.

Many unaddressed questions still remain for nursery practices, regeneration, weed control, timing and density of spacing activities, growth and yield. Methodologies for this type of research are well developed, making research implementation easy.

A well-run cooperative is an efficient means of increasing and accelerating the level of hardwood silvicultural research in the region. Cooperatives are a mechanism of pooling limited resources to carry out research at a modest cost per cooperative member. A cooperative can also assure that important research problems are identified, because cooperators help choose the problems. Cooperatives also make it possible to conduct research on a broader scale and variety of lands and materials than are generally available to individual organizations. Because cooperators participate directly in research, communication of results is speeded and findings are applied more rapidly and effectively than occurs with conventional research methods. Finally, support for individual research organizations in the region has been shrinking. This cooperative can help fill the gaps in hardwood silviculture research programs being created by cutbacks in other programs.

Given these resource conditions, research needs and potential research support, this prospectus describes the structure and operation of the Hardwood Silviculture Cooperative.

Several factors make OSU uniquely qualified to be the sponsor of this cooperative. OSU has both the required expertise and willingness to assume the leadership role as well as experience with research cooperative operations. This prospectus has strong endorsement from the University Administration. Furthermore, OSU is centrally located in the Northwest's hardwood region, and strong supporting groups in botany and forestry (silviculture, ecology, physiology, economics, and forest products) are already located on campus.

Much research needs to be done. Further delay in acquiring the needed information can only lead to uninformed decisions in the future and subsequently, less revenue from hardwood management programs. Continued growth of the Cooperative will ensure that these needs are met as quickly as possible.


Purpose
 The Hardwood Silviculture Cooperative conducts high priority silvicultural research on hardwood species and mixed hardwood/softwood stands in the Pacific Northwest, with the goal of providing information that will improve the management of these stands. The land base of the Pacific Northwest includes large areas that currently support or might best support hardwoods or a hardwood component under forest management systems with medium to long rotations. This land base and its use is the Cooperative's focus.

Scope
 The activities of the Cooperative are divided into two broad areas: research in existing stands and research in new stands. Red alder is the species of primary, but not exclusive, interest.

Existing stands

New Stands

Location of existing installations for the Red Alder Stand Management Study.

HSC research sites are divided into three specific types of installations.

The three types of study installations are as follows:

  • Type 1 are natural alder stand thinned to various densities at various ages

  • Type 2 are alder plantations. At each site alder is planted in large blocks of various densities and each block is subdivided into several thinning and pruning treatments.

  • Type 3 are mixed plantations of alder and Douglas-fir. Each site is planted to 300 trees per acre with five proportions of the two species.

    		•  HSC logo



    Research

    (in the following tables please see "List of Acronyms" at the bottom of the page for a full list of ownership acronyms)

    The HSC's highest priority is understanding the response of red alder to intensive management. To accomplish this, the HSC has installed 26 variable-density plantations (Type 2) extending from Coos Bay, Oregon to Vancouver Island, British Columbia. The majority of plantations are located in the Coast Range, with a few in the Cascade Range (Type 2 Map). The plantation distribution covers a wide range of geographic conditions and site qualities (Type 2 Matrix). At each site, cooperators planted large blocks of red alder at densities of 100, 230, 525, and 1200 trees per acre (Type 2 Site). Each block is subdivided into several treatment plots covering a range of thinning and pruning options (up to twelve total treatments per site) (Type 2 Treatments). These sites were established over a 9 year period, starting as far back as 1989 and continuing until 1997 (Type 2 Dates). These oldest sites are some of the oldest alder plantations in existence!

    In addition to the 26 variable-density plantations, the HSC has related studies in naturally regenerated stands (Type 1). Young stands (about 15 years old) of naturally regenerated red alder, 5 to 10 acres in size (Type 1 Site), were pursued as a means of short-cutting some of the lag time before meaningful thinning results could be obtained from the variable-density plantations. It came as a surprise to find only four naturally regenerated stands of the right age and size available in the entire Pacific Northwest (Type 1 Map). At the time of thinning, stand age ranged from 14 to 17 years old (Type 1 Dates). Two of the sites fell into the "early" thin treatments (control, thin to 230tpa, thin to 525tpa) and the other two sites fell into the "late" thin treatments (control, thin to 100tpa, thin to 230tpa) (Type 1 Treatments). We now have over 10 years of post-thinning response data from these sites!

    The HSC has also established seven mixed species plantations of red alder and Douglas-fir (Type 3). They are located on land designated as Douglas-fir site class III or below (Type 3 Map). Each plantation is planted with 300 trees per acre with five proportions of the two species (Type 3 Treatments). The site layout is designed to look at the interactions between the two species. Other studies have shown that in low proportions and when soil nitrogen is limited, red alder can improve the growth of Douglas-fir. This improvement is due to the nitrogen fixing ability of red alder. The management challenge is to find the right proportion of the two species to maintain a beneficial relationship. Because these sites are fairly young (Type 3 Dates), this beneficial relationship is currently hard to quantify however, treatment effects are readily visible.




  • Type 3 Installations


    • Type 3 Treatments

  • 314- 100% red alder planted at 300 tpa (741 tph) density.
  • 315- 50% red alder and 50% Douglas-fir planted at 300 tpa (741 tph) density.
  • 316- 25% red alder and 75% Douglas-fir planted at 300 tpa (741 tph) density.
  • 317- 11% red alder and 89% Douglas-fir planted at 300 tpa (741 tph) density.
  • 318- 100% Douglas-fir planted at 300 tpa (741 tph) density.



    Establishment Dates of Type 3 installations.

    Site #
    Site Name
    Owner
    Establishment Date
    2301 Monroe-Indian ANE Hardwoods
    1994
    2302 Cedar Hebo Siuslaw NF
    1996
    3301 Menlo WA DNR
    1995
    4301 Turner Creek Goodyear-Nelson
    1994
    4302 East Wilson BC Ministry
    1992
    4303 Holt Creek BC Ministry
    1994
    5301 Puget Gifford Pinchot NF
    1997



    Definition of Acronyms

    1. ANE-ANE Forests of Oregon.
    2. BCMin-British Columbia Ministry of Forests.
    3. BLM-Bureau of Land Management.
    4. DNR-Washington Department of Natural Resources.
    5. GYN-Goodyear-Nelson.
    6. GPNF-Gifford Pinchot National Forest.
    7. MEN- Menasha Corporation
    8. MBSNF-Mt. Baker Snoqualmie National Forest.
    9. ODF-Oregon Department of Forestry.
    10. OSU-Oregon State University Forest Research Laboratory.
    11. SNF-Siuslaw National Forest.
    12. WHC-Washington Hardwood Commission.


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