{"id":134,"date":"2019-04-06T21:55:38","date_gmt":"2019-04-07T01:55:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/fode014notebook\/?post_type=chapter&p=134"},"modified":"2019-05-14T00:07:52","modified_gmt":"2019-05-14T04:07:52","slug":"topic-11-2-site-preparation-and-planting","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/fode014notebook\/chapter\/topic-11-2-site-preparation-and-planting\/","title":{"raw":"Topic 11.2: Site Preparation and Planting","rendered":"Topic 11.2: Site Preparation and Planting"},"content":{"raw":"Given that most forestry plantations are located on soils that are not suitable for intensive agriculture due to low fertility, droughtiness, or other factors, managers of short-rotation plantations are faced with the considerable challenge of maintaining and, if possible, improving site conditions.\u00a0 As in natural forest management, maintenance of productivity in plantations requires avoidance of soil compaction and erosion. Also as in natural forests, most of the nutrients that are or will be available to plantation trees are located in the trees themselves, in litter, and in soil organic matter.\u00a0 It is therefore critical to protect these stores of nutrients and to avoid other site damage, most of which occurs during harvesting, site preparation, and replanting operations, all of which are more intensive in plantations than in managed natural forests.\u00a0 Avoidance of nutrient losses due to harvesting is particularly problematic where whole trees and not just bark-free boles are harvested.\u00a0 Where bark, branches, and leaves are removed from the site, the nutrients taken with them have to be replenished.\u00a0 Perhaps more difficult is replacing the other functions that the harvested biomass would eventually have performed as soil organic matter by helping to maintain soil structure and increasing soil nutrient-holding capacity.\r\n\r\nLoss of nutrients and organic matter, as well as physical degradation of soil (e.g., compaction and erosion) need to be carefully monitored\u00a0 and minimized in intensively managed\u00a0 plantations.\u00a0 The greatest site deterioration is associated with short-rotation whole-tree harvesting by clearcutting and yarding with heavy equipment (e.g., bulldozers) on steep slopes with wet soil.\u00a0 When such harvesting practices are followed by windrowing (=pushing into linear piles) and burning of slash (=logging debris), future yields are likely to diminish substantially.\u00a0 In addition to avoiding such treatment, site productivity can be enhanced by using cover crops to avoid inter-rotational surface soil exposure and interplanting with nitrogen-fixing trees.\u00a0 Use of wind-breaks, minimum tillage site preparation methods, and judicious use of herbicides for weed control can also contribute to avoiding site deterioration.","rendered":"

Given that most forestry plantations are located on soils that are not suitable for intensive agriculture due to low fertility, droughtiness, or other factors, managers of short-rotation plantations are faced with the considerable challenge of maintaining and, if possible, improving site conditions.\u00a0 As in natural forest management, maintenance of productivity in plantations requires avoidance of soil compaction and erosion. Also as in natural forests, most of the nutrients that are or will be available to plantation trees are located in the trees themselves, in litter, and in soil organic matter.\u00a0 It is therefore critical to protect these stores of nutrients and to avoid other site damage, most of which occurs during harvesting, site preparation, and replanting operations, all of which are more intensive in plantations than in managed natural forests.\u00a0 Avoidance of nutrient losses due to harvesting is particularly problematic where whole trees and not just bark-free boles are harvested.\u00a0 Where bark, branches, and leaves are removed from the site, the nutrients taken with them have to be replenished.\u00a0 Perhaps more difficult is replacing the other functions that the harvested biomass would eventually have performed as soil organic matter by helping to maintain soil structure and increasing soil nutrient-holding capacity.<\/p>\n

Loss of nutrients and organic matter, as well as physical degradation of soil (e.g., compaction and erosion) need to be carefully monitored\u00a0 and minimized in intensively managed\u00a0 plantations.\u00a0 The greatest site deterioration is associated with short-rotation whole-tree harvesting by clearcutting and yarding with heavy equipment (e.g., bulldozers) on steep slopes with wet soil.\u00a0 When such harvesting practices are followed by windrowing (=pushing into linear piles) and burning of slash (=logging debris), future yields are likely to diminish substantially.\u00a0 In addition to avoiding such treatment, site productivity can be enhanced by using cover crops to avoid inter-rotational surface soil exposure and interplanting with nitrogen-fixing trees.\u00a0 Use of wind-breaks, minimum tillage site preparation methods, and judicious use of herbicides for weed control can also contribute to avoiding site deterioration.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":656,"menu_order":2,"template":"","meta":{"pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":[],"pb_section_license":""},"chapter-type":[],"contributor":[],"license":[],"class_list":["post-134","chapter","type-chapter","status-publish","hentry"],"part":130,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/fode014notebook\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/134","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/fode014notebook\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/fode014notebook\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/fode014notebook\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/656"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/fode014notebook\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/134\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":219,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/fode014notebook\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/134\/revisions\/219"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/fode014notebook\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/130"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/fode014notebook\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/134\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/fode014notebook\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=134"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/fode014notebook\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=134"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/fode014notebook\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=134"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/fode014notebook\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=134"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}