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Someone logged a 500 hectare plot in Borneo. They split this into 125 sections and planted 0, 1, 4, or 16 "tree species that are frequently targeted for logging

Someone logged a 500 hectare plot in Borneo. They split this into 125 sections and planted 0, 1, 4, or 16 "tree species that are frequently targeted for logging". After 20 years, satellite imagery shows that the more tree species you planted, the more recovered the land appears to be. I'm left wondering: 1. Why did they plant only tree species that are frequently targeted for logging? This makes the whole experiment very suspect. The linked article talks a lot about restoring forests, but why restrict the tree species to those that are profitable to log? 2. Is the satellite imagery actually representative of on-the-ground truth? A lot of logging land in western America gets replanted with logging-friendly trees in very regular grid patterns. These areas may look like forests from satellites (or to uninformed ground-level visitors), but the regrown tree farms do not behave like forests. The dense growth crowds out the ground-level plants, which in turn makes the entire tree farm a poor habitat for local fauna. If your goal is to grow more trees for lumber, tree farms are great. But I'm not sure the claims about "forest restoration" are honest/true here.

liotier 3y ago
Between clear-cut horror and ideal pristine old growth, there is a world of managed forests that fix carbon with an economically sustainable model. Not the best biodiversity but mixing sixteen species makes the initiative top tear already.
- unglaublich 3y ago
  And generally, these forests are subdivided in plots of different 'age'. Every year, they will log 1/20th of the forest or so. The wildlife might be able to move from an affected area to one of the bordering areas. In fact, this model comes quite close to natural destruction of forests, where old trees would fall over, and wildfires would rage. The only difference is that the process is not random, but nicely planned and managed to allow _humans_ instead of _wildfires and storms_ to reap the full-grown timber.
soperj 3y ago
> 1. Why did they plant only tree species that are frequently targeted for logging? This makes the whole experiment very suspect. The linked article talks a lot about restoring forests, but why restrict the tree species to those that are profitable to log? Because the whole point of tree planting is forest management. That's why whenever there's a forest fire they spray it with glyphosate so that other trees don't grow, then they plant GMO trees that can live in glyphosate doused soil.
- drone 3y ago
  Glyphosate is not soil active, so there are no "trees that can grow in glyphosate-doused soil." The primary reason for broad herbicide treatment as part of site prep is to avoid low-value, or ecologically opportunist species that thrive in disturbed soil/land, and prevent either the target species from growing, or create an environment which lacks the diversity necessary for the region. For example, sweetgum, huisache, black locust, chinese tallow (as examples from specific regions in the US), will all take over and completely dominate a deforested section and prevent oaks, pines, etc. and appropriate forb for wildlife without consistent, ongoing burns. FWIW, there are no "trees which are GMOd to live with glyphosate application" - you're thinking non-tree crops. Nearly every softwood and hardwood tree is susceptible to damage from Glyphosate.
  - dudeofea 3y ago
    why not plant other species to out-compete the invasive ones? why do we need to perform chemotherapy on our forests?
    - drone 3y ago
      Only one of the trees I listed was invasive, the others are opportunistic natives to their regions that will outgrow everything else. The nice "diverse" forest you're thinking of in your mind took a long time to become that way, the normal state of nature is to not create a perfect balance out of the gate, but for constant competition and regularly have to cycle through multiple iterations of configuration which are, by all means, not as productive or valuable for wildlife/nature as their final states. None of that means that using a herbicide is sufficient, but without, you're looking at potentially hundreds of years to get back a usable environment for wildlife that is well-balanced vs 10's of years. Outside of a few soil-active herbicides, most of what they use is one-and-done and can be applied selectively to only problem plants with minimal unintended consequences.
mschuster91 3y ago
> Why did they plant only tree species that are frequently targeted for logging? This makes the whole experiment very suspect. The linked article talks a lot about restoring forests, but why restrict the tree species to those that are profitable to log? Because that is what private land owners will do, they'll want to plant primarily what they can sell. This research likely intended to reduce the immediate damage from logging.
- kmeisthax 3y ago
  Interestingly enough, this is also part of the reason for Canada's horrible wildfires a few months back: https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/16/murder-offsets/#pulped-and-papered https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/16/murder-offsets/#pulped-an...
  - bequanna 3y ago
    [dead]
toast0 3y ago
> Why did they plant only tree species that are frequently targeted for logging? This makes the whole experiment very suspect. The linked article talks a lot about restoring forests, but why restrict the tree species to those that are profitable to log? Logging companies typically log a parcel and replant for logging again in the future. They might be convinced to do things differently, especially if the outcome is better for them, but it would be hard to convince them to plant trees that won't be commercially viable when they come back to log again. If diversity is good for the environment and the loggers, that seems ideal. If diversity is good for the environment and about the same for the loggers, they might be convinced. Not all the parcels will end up being relogged, but that decision is unlikely to be made at the time of replanting.
harywilke 3y ago
This is an aside. This [0] is what an attempt at balancing logging, locals, and forest conservation ~150 years ago looked like. The checkerboard effect [1] is pretty striking. This strategy ended up being a disaster for some animals, famously the Northern Spotted Owl. [0] https://www.google.com/maps/@43.4146826,-123.52657,129879m/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu https://www.google.com/maps/@43.4146826,-123.52657,129879m/d... [1] https://osupress.oregonstate.edu/blog/checkerboard-effect https://osupress.oregonstate.edu/blog/checkerboard-effect [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_spotted_owl https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_spotted_owl
llbeansandrice 3y ago
> Why did they plant only tree species that are frequently targeted for logging? Because the main purpose of replanting trees to is be able to harvest them again in the next few decades. Private land owners generally aren't interested in creating old-growth forests, they're trying to make money. It's not exactly ideal, but ending up with more biodiversity is likely a good thing even if it will be logged again later. If you want more old-growth forests there's going to have to be a _lot_ more subsidies to private owners to literally pay them to not log their land.
- adasdasdas 3y ago
  Why do we want old growth forests over harvestable forests? Is there an ecological advantage
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - taway_6PplYu5 3y ago
    Actually I've heard that the best ecological and economic outcome is to manage an old growth forest and log it selectively using patterns that mimic tree loss from non-human activity. Maximizing ecological advantage also maximizes economic advantage, even in the short-medium term.
    - thaumasiotes 3y ago
      > I've heard that the best ecological and economic outcome is to manage an old growth forest and log it selectively using patterns that mimic tree loss from non-human activity I don't see how this is supposed to be accomplished. For that concept to make any sense, you'd need to prevent the tree loss from non-human activity, which is all but impossible to do. If you can't do that, then the existing pattern of loss already looks like "loss from non-human activity", and any logging you do will look like "a lot more loss than typical of non-human activity".
      - 3y ago
greenie_beans 3y ago
> 1. Why did they plant only tree species that are frequently targeted for logging? This makes the whole experiment very suspect. The linked article talks a lot about restoring forests, but why restrict the tree species to those that are profitable to log? Because forest management is for logging. They will log those trees once they mature to the best value when considering DBH, the market, and opportunity cost.
joshvm 3y ago
Re satellite. At Sentinel resolution (10-20m) not much, maybe enough to distinguish plantation from natural forest spectrally. At Planet (3m) and below you can start to see large individual trees. It's very difficult to accurately measure biodiversity from space. Drone imagery might get you species visually but until we have widespread hyperspectral (see ESA CHIME) 12-13 bands is what most people work with.
thaumasiotes 3y ago
> the regrown tree farms do not behave like forests. The dense growth crowds out the ground-level plants Crowding out ground-level plants is the entire point of being a tree; it's pretty normal for forests to have clear ground. Here's what a redwood forest looks like: https://www.westwindvistas.com/Redwood%20Forest%20Floor.htm https://www.westwindvistas.com/Redwood%20Forest%20Floor.htm

liotier 3y ago

Between clear-cut horror and ideal pristine old growth, there is a world of managed forests that fix carbon with an economically sustainable model. Not the best biodiversity but mixing sixteen species makes the initiative top tear already.

unglaublich 3y ago
And generally, these forests are subdivided in plots of different 'age'. Every year, they will log 1/20th of the forest or so. The wildlife might be able to move from an affected area to one of the bordering areas. In fact, this model comes quite close to natural destruction of forests, where old trees would fall over, and wildfires would rage. The only difference is that the process is not random, but nicely planned and managed to allow _humans_ instead of _wildfires and storms_ to reap the full-grown timber.

soperj 3y ago

> 1. Why did they plant only tree species that are frequently targeted for logging? This makes the whole experiment very suspect. The linked article talks a lot about restoring forests, but why restrict the tree species to those that are profitable to log? Because the whole point of tree planting is forest management. That's why whenever there's a forest fire they spray it with glyphosate so that other trees don't grow, then they plant GMO trees that can live in glyphosate doused soil.

drone 3y ago
Glyphosate is not soil active, so there are no "trees that can grow in glyphosate-doused soil." The primary reason for broad herbicide treatment as part of site prep is to avoid low-value, or ecologically opportunist species that thrive in disturbed soil/land, and prevent either the target species from growing, or create an environment which lacks the diversity necessary for the region. For example, sweetgum, huisache, black locust, chinese tallow (as examples from specific regions in the US), will all take over and completely dominate a deforested section and prevent oaks, pines, etc. and appropriate forb for wildlife without consistent, ongoing burns. FWIW, there are no "trees which are GMOd to live with glyphosate application" - you're thinking non-tree crops. Nearly every softwood and hardwood tree is susceptible to damage from Glyphosate.
- dudeofea 3y ago
  why not plant other species to out-compete the invasive ones? why do we need to perform chemotherapy on our forests?
  - drone 3y ago
    Only one of the trees I listed was invasive, the others are opportunistic natives to their regions that will outgrow everything else. The nice "diverse" forest you're thinking of in your mind took a long time to become that way, the normal state of nature is to not create a perfect balance out of the gate, but for constant competition and regularly have to cycle through multiple iterations of configuration which are, by all means, not as productive or valuable for wildlife/nature as their final states. None of that means that using a herbicide is sufficient, but without, you're looking at potentially hundreds of years to get back a usable environment for wildlife that is well-balanced vs 10's of years. Outside of a few soil-active herbicides, most of what they use is one-and-done and can be applied selectively to only problem plants with minimal unintended consequences.

mschuster91 3y ago

> Why did they plant only tree species that are frequently targeted for logging? This makes the whole experiment very suspect. The linked article talks a lot about restoring forests, but why restrict the tree species to those that are profitable to log? Because that is what private land owners will do, they'll want to plant primarily what they can sell. This research likely intended to reduce the immediate damage from logging.

kmeisthax 3y ago
Interestingly enough, this is also part of the reason for Canada's horrible wildfires a few months back: https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/16/murder-offsets/#pulped-and-papered https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/16/murder-offsets/#pulped-an...
- bequanna 3y ago
  [dead]

toast0 3y ago

> Why did they plant only tree species that are frequently targeted for logging? This makes the whole experiment very suspect. The linked article talks a lot about restoring forests, but why restrict the tree species to those that are profitable to log? Logging companies typically log a parcel and replant for logging again in the future. They might be convinced to do things differently, especially if the outcome is better for them, but it would be hard to convince them to plant trees that won't be commercially viable when they come back to log again. If diversity is good for the environment and the loggers, that seems ideal. If diversity is good for the environment and about the same for the loggers, they might be convinced. Not all the parcels will end up being relogged, but that decision is unlikely to be made at the time of replanting.

harywilke 3y ago

This is an aside. This [0] is what an attempt at balancing logging, locals, and forest conservation ~150 years ago looked like. The checkerboard effect [1] is pretty striking. This strategy ended up being a disaster for some animals, famously the Northern Spotted Owl. [0] https://www.google.com/maps/@43.4146826,-123.52657,129879m/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu https://www.google.com/maps/@43.4146826,-123.52657,129879m/d... [1] https://osupress.oregonstate.edu/blog/checkerboard-effect https://osupress.oregonstate.edu/blog/checkerboard-effect [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_spotted_owl https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_spotted_owl

llbeansandrice 3y ago

> Why did they plant only tree species that are frequently targeted for logging? Because the main purpose of replanting trees to is be able to harvest them again in the next few decades. Private land owners generally aren't interested in creating old-growth forests, they're trying to make money. It's not exactly ideal, but ending up with more biodiversity is likely a good thing even if it will be logged again later. If you want more old-growth forests there's going to have to be a _lot_ more subsidies to private owners to literally pay them to not log their land.

adasdasdas 3y ago
Why do we want old growth forests over harvestable forests? Is there an ecological advantage
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- taway_6PplYu5 3y ago
  Actually I've heard that the best ecological and economic outcome is to manage an old growth forest and log it selectively using patterns that mimic tree loss from non-human activity. Maximizing ecological advantage also maximizes economic advantage, even in the short-medium term.
  - thaumasiotes 3y ago
    > I've heard that the best ecological and economic outcome is to manage an old growth forest and log it selectively using patterns that mimic tree loss from non-human activity I don't see how this is supposed to be accomplished. For that concept to make any sense, you'd need to prevent the tree loss from non-human activity, which is all but impossible to do. If you can't do that, then the existing pattern of loss already looks like "loss from non-human activity", and any logging you do will look like "a lot more loss than typical of non-human activity".
    - 3y ago

greenie_beans 3y ago

> 1. Why did they plant only tree species that are frequently targeted for logging? This makes the whole experiment very suspect. The linked article talks a lot about restoring forests, but why restrict the tree species to those that are profitable to log? Because forest management is for logging. They will log those trees once they mature to the best value when considering DBH, the market, and opportunity cost.

joshvm 3y ago

Re satellite. At Sentinel resolution (10-20m) not much, maybe enough to distinguish plantation from natural forest spectrally. At Planet (3m) and below you can start to see large individual trees. It's very difficult to accurately measure biodiversity from space. Drone imagery might get you species visually but until we have widespread hyperspectral (see ESA CHIME) 12-13 bands is what most people work with.

thaumasiotes 3y ago

> the regrown tree farms do not behave like forests. The dense growth crowds out the ground-level plants Crowding out ground-level plants is the entire point of being a tree; it's pretty normal for forests to have clear ground. Here's what a redwood forest looks like: https://www.westwindvistas.com/Redwood%20Forest%20Floor.htm https://www.westwindvistas.com/Redwood%20Forest%20Floor.htm