Byron and Nancy Stutzman will host a Tree Farm tour at their Flat Brook Tree Farm in Ware on Thursday, August 31st from 4 to 6 pm.
Flat Brook Tree Farm was the Massachusetts Tree Farm of the Year in 2016 and has been the site of terrific previous Tree Farm tours.
In 2015, the Stutzmans acquired an adjacent 96-acre woodland in Hardwick. The woodland had oaks, mixed hardwoods and white pines but had been high-graded by a previous owner during the 1990s. The Stutzmans began management of this woodland to initiate multi aged silviculture and promote regeneration of red oak and white pine by using a European forestry practice called Acadian Femelschlag silviculture.
Femelschlag silviculture creates irregular 1/2 acre gaps in the forest to regenerate species such as white pine and red oak under a shelterwood overstory. Acadian Femelschlag retains some merchantable trees and biological legacy trees indefinitely to simulate the normal disturbance rate of New England forests.
After an initial harvest to create the initial gaps on 20% of the stand, new gaps are created by subsequent harvests at 10 to 20 year intervals to create a multi-aged forest.
The Tree Farm tour on August 31st will visit some of the gaps created by the first harvest to see how the Femelschlag silviculture is implemented on the ground and view the results.
Participants for the August 31st tour should dress for the weather with sturdy boots and bring bug spray. Water and other beverages will be available.
This program has been approved for 2.0 Massachusetts Forester licensing credits in Category I, and for 1.0 Connecticut CEUs.
Directions: Flat Brook Tree Farm is located on Old Poor Farm Road off Route 9 west of downtown Ware. To get there take Greenwich Plains Road north off Route 9 at the Ware Center meeting house. Go 1.9 miles north on Greenwich Plains Road and continue straight on Old Poor Farm Road another 1 mile. Turn left through the steel gate by the Tree Farm sign into the Flat Brook Tree Farm.
Participants will car pool to the tour site at the north end of the property.
Rain Date: September 7th at 4 pm
For information, call Greg Cox at 413 475-2883 or email gcox@crocker.com