Tough Question for Our Foresters

[wmrussel]

What does the term "chip and saw" mean?

Chip n saw means that I'm sad, if I have some that needs harvesting right now.   

[ibseeker]

After 8 months of looking for a forester to work with me and not having any success, I decided to use a local logger recommended by the State Forester. They have a good reputation in the area. I signed the contract with the loggers a couple of days ago. They will start clearing out the yellow pines and select cutting the poplar and silver maple. My FIL will be there to mark the trees and observe the logging operation. He's familiar with the loggers and understands what the plan is.

Now I understand the term "cant hook"....I've used one too many times to remember but was ignorant of it's origin. Not that it's important but etymology is interesting to me.

The issue of succession is another curveball that I didn't see coming. It seems like that just about the time I think I've got this plan figured out, something like this blindsides me.

So the questions become:
How does the issue of succession affect my plans?
What would you do differently is this was your plan? 

I'm too old (51) to plan for a second planting. I'm only planning on developing this forest, not harvesting it. That will be for future generations, if they are willing to stick to the long-term plan.

If I plant 200 black walnuts on an acre with 12' spacing with 8' between rows, what hardwood species should I plant in between (6' spacing) to promote side branch competition?
My understanding is that after 10 years or so, the juglone will likely kill any trees immediately around the black walnut. My idea is to cut down the trees between the black walnuts to remove competition and open up the forest to allow the black walnut to really develop well.
Is this a good plan?
Any suggestions on which hardwood species to plant?
Why do you suggest that species? 

I would appreciate it if you would please continue to critique my plans.

[Riles]

Succession isn't much of an issue if you're managing your property. Managed stands tend to be "frozen" in time at a particular stage of succession; in other words, you're doing things to favor your black walnuts, bypassing the early stages by reducing competition and not letting the later stages develop. Your soil conditions are set now.

If you go with 12x8 spacing, you'll only get half an acre. You'll need about 450 trees to fill up an acre on that grid.

I'm not familiar with black walnut plantations, so I can't recommend a specific trainer tree. I know of one study that used sweetgum and loblolly as trainers for red oak.

Since money is not your primary objective, I would suggest a little diversity makes for a healthier forest. Mix up your black walnut with northern red oak and yellow poplars since they're preferred on your site.

[beenthere]

Here are my walnut trees on 10 x 10 spacing. Getting good height growth, and need to continue with pruning. The only additional planting I wish I'd done was a small cedar bush on the southwest side of each tree. The sun warms that side in the late winter-early spring and causes cracking of the growing layer, and a callous growth to form on most of the trees. A little shade from that sun would have helped, I think.
This plantation now gets just mowing, with occasional fertilizer, and occasionally some round-up treatment.



 

[ibseeker]

beenthere: Beautiful grove, that's what I'm hoping to grow someday.
Would you mind sharing some history of the plantation?
What is the age of the plantation?
Did you use trainer trees? It doesn't look like it.
Did you pick a particular cultivar?
Did you start with seedlings?

Riles: The idea of using the trainer trees came from some articles that I read. It might be better to spend less on the quality of the seedling and go for more quantity....just plant it all in black walnut and thin out the poor quality trees. What do you think?

[WDH]

I like what Riles said.  Mix it up a little.  Would look more natural.  Or go whole hog like Beenthere did with all walnut and let them train themselves.  Later, you could thin out the undesireable ones to get the number of trees that you want.

Beenthere, that is a fine looking plantation .

[beenthere]

Thanks
Started with seedlings and plowed field back in the early 70's, so they've 'beenthere' ~35 years already (time flies....).

Had 100% survival, and kept the field weed-free with cultivation and careful hoeing around each tree for first 15 years.  Worried about root trimming so quit that, and used roundup for keeping down any competition until the last 10 years, and now just mow a few times a year. 
Trees grew well early on, but noticed each year that the terminal growth would die back and a side shoot would take over as the terminal. Had an entomologist look at the trees, and discovered a "new" critter that was akin to a corn-borer. The egg would be laid at the base of the terminal bud in the fall, and in the spring the larvae would hatch and eat its way out from inside the terminal stem, thus girdling it from the inside out. Made for some real ugly looking walnut stems. I finally sprayed the entire plantation with Sevin at about 10 years, and wiped them out (much to the chagrin of the entomologist, who had called several experts around the country to come see these new critters - only to make a trip out to my field and find none - zippo  ). 

Only walnut were planted, and don't know the cultivar.....but it was one that didn't bear nuts for at least 20 years.. ...and now only meager nut production - unlike the natural walnut around them that put out good nut crops most years.  I think there are better selections for walnut planting now than there were in the early 70's.

It's been a fun project - expensive hobby, but still fun.

They are now too close together, and they are self-pruning to about 18'. Time to remove some of the small ones that are not growing well, and release some of those with good form and better size. I have been impressed with the height growth, and thus don't feel so guilty that I didn't thin the stand earlier (making excuses, probably  ).

[Riles]

I think you will see more and more use of trainer trees in the future for a number of reasons. Large scale plantation operations will tend to avoid them because management is more complicated, but with the fragmentation of parcel sizes, small scale farmers can focus on 20-30 acres. If you do it right, you get (relatively) short term revenue and good quality saw logs in the long term. You can mix hardwoods and softwoods, wildlife, esthetics and get healthier stands.

On the downside, there hasn't been a tremendous amount of research on species selection vs location. To some extent, you're experimenting. It requires a more time and effort on your part.

As far as quality vs quantity, that's probably another experiment, at least as far as black walnut goes. With loblolly pine, it's an economic analysis. With black walnut, you may look at it from an esthetics point of view. Is it worth it to me to pay the extra money to get higher survival rates, faster growth and better form? What's the source of your seedlings? Is this genetically improved stock? Are they from a regional genetic source? I suspect the state of the art in black walnut genetics is not that advanced and probably not worth the extra money, but I'm ignorant here.

You could always buy a truckload of 2 inch caliper nursery containers. That'd only set you back, maybe, $40,000.

If I was going for a plantation, I'd plant quantity, but personally I'd mix up the species some. You definitely want to plant in rows so you can mow.

[SwampDonkey]

Trees grew well early on, but noticed each year that the terminal growth would die back and a side shoot would take over as the terminal. Had an entomologist look at the trees, and discovered a "new" critter that was akin to a corn-borer. The egg would be laid at the base of the terminal bud in the fall, and in the spring the larvae would hatch and eat its way out from inside the terminal stem, thus girdling it from the inside out. Made for some real ugly looking walnut stems.

Noticed the same thing this spring for the first time. They don't bother the butternut though, standing beside it.
o
What was the bug? I'm guessing a lepidoptera larvae? I seen a few inch worm type bugs around. But, something tunneling in is more the behaviour of a beetle or sawfly.

[ibseeker]

In the post above, Swampdonkey copied a quote from beenthere that appears in a box. How do you do that?

[beenthere]

SD
Don't recall the critter, but it is a close relative to the corn borer...I'll try to find out more.

ibseeker
There is a "quote" button to click when reading a post, which will take you to the reply box. Just type your response outside the '[] brackets, or it will look wierd and hard to determine what your response is to the quote. Also, you can edit what is in the quote so your response pertains to just that important and significant part.  Also, use the preview button to review what is going to be posted, so editing can be done to get your post just the way you want it to look.

[SwampDonkey]

Even though it may not be corn borer, we do have a lot of those here. They are little brown butterflies by the thousands. They even get into the potato tops, so I guess the boring can be lepidoptera. Even spruce budworm bores I think in the  early instars, into the tree bud. Don't know what I was thinking.  Dang blasted things.

[ibseeker]

SD
Don't recall the critter, but it is a close relative to the corn borer...I'll try to find out more.

Ok, I'll try it here.

Here's what I found about the pests affecting black walnut:
Black walnut is damaged by a number of insects. In southern Illinois more than 300 insect species were found on black walnut. Even though many insects feed on black walnut, only a few are considered serious pests. The walnut shoot moth (Acrobasis demotella), which damages the terminal buds in early spring when the larvae bore into the still unexpanded bud, causing multiple forks and crooks in the main stem.

[ibseeker]

Well, that didn't work right...my response ended up in the quote box.  I typed outside the quotations and pre-viewed it. However, it looked the same with the [ ] in the pre-view. I'll keep trying.

This is what I wanted to post and what I think is relevant to the topic.

Here's what I found about the pests affecting black walnut:
Black walnut is damaged by a number of insects. In southern Illinois more than 300 insect species were found on black walnut. Even though many insects feed on black walnut, only a few are considered serious pests. The walnut shoot moth (Acrobasis demotella), which damages the terminal buds in early spring when the larvae bore into the still unexpanded bud, causing multiple forks and crooks in the main stem.

The sevin spray seems to have been the best solution. How do you spray the whole plantation? More directly, how did you spray the crowns? and during what season?

[ibseeker]

I think you will see more and more use of trainer trees in the future for a number of reasons. On the downside, there hasn't been a tremendous amount of research on species selection vs location. To some extent, you're experimenting. It requires a more time and effort on your part.

 Do you think the issue of trainer trees is more complex than just side branch competition for columnar growth? Wouldn't the trainer trees need to also survive the effects of the juglone as the trees age?

I'm wondering if the root competition might also be beneficial, especially during drought conditions. Until now I was thinking about relative growth rates that would keep the BW near the top of the canopy as the grove develops.
 
I found this information in an article about BW:
The depth of walnut lateral roots may vary in response to root competition with its associates. In one study, lateral roots of walnut occupied a much shallower position in pure walnut stands than in mixed walnut-ash stands. This was explained by theorizing that the ash, having a strongly developed surface root system, forced the walnut roots into deeper soil layers.

I haven't been able to find any information about which trees to mix in with the BW, however from the information I quoted above, Ash might be a good choice.

Riles, you state: If you do it right, you get (relatively) short term revenue and good quality saw logs in the long term.

By this did you mean that by cutting down the trainer trees after a number of years (10-15?) you could get short term revenue?

[beenthere]

I just punched in walnut terminal bud borer and google came up with this hit.

terminal bud ambrosia beetle

So it may be the culprit. The description as to characteristics of pin holes, and size of beetle fit my memory of what was there, as well as the 'under 8 year old' walnut trees.

I'm using 'trainer trees' so to speak in a tree field of red oak with every other tree in the row being spruce or white pine. The spruce are growing way too fast, and need thinning so I'll be digging many of them out (or just cutting them off). Been just eight years, and some spruce are 20 feet tall. Most of the red oak are growing well too, and past the size where the deer took their toll of the buds.

[ibseeker]

From your experience of mixing the hardwoods and the conifers, would you agree that the relative growth rates of the trainer trees can be an issue?
The TN State Forester explained to me that the problem of replacing a conifer stand with a hardwood stand was that the regenerated conifers would outgrow the hardwoods eventually killing them or producing unsuitable trees.

Have you done much research about pruning your black walnut grove?

 

[SwampDonkey]

Some photos of early shoot damage








This years crop coming along. 

[beenthere]

From your experience of mixing the hardwoods and the conifers, would you agree that the relative growth rates of the trainer trees can be an issue?
The TN State Forester explained to me that the problem of replacing a conifer stand with a hardwood stand was that the regenerated conifers would outgrow the hardwoods eventually killing them or producing unsuitable trees.

Have you done much research about pruning your black walnut grove?

I'd agree with the growth rates being an issue. But not convinced if the issue is all negative. I see red oak pushing up through the spruce competition, as well as see some being crowded out. But if all the oak I planted pushed up, then eventually some of them would have to be thinned out, so maybe the spruce are doing that for me already, and thinning out the less aggressive red oak.

No "research" on the black walnut pruning. Early on, I had the idea I would prune lower branches to clean the lower bole. then I decided to go into the crowns and spend effort training the stem in the crown (i.e. remove forked stems, and larger side limbs) before removing some of the growing lower limbs (with the thought that better growth would result from more growing leaves). That seems to have worked out pretty good. The crowns for the most part look better higher in the tree, and the lower limbs died back naturally and dropped off.
Then I procrastinated (DanG trick  ) on thinning out the small, more crooked trees to lessen the competition with the larger ones, just long enough for me to think during those years that the trees increased more in height growth (but this may just be my imagination or mental justification for procrastinating  ).  Truth is, I didn't want to have to cut down and drag out small walnut stems without a use for them (and I don't think they are good enough for firewood, relative to the work involved). I should try to dream up a market for the 6-8" diameter walnut stems - any ideas? 

Sd
Good pics of the shoot damage. Brings back bad memories of how ugly those terminal growths looked when they died back.

[ibseeker]

 Here's what I've found about pruning black walnut:

Pruning lateral branches helps to produce knot-free wood under open growing conditions that would normally permit most of the lower branches to persist. The objective of pruning is to produce a clear bole while minimizing damage to the tree and growth loss. When needed, pruning should be begun early in the life of the tree and continued as needed. To minimize damage and promote rapid healing, branches should be pruned before they are 5 cm (2 in) d.b.h. A neat, clean cut should be made, being careful not to be cut into the branch collar. Ring shakes and dark bands of discolored wood were associated with 14 of 17 stubs that were "flush cut" (branch collar removed) 13 years earlier. Pruning young trees eliminates these problems, but if older trees are pruned, care must be taken not to remove the branch collars that form around the bases of dying and dead branches.

When trees are pruned during the dormant season (early spring just before the leaves appear is best), wounds tend to heal more rapidly and completely and sprouts from dormant buds near the wound are less likely to develop. If sprouts do develop, they should be removed promptly. No more than 25 percent of the live crown should be released in a single year, and at least 50 percent of the total tree height should be maintained in live crown.

I'll bet that you've already thought of this but how about gun stocks?