[Tim Harrigan]

@Carl Russell 38434 wrote:

… 10 minute contractions of 1/2 – 2 hour sessions, …so that you all can review, comment, and critique as we progress, …..

Carl

We are not too far off, you seem to tend toward blog, I am thinking of the video sharing possibilities.

[Tim Harrigan]

No, I was not thinking live feed. Maybe considered discussion in video format, closer to the give and take on the forum except enhanced with video.

[Tim Harrigan]

That’s cool, JL. Have a great holiday season.

[Tim Harrigan]

@Carl Russell 38421 wrote:

…So what I hope to do this winter after the Suffolk gets here is to put the foundation under the horse and novice together. My theory is that the concepts will have more pertinence when applied to a horse that is learning them for the first time than theoretical application to a horse that is already informed.

I will try to document the progress with video, covering our discussions and the results of our approach to the animal.
Carl

Carl, I wonder if there is a way that we could get more folks involved in that video discussion. Just thinking.

[Tim Harrigan]

Probably no one knows more about working horses, oxen or mules than those with 6 months experience, prior to their first wreck, runaway or disaster. Then they begin to realize that the longer they stick with it the less they know.

[Tim Harrigan]

Yes, I would say becoming a good teamster requires drawing on everything you have learned since birth.

[Tim Harrigan]

Depends on where it is. Usually I will cut tops down somewhat, but not with the goal of maximizing ground contact. In some areas I will cut it up and make larger piles for animal habitat. Keeps things interesting for the rabbits, hawks and owls.

[Tim Harrigan]

thanks, Andy. That was very good.

[Tim Harrigan]

@Jen Judkins 38305 wrote:

…Learning to provide leadership to your horses/mules is a learned process and a mentor is required…

And there is nothing better to focus your attention than finding yourself in a tight spot.

[Tim Harrigan]

@Carl Russell 38295 wrote:

I have seen several properties over the years that I feather brushed into nice woodlots, sold and immediately cut off. I don’t care how you slice it….. that is not forestry, but in our culture it is part of the acceptable continuum that passes for forestry.

Carl

Yes, I was just wondering to what extend a management plan with inventory and valuation became part of property assessment.

[Tim Harrigan]

Carl, for this to work the increased value of the woodlot has to be transferable and valued by the next land owner. Some of the best long-term management gets short-circuited when the landowner decides to cash out with a hard harvest.

[Tim Harrigan]

Forest ecology is not an area that I have tried to pursue as far as published research papers are concerned, but I am certain a lot of this work is being done. I am aware of some of it on the ground at the Kellogg Biological Station here in MI. The Kellogg forest was logged off (clear cut) in the 1920’s. Severely eroded, it was bought by W.K. Kellogg the cereal guy for restoration work and was eventually given to MSU as forestry research station. I know they have untouched areas as well as comparison sites in various degrees of harvest intensity, included a site that was clear cut again ten years ago or so. I am certain the research extends beyond the trees alone into other woody vegetation, plant and animal life, etc including soil quality and microbiology.

So Andy, I think you are right, there is probably room for studies that tie current with historical research. There are a lot of challenges with that and I could list many but to no practical end. But Andy, in the academic world this is the work equivalent to the lonely DAPNet post that get 1 views per year. Not going to be on the news, not in any magazine, bring it up with almost anyone and their eyes will turn to pinwheels, they may even pass out from boredom from lack of interest and comprehension. In MI, most woodlots are most valued as a place to put up a deer stand. For most folks, there is little difference in value between long-term, well managed lots and those that have been hit hard and abused because they don’t understand where the value is. That is, until the timber buyer visits the well-managed lot.

I think there are ways to integrate the quantitative and qualitative aspect in research, it is just really hard to get the data you need to make the analysis. It is time consuming and expensive. The qualitative aspect will have its level of frustration because it will come down to placing values on the qualitative components. So think of a matrix with timber value, botanical diversity, water quality, viewscape, wildlife habitat, whatever you value in the forest, versus value, could be $ or from 1-10, you still will have to end up with a ranking system to come up with an overall combined value. And the values we place will vary with the location of the site, if it is environmentally sensitive, are there competing uses etc. It will be really hard to separate it from the fact that it is managed land, and with management come certain expectations, most of them relatively short-term.

Forest ecology from a purely scientific perspective? Interesting and informative, and in the long run it can influence management, but it is maybe unrealistic to expect for much else in our lifetime.

[Tim Harrigan]

@Countymouse 38193 wrote:

… It is not the information itself that is attractive, but our diversity of viewpoints and our open, thoughtful, and passionate intellectual exchange. I just had to experiment a little myself to verify this. It’s my way…

That is true, Andy, and there are a lot of ways that this information could be viewed. Membership and awareness of this site has grown considerably over the years so there is a bigger audience now than when that thread first started and ended. Also, when you revive a thread it becomes active and becomes highlighted on home page until it has been dormant for 24 hours. Many of these views may be quick clicks with little engagement based on lack of interest. So maybe a more important number is the number of view that occur when a thread is not active. Those folks are actually looking for something. To them, the most valuable gems might be some of the most obscure with few views.

Others numbers that I quickly approximated: Only 7% of the listed members have more than 10 posts. Only 8% of members are currently classified as active. 2.3% of the currently active members account for about 80% of all the posts. So if the interaction is important, why don’t more folks interact?

[Tim Harrigan]

This has been a very interesting and informative discussion that I have not had the energy to join. What I find really interesting about forest ecology is the long time scale needed to see the impact of some decisions, how easy it can be to reconstruct events and decisions that took place 50 years ago, and also the immediate response of vegetation to the intervention, usually in my case a harvest or thinning activity. I think we always have some outcome in mind and that clouds our perception of what an ecological disturbance is, and what the net result will be.

The ash problem here is an example of a severe disturbance, but as Carl generally points out, the ecological response is dynamic and self-organizing as new opportunities arise. This sensitivity has caused me to be very observant and careful. It sometimes causes me to work much harder than perhaps necessary because I will drop a tree to an unfavorable lay if it means protecting desirable saplings. The cut ash will regen from stumps, and I hope that means we will once again have ash trees in our forest, but not in my life time to any extent. But then I see where the deer (too many) are browsing heavy on the regen, not only the ash but other favorable species as well, like sugar maple. So I do not see nearly enough desirable regen as I would like. But then I also see the invasive multi-flora rose that Will and I hate, and in many woodlots herbicide treatments are used to eliminate it. But deer don’t like it any more than I do, and what do you know, it protects the shade tolerant species like sugar maple from the browsing deer.

This is just one example and probably not particularly perceptive, but is illustrates that we don’t often have a long-term view, we don’t have perfect understanding or perfect information about how the forest will respond to some of these insults. But I think the approach of treading lightly, observing closely and trying to make the connections between what happens today what the forest will be like 80-100 years from now is a good approach.

Now I just need to get my mind right about box elder.

[Tim Harrigan]

@Countymouse 37994 wrote:

I think of connectivity and networking as generally synonomous.

Andy, I can see how there are similarities between connectivity and networking, but in my mind they are at different ends of a continuum. Networking is near the social interaction end. Content is near the other end and connectivity is the linkage that provides context and meaning. Connectivity amplifies the content and provides the energy that drives this site.

A good example is one you have already mentioned, the discussion of draft buffers. I do not remember exactly how that topic emerged, I know the thread actually arose from earlier discussions. But basically the discussion evolved from discussions of efficient use and application of draft animal power, to tools and techniques for conserving draft energy, to measuring the forces required to move various loads, to animal behavior and conditioning for work, to the theory, application and evaluation of mechanical and biological buffers for animal comfort and energy conservation, and finally to the design of your buffered singletrees. Which, to the best of my knowledge represents a new and novel approach to modifying and improving the transmission of pulling forces between the team and the load. Rock on, Andy! So the network provided a system for connecting one level of content to new and deeper layers. In this context the networking on this site inspired the discovery of connections that enhanced everyone’s understanding of the application of animal draft. So connectivity links ideas and information and allows us to peel concepts away like the layers of an onion, and create new knowledge in the process.

You may have thought that I was negative toward the development of high quality videos as an addition to this site. Not at all. In fact, I do not think that there are many on this site that put as much effort into animal draft videos as I do. Videos have value, but limited value compared to their ability to inspire the interactions and linkages to other content, both physical and mental, that can happen on this site. You may think the the information is just here and folks find it or they don’t. But I don’t think that what has been built here was self-organizing. It was organic, but purposeful, and guided by an invisible hand to a certain extent.

Can we measure connectivity? I don’t know. Can you measure the bond between you and your oxen?

So. I think Carl has thrown down the gauntlet and is challenging this network to evolve into something greater, and also warning that it could devolve in to something less.

[Author]

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