Save our Forests
What can I use instead of clear-cutting?
One such method is selective logging (removing one or two trees and leaving the rest intact) that maintains an uneven-age forest structure and creates openings typically smaller than 0.4 ha, and often considered a sustainable alternative to clear-cutting.
What is the cause of clear-cutting?
Soil erosion is caused by poorly laid out road systems, whether or not the forest is clearcut or only partially cut. Clearcutting can be done without significant erosion or sedimentation if roads are pre-planned and built correctly by using accepted Best Management Practices to protect streams.
What’s bad about clear-cutting?
Clearcutting disturbs soils, wetlands, and peatlands, releasing their vast carbon stores, and diminishes the boreal forest’s ability to sequester carbon from the atmosphere. As such, it is often an ecologically harmful form of logging.
How is selective cutting good?
When practiced correctly, selective cutting has the following benefits. Removes trees that are low quality while they are young. Removes some of the profitable mature growth. Allows more light to penetrate the upper story of growth.
How is selective cutting done?
Selective cutting is the cutting down of selected trees in a forest so that growth of other trees is not affected. This is done according to criteria regarding minimum tree size for harvesting, specifications of the number, spacing and size classes of residual trees per area, and allowable cut.
Why is cutting trees sustainable?
How can logging ever be sustainable when, by definition, it requires that trees be cut down? Sustainable forestry balances the needs of the environment, wildlife, and forest communities—supporting decent incomes while conserving our forests for future generations.
What are the advantages and disadvantages of clear cutting versus selective cutting?
Clear-cutting is usually quicker and cheaper than selective cutting. It may also be safer for the loggers. Clear-cutting can damage the environment and the soil where the trees were cut. The soil is exposed to wind and rain.
Why is selective logging bad?
“Selective logging, unless it is practiced at very low harvest intensities, can significantly reduce the biomass of a tropical forest for many decades, seriously diminishing aboveground carbon storage capacity, and create opportunities for weeds and vines to spread and slow down the ecological succession.”
What does selective logging look like?
Selective logging—the practice of removing one or two trees and leaving the rest intact—is often considered a sustainable alternative to clear-cutting, in which a large swath of forest is cut down, leaving little behind except wood debris and a denuded landscape.
What are the disadvantages of controlled logging?
Selective logging is harmful not only to the trees that are cut down, but to the ones near them. It is estimated that for each tree that is logged, 30 others are harmed on average. One reason is that when a tree is cut down, the machinery that is used to log it can seriously damage the nearby trees.
What are the pros and cons of selective logging?
It is more resistant to disease and insect manifestations. It leaves a lighter ecological footprint. It creates a more natural-looking forest stand after harvesting....
What are the cons of selective cutting?
(Cons) Disadvantages of selective-cutting: • Expensive and time-consuming • Some species will not regenerate (regrow) as fast • More exposure to weather damage such as ice, storms, and fires • Lots of stumps and other tree debris left behind • Removes genetically superior trees, whose seed is needed to keep forest ...
Is selective logging successful?
Although selective logging has a far less impact on forest processes than deforestation, selectively logged sites experience higher rates of forest fires, tree fall, changes in microclimate, soil compaction and erosion, among other ecological impacts on biodiversity and ecosystem functioning.
What are the benefits of selective logging?
Logging and replanting – selective logging of mature trees ensures that the rainforest canopy is preserved. This method allows the forest to recover because the younger trees gain more space and sunlight to grow. Planned and controlled logging ensures that for every tree logged another is planted.
What are the negatives of selective logging and replanting?
Selective logging and replanting, However, it does have major drawbacks. Although single trees are felled because they are valuable, other trees can be damaged in the process. This is because a felled tree can damage other trees as it falls to the ground once felled.
Does selective cutting cause erosion?
Selective cutting takes longer, is more expensive, and can be dangerous for loggers working in tight spaces, however, it preserves topsoil and does not expose soil to erosion or streams to sedimentation.
