Study tour gives food for thought

Paul Adams, Principal Research Scientist (Plantations)

A STUDY tour of the United States last year will lead to new research and strategies to improve operational practices, nutrition management and productivity in Forestry Tasmania eucalypt plantations.

The study tour was to south-east of the United States, which is home to one of the largest and most important forest regions in the world.

While there, I attended the North American Forest Soils Conference and visited the Forest Nutrition Cooperative as well as a number of forest companies in the region.

The tour gave me a valuable insight to the region, the history of land use, forest distribution, development and management on a wide range of soils and environments.

The forest managers I visited have good knowledge and understanding of the link between soil and forest productivity and other factors that influence tree growth. This has been the key to improving productivity and in large part is due to the collaborative research that has been undertaken by the Forest Nutrition Cooperative.

Discussions with the three forest companies indicated there is a strong relationship with the staff and students at the FNC.

Key observations made during the study tour include:

• the importance of knowing your soils and understanding the relationships between soil characteristics and land use capability;
• the saying “leaves grow trees, resources grow leaves” underscored the importance of using remote sensing to estimate leaf area – in other words let the trees tell you what they need nutritionally;
• weed control in combination with fertiliser is a better investment than either alone;
• post-thinning fertilisation can be a very good investment;
• significant savings can be achieved by targeting stands that will respond to fertiliser; and
• while long-term productivity studies are expensive and difficult, they provide useful information to forest owners, managers and scientists.

The study tour was funded through the Gottstein Fellowship program, which was established in memory of forest products research scientist Bill Gottstein.

For a full copy of the report visit the website at www.gottsteintrust.org