What have they done to the forest?

[James Morse]

I was looking at Google Earth and wow things have changed. There are some guys kind of close to this like Blmpkn so I'm hoping someone will check this out as I am far away.
Follow Route 2 west from Maine side towards Gorham NH. East of Gorham about 4 miles cross the Androscoggin at Shelburne. That's the North Road (or so we called it). Hogan road goes off to the left just after the bridge and Lead Mine Road just a bit further.

It looks like there was a massive logging operation up Lead Mine Road, anyway, it's not clear cut but it looks like they have logged way up in there towards Goose Eye. This was all wilderness and I'm surprised they did this, it's right where the Appalachian Trail goes. Go check that out and now you see what looks like a passable road going way far up in there. I think you could 4x4 it. Per usual there are feeder trails for the skiders and loading yards. The mill in Berlin is closed now but they must be getting pulp wood for Rumford etc if they are still in operation. Unless it's old growth timber.

I don't know if it's National Forest or who owns it now but that could come into it. Anyway, I'm not real happy about the logging. I'm not against logging, it's just that was a place I used to hike, it's right next to Mahoosuc Notch, and it surprised me they, whoever they is, were permitted to do this. I'm not talking about a small area. The potentially good thing is it looks like you could go way up in there. If a logging truck can get in there then a good 4x4 should be able to also.

There are less fresh, but recent, logging roads off Hogan Road also.

Maybe I'm not seeing what I think I'm seeing, but it looks like it was heavily logged. If I were closer I'd check it out.

 

[RonD]

Renewable resource, much like farming, where a farmer "clear cuts" a crop(harvests) then plows the area and replants, and annual occurrence, sometime twice a year

Trees just take longer to grow as a crop, 20-40 years, but they are a "crop" to be harvested

All forests in North America have an end of life which is wild fires, been that way for millions of years, in fact some trees like the giant sequoias on the west coast can't reproduce without fires, same for Jack pine and lodgepole pine, evolution

Its only recently, with human intervention, that some of these wild fires can be limited in area
Fires can't spread very far in new growth, so there is a metric to measure when a forest reaches a stage/age where a wild fire can continue to spread
Logging on Public lands is usually allowed when that stage is reached or surpassed especially around populated areas, and done as a "fire break" to keep a wild fire from spreading, so it can look like patch work logging, lol

Private lands will be logged based price of lumber, board foot estimates of trees on the land and cost to log it

Any logging requires replanting, on private land its an investment, replanted with fastest growing trees, usually, lol
On Public land its in the contract, and usually requires specific species of trees to use

Clear cutting allows the replanted trees to grow faster, less shade

And in keeps with the times
Trees capture carbon and hold it in the wood
If the trees are burned then that carbon is released
If the wood is used to build a house then carbon stays captured

 

[James Morse]

Yes in FL same thing with the pines they don't seed until fire.
I'd think the thing with clear cutting is erosion if it's hilly and zero brush or trees. If you looked at the pic or better G. Earth, to me what they did there is kind of make strips.
If you don't replant you get whatever is the fastest growing so a lot of forests now aren't the same species they used to be, like, here was tons of chestnut etc, do you see them now, no.
When I was growing up there was no such thing as replanting they just cut everything to the ground and leave it so maybe there are different practices now. I know out west they did replanting in the 70's for sure.
I guess if someone is thinking of going to a place like that, and if the road isn't chained, then there'd have to be a little research to find out if it's trespassing or not. I'd say if it's open and not posted, you can go there.
I'm all for wood houses this house here was built 1920, if you were to replace like with like it'd cost a fortune just for the materials.
I use specific kinds of wood in my instrument building and take something like ebony, it's getting almost impossible to get the good stuff any more, same with boxwood, and the spruce I use for soundboards is old growth stuff they couldn't get before.
At one point I was going to try to plant walnut on 10 acres I had but that's old history.
I agree fire is a natural part of things.
Just kind of odd the way it looks like they took strips and a particular species wouldn't grow in patterns like that. I don't think.
Thanks for lots of good info there.
I have never heard of forest fires in that particular area but surely there must be sometimes. We used to go to Pine Mt fire tower you could climb up the thing.
Sounds like you were saying they actually would have been better off to clear cut it then replant.

 

[James Morse]

To add, thread title 'what have they done' wasn't bemoaning anything I was actually asking, what kind of cutting is this to be in that what looks like weird patterns, when you zoom in on it you see.
Maybe it is clear cut but if so I don't see new plants coming. It's really more curiosity than anything, plus, looks like miles and miles of off-road available there.
Google might not be up to date. All I know is it's way different than 50 years ago, lol.
There's no towns to burn over there, you cross the river and there's nothing until Canada. Well, more or less, that's what we always said, anyways. I spent a good portion of my high school days over there, we had a canoe and crossed the river next to my house and hung out over there. You'd see people once in a while, not much. Snowmobiles or horses mainly if anything. We'd visit Old Lady Hogan. She said there were still cougars there.
I guess it'd just be weird if you hiked over Mt Hayes and towards Goose Eye it looks like you'd be going right through all that but since I'll probably never be there again it hardly matters to me personally does it.
It would probably improve the views. I kind of thought that was a protected area but I guess they can log in protected areas. Heck, it's probably all second or third growth anyway.

 

[James Morse]

Check this out. It's the dark area labelled "Mahoosuc Public Reserved Land". I don't know what that means - reserved out of the National Forest for logging?
However the fact it's public means you should be able to drive on it.

 

[Roert42]

"The Mahoosuc Public Lands contain a 9,993-acre Ecological Reserve designated by the State to sustain sensitive ecosystems in their natural condition and provide for monitoring of ecological changes over time. The Reserve includes a sub-alpine tarn, Speck Pond, and several rare plant and animal species."

Seems almost the opposite.

 

[RonD]

You missed the last few lines

"The Mahoosuc Public Lands contain a 9,993-acre Ecological Reserve designated by the State to sustain sensitive ecosystems in their natural condition and provide for monitoring of ecological changes over time.
The Reserve includes a sub-alpine tarn, Speck Pond, and several rare plant and animal species.
The Maine Bureau of Parks and Lands manages portions of the Mahoosuc Public Land Unit for timber production (in addition to other benefits).
The timber management practices are certified sustainable and help support the costs of maintaining Public Lands."

Where trees are harvested can be by property lines in the case of private lands and growth differences, may have a south side of hill that has more growth so north side is left for a few more years
In the case of Private land you get a partial Farm tax deferral when you replant which you pay when you Harvest the crop of new trees

In public lands or even reserves Foresters evaluate tree groups and undergrowth for forest health and susceptibility to fire

I think there is also a national law that trees within 100ft??? of a creek or river can not be cut down, even on private land, so from the air you might see an odd strip of forest wandering its way thru a clear cut, its on the banks of a creek

 

[RobbieD]

All I know is it's way different than 50 years ago, lol.

I have come to the conclusion, that EVERYTHING is way different than 50 years ago.

Damn it!

 

[James Morse]

The logging seen is all on the NH side. On the Maine side you don't see it. Once I got G. Earth so I could see the state lines it became obvious.
I think Maine is not saying they will never cut any trees but it is managed differently it would seem.
Where they are logging, it's actually not that near the Appalachian Trail. You'd see it, looking down, but you wouldn't be anywhere near walking through it.
If you like hiking, that's a really nice trail there, I've done it a couple times, just beautiful up there.

I remember when I lived in Eugene trucks would come in with just three long logs on them, that's all that would fit. When they cut the spruce the stumps are still about 5 feet off the ground and one time I climbed up on one and stretched out my arms laying down on it and still couldn't touch the edges. That's a big tree that took a long time to grow. I like it if we leave just a few of those around so people can see what it used to be like.

Around here the trees are like sticks compared to the west. You do see 150 year old oak sometimes, and I've seen spruce they were cutting here that was six foot plus diameter trunks, that's just about for sure old growth stuff. But mostly the forests are totally not what they originally were, it takes a while to grow a good size oak tree. There's a lot of poplar, it grows straight, fairly good lumber, kind of a hard softwood. Up there in NH there is some birch they use for dowels but trees just aren't that big because they been cut except for higher elevations where trees can be a million years old and less than a foot diameter, because of elevation and climate. The difference in color tells you exactly how far up they have cut because the high elevation stuff is all softwood species. For pulpwood, which is 99% of what I saw being cut when I was up there, I think they don't even want it huge. It's all 4' lengths. So that stuff could probably easily grow back in 40 years.

 

[Blmpkn]

I'm not exactly sure how we (maine) manage logging around our bits of the A.T.. we're certainly not shy about logging though. The majority of the state is owned by paper/lumber companies.. and they'll take as much as they can.

 

[James Morse]

The Maine side might just be in a different stage of regrowth. You can see where there has been logging. It seems like they always are taking/leaving strips downhill.
But if you look at the pic at whenever they took it, you see distinctly the Maine side green all over and the NH side is where you see no regrowth but the same general approach to what they took. Maybe that's part of the management practice, to leave part of it.

It's a commodity. In Berlin, when the mill was there, there were always pulp trucks going through. That mill supported the area from trucks to chain saws to the employees and the stores where they bought things.
It did stink to high heavens. When tourists would ask "ew, what's that smell?" (the sulphur dioxide and/or the chlorine) we'd say "That's the smell of money."

 

[99 XLT]

I feel you on this.

I live in Wisconsin and our timber industry has really kicked up the last 10 years.

Land I use to hunt, hike, fish, camp is now clear-cut or select cut leaving only the sad trees and re-planting sapplings that won't ever grow back to their original size in my life.


If it's not being logged, it's being developed. Tons of farms and empty fields just 10-15 minutes outside the city that I use to drive my dirtbikes on or hunt, has now all been sold and is now developed homes or parks for the homes, or parking lots for the walmarts.

We're losing our land every day, inch by inch. I use to be able to drive 15 minutes west or north and be in the country, the sticks, woods and back roads. Now it's all paved and I have to go 45 minutes north or west to hit the same scenery. In another 20 years I'll be having to drive 3hrs north west to hit any farmland or woods that isn't all newer than 20years old with huge underbrush and weeds.

 

[sgtsandman]

The Sportsman's Club I belong to just had their property logged. They only took the trees best suited for what they are logging for and left the rest. It does help thin out the woodlands so that the younger trees get more light and have more room to develop. The downside with logging, at least here, is that the logging companies leave a lot of the stuff they don't want behind. Like tree tops and limbs. It would be fine if they heaped them up to create wildlife dens or something along those lines but they don't. They just leave a mess behind.

 

[ZMan]

The entire midwest was clearcut 100-150 years ago.
We spent a week in Oregon back in June, seems like all the forests there are man made, the old growth was logged over 100 years ago, now it's all plots of the same trees in perfect rows that get taken out every 30-40 years. Along the road there are signs that tell you what type of trees each plot has and when they were planted.

 

[lil_Blue_Ford]

I think there is also a national law that trees within 100ft??? of a creek or river can not be cut down, even on private land, so from the air you might see an odd strip of forest wandering its way thru a clear cut, its on the banks of a creek

If there is such a National law, it sure didn’t stop them from ramming a sewer line through everyone’s backyards and mowing down nearly every tree within 70’ of the creek here. A lot of the few they didn’t cut either died or fell in the creek. Mowed right through a bunch of wetlands/swamps that even now more than 15 years later haven’t come close to recovering. There was old growth trees in those swamps that I’ll never see again in my life. All because running the line along the road would have cost more.

I could never get away with doing anything like that, but hey, if you got money then anything is possible (there were a few people looking to put housing developments in that would have been served by the sewer line they was “the last option out of 6 different sewer line options”. To date, none of those housing developments have been built. Instead, someone is trying to build a housing complex along the main highway through here where the sewer line was originally supposed to run…

Oh, and the sewer line was also billed as “helping with failed septic systems in the community” but didn’t pick up a single house with a failed septic and ended up about 1,000 foot short of a failed septic, but they told the land owner they would have to pay something like 20k to have the line extended to them, which naturally was not something they were willing/able to spend.