Forestry for Dummies - the Freelance Files MMCXXIII

 

Coring a tree to measure age

If you've ever wondered what a forester does, we refer you to Suzanne Simard's recent memoir, Finding the Mother Tree. One of the staffers recently read it and, although it's not as thrilling as a Tom Clancy novel, it's educational and interesting. It's a shame that Felicia Dye never had a chance to tread Simard's book, however, because if she had, she might well have written an entirely different "answer" to the question, "What are the Different Types of Forestry Tools?" at the WiseGEEK niche site ABoutMechanics.com. Then again, she might not. Why would we say such a thing? Because it's pretty clear from the list Dye pounded out that she didn't know the difference between a forester and a logger.

Just so's you know, here's one discussion of forester vs. logger:

"A forester is a professional with a college level education and experience in a broad range of forest-related topics including forest and wildlife ecology, economics, legal issues and the growing and harvesting of forest products... A timber harvester, or logger, is in the business of cutting down trees, cutting them into logs, removing the logs from the woods to the roadside and transporting the logs to the sawmill."

With that learned discussion in mind, here's what Felicia considered to be "forester's tools":

• Axes
• Saws
• Log splitters
• Excavators
• Range finders
• Stump grinders

With the possible exception of a range finder, those are all tools for the removal of trees. A log splitter is solely for the purpose of cutting firewood, and a stump grinder – despite Felicia's notion that,

"Once a tree is cut down, the stumps are disposed of using stump grinders."

– stumps are not ground in logging, only in cosmetic situations, e.g., on someone's lawn. In reality, a forester uses tools to evaluate the quality of trees and their suitability for harvest. To that end, a forester – as opposed to a logger – might be found using a specialized tape measure for tree diameter, height gauge, tree caliper, coring tools, bark gauge... all the tools of a forester. Apparently Felicia was unaware that there is a field called "silviculture"... ...yet she pretended to give some poor yutz a list of tools a "forester" might use. Instead, our Dumbass of the Day rattled off a list of the tools of a logger and, even there, confused them with the tools of an arborist. No wonder we gave her this award... again.

SI - BOTANY