Attend any forestry meeting about engaging woodland owners and you’ll soon hear someone mention about reaching “beyond the choir.” In essence, landowner outreach programs are good at reaching people who like managing their land and are actively engaged in it. However, reaching beyond that core group has remained a challenge. A recent study completed as […]
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“Picture a savanna with lush grass, a herd of grazing animals, and scattered trees. Silvopasture is a farming system modeled on savannas that integrates tree, grass, and livestock production. In many parts of the world, farmers and foresters find that combining grazing animals with woodlands or tree plantations can improve both tree growth and milk or meat production.” […]
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Loggers play an essential role in forestry and local economies. They are also important forest stewards that shape the forest for today and tomorrow. This extension reports on the status of Wisconsin’s logging sector based on data collected in 2004 and 2011. It covers production capacity, profitability, workers, and considerations for the future. Citation: Rickenbach, M., […]
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Does the feedstock affect how people evaluate bioenergy? Bioenergy has been viewed as a positive development in terms of energy independence and mitigating climate change impacts. It may provide economic returns to landowners and local communities by providing additional revenue opportunities to traditional industries. In this study, we investigated how framing affect perception. In particular, […]
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In Wisconsin, there are over 300,000 woodland owners. Only 30,000 or so are enrolled in the Managed Forest Law program. The MFL has a timber focus, which might make it unappealing to some. Also, society values other forest benefits, often called “ecosystem services”. To study this, we surveyed non-MFL enrolled landowners to assess their willingness […]
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Forests cover roughly 16 million acres (> 25,000 square miles) in Wisconsin: larger than the entire state of West Virginia. Who owns all that forestland? It is a mix of private and public owners ranging from the USDA Forest Service managing over 1 million acres to families and individuals owning 30 or 40 acres. The […]
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Forestry and wood products are big business in Wisconsin. How big? Total 2012 output totaled nearly $23 billion with employment of more than 59,000, according to WDNR forest economist, Julie Ballweg. Additionally, forestry is the number one employer in SEVEN counties. To learn which ones (and other interesting statistics) or to DOWNLOAD statewide or county specific […]
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My last post included a number of forestry-related impacts of the Governor’s proposed 2015-2017 budget. One of those impacts was a change in Managed Forest Law cutting notice approval. On Saturday the Wisconsin State Journal published an article about this proposed change.
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In his 2015-2017 proposed budget, the governor proposes numerous changes to the way state government should work in the future. Certain items have made headlines (e.g., public authority for the UW System), but the forestry budget has not yet received much attention. A recent e-mail from Paul DeLong, Chief State Forester and DNR Division of […]
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This project will investigate the potential for grazing livestock on publicly owned and managed grasslands and to analyze the environmental, economic and social outcomes of that activity. The need for this information rests on two primary drivers – the need for cost-effective grassland management and the potential for these lands to increase the profitability of […]
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