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CAPITAL IDEAS -- LIVE!
MARCH 2010
News Conference for Forest Owners
Sponsored by the Alabama Forest Owners' Association, Inc.
This Conference was recorded on March 23, 2010.
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Hayes D. Brown
starting time: (00:00)
Comment |
Moderator
Hayes D. Brown, attorney and forest owner, will moderate this news
conference. Hayes' email address is
hbrown@hayesbrown.com.
Click Here to View & Hear Prior News Conferences.
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Mr. Joel Pate
(00:27)
Hear Conference
Comment |
Boggs and Boulders
Joel Pate is a manager of C. R. Pate Logging on weekdays, but on
weekends he's known as boggdaddy to friends and visitors to
his Brooklyn, Alabama,
Boggs and
Boulders Adventure Park. To give you a flavor for what he is trying
to accomplish at the 850 acre park, we quote from the B & B webpage:
Our goal is to offer you our southern
hospitality and hope you enjoy every minute of your weekend vacation
with us. Whether you come to relax, lay back and take in all the action
around our huge 10,000 square ft Pavilion, our Campgrounds,
our Cool Pool, or maybe the Mud Pie Cafe. Maybe you will
bring your dirtbike, 4-wheeler, sidebyside atv, jeep, mud buggy, rock
crawler, 100ton army tank, 4x4 truck, your wife's SUV, HARLEY DAVIDSON,
crotch rocket, hiking gear, mountain climbing stuff, or swimsuit. We
have something for You and It somewhere on our beautiful, scenic
850 acres. We even have Caves to explore or camp in. We have 3
lakes on the property for you to camp beside, or just sit on the many
picnic tables, positioned all around the waters edge in the shade, and
admire the beauty of the water and wildlife. We have mild rolling hills
mixed with timberland and pastures (even cattle and buffalo at large in
places). We have slick red hills, sand hills, rocky hills, xx steep rock
bluffs for the rock crawling crowd (all natural, not man made), and
GUESS WHAT?? YES we have just what everybody loves, MUDDDDDD!
and lots of it. It's natural too, not man made. Black mud flats. Acres
of them. Some shallow, some deep, be prepared for both, or either be a
woozie, and take all the bypass trails around the fun. Like I said we
have something for everyone to enjoy, young or old, experienced or not
so experienced, we have miles and miles of marked trails for you to
hike, or ride.
Since
AFOA's April 16 & 17 Annual
Meeting is going to take place in Atmore this year, we thought you might
like to stop off at Boggs and Boulders on your way to or from the meeting.
Brooklyn is about 21 miles southeast of I-65 near Evergreen, and about 53
miles northeast of our meeting headquarters.
Phone: (251) 578-4385
Email:
boggdaddy@boggsandboulders.com
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Ms. Amanda Hamsley Lang
(03:50)
Hear Conference
Comment |
The Soundness of Bioenergy Projects
Amanda Lang is operations
manager at Forisk
Consulting LLC and also the Managing Editor of Wood Bioenergy
South.
Wood Bioenergy South is an interesting little monthly report that all
forest owners should be paying attention to during the coming years.
Take a look at the February 24, 2010 issue. The first line in the
Projected Annual Wood Demand, 2020 table under the yellow title bar sums the
six announced bioenergy projects for Alabama. Not many of the projects make
it through Ms. Lang's screens and we asked her why. We thought it
interesting that the total amount of wood demand likely to happen in the 11
southern states by 2020 (18,702,885 tons) is less than the Current Pulpwood
and Direct Chip Demand for Alabama alone (21,423,812 tons). Perhaps press
releases about many of the bioenergy plants being touted in the news are
written to please grant makers and should be read with skepticism by those looking for solid markets for roundwood products.
Click here
for an index to past and future Forisk reports.
Phone: (478) 396-0704
Email: ahlang@forisk.com
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Mr. Stephen Pecot
(06:40)
Hear Conference
Comment |
Cogongrass Control Program
Stephen Pecot
is Communications Director for the
Alabama Cogongrass Control Program, a new program funded by a $6.2
million grant from the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act (ARRA), the
2009 Stimulus Bill. The
Alabama Forestry
Commission was awarded the grant and has contracted out the
administration to Larson & McGowin, Inc., Stephen's employer.
Landowners in south Alabama have become very aware that
Cogongrass is a serious forest pest, while north Alabamians may not have
even heard about it. Stephen reminds us, however, that the program is
available to landowners in every Alabama county.
Cogongrass burns at
very high temperatures, enough to kill mature longleaf, and is slowly
spreading across the southern states. It is hard to control, maybe nearly
impossible to control in extreme southern counties, such as Mobile and
Baldwin, because
infestations are so common and the grass establishes itself so easily.
Stephen is currently asking landowners who have infestations on their land
to apply for control help. The Program will hire contractors to kill
infestations with a goal of complete eradication north of U.S. 82
(Mississippi to Montgomery) and U.S. 80 (Montgomery to Georgia), and will
provide some control work on up to 10 acres per landowner for infestations
south of the 80-82 line. Stephen will describe the program at
AFOA's April 17
Educational Conference in Atmore and will be with us all day on
the 17th to sign up interested landowners.
Phone: (334) 240-9348 (Montgomery)
Email:
specot@alabamacogongrass.com
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Mr. Powell G. Ogletree, Jr.
(10:07)
Hear Conference
Comment |
Do Fences Really Make Good Neighbors?
Gee Ogletree is a Partner in the law firm of Adams & Reese LLP. He
is a real estate, forestry, natural resources, economic development and
business attorney who, among other things, counsels clients in avoiding
litigation or resolving disputes through alternative dispute resolution
proceedings. He is also a writer with a great sense of humor, as you will
see when you read
Do Fences
Really Make Good Neighbors? The essay was published in the summer
2008 issue of the Mississippi Forestry Association's Tree Talk
magazine. In six steps, Gee explains why a chocolate pie offering may
a better way to solve a boundary line dispute than initiating costly
litigation. And his advice may save you attorney's fees. Who could argue
about that?
The Steps:
- Chocolate Pie Mediation
- Nice Letter
- Lawyer Nice Letter
- Lease or Written Acknowledgement
- Notice to Chancery Clerk
- Litigation
Phone: (601) 292-0740
Email: gee.ogletree@arlaw.com
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Mr. Thomas J. Ebner
(13:36)
Hear Conference
Comment |
Thinning Planted Pines -- to Mark or Not
Tom Ebner has been busy since
we last heard from him in July 2008.
At that time he told us, "Marked thinning results in higher quality residual
stands, increased diameter growth and higher stand present value prior to
the second thinning than in operator select thinning. Costs for marking are
easily justified by increased stand value." He hasn't changed his mind, but
has continued to gather data that strengthens his argument for hiring
skilled timber markers to select trees to be left to grow, rather than
leaving that decision to the logger (operator select). When discussing which
trees to leave, he pointed out that "bigger" is part of being best and he
wants landowners to leave the best trees to grow after the first thinning so
they can grow into sawtimber and greatly increase in value. Why should
a landowner encourage his consultant forester to carefully mark plantations
to be thinned? Because "You're looking at $300 to $400 per acre loss if you
don't mark." Tom's paper, tables and charts are not easy to read for
a layman, but we encourage forest owners to show Tom's work to their
consultants when the discussion about thinning plantation pines comes up.
It's worth it.
Phone: (662) 328-5304
Email: tjebner@earthlink.net
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Dr. Wayne K. Clatterbuck
(18:08)
Hear Conference
Comment |
Planting Hardwoods -- Successfully
Wayne Clatterbuck
is Professor of Silviculture and Forest Management at the
University of Tennessee -
Knoxville. Wayne has spoken to us several times about hardwood
management at AFOA Annual Meetings, but this is the first time he has been a
guest on Capital Ideas - Live! He and co-authors Jeffrey Stringer and
John Seifert have recently published a 36-page guidelines entitled
Site Preparation and Competition Control Guidelines for Hardwood Tree
Plantings (PB1783). Wayne told us, "I like the way it is
presented with scenarios that landowners and professionals encounter," and
we think you will, too, especially if your land is in north Alabama.
Topics include:
- Successful Tree Plantings
- Factors Affecting Planting Success
- Types and Sources of Competition
- Hardwood Specific Herbicides
- Prescriptions - several scenarios
- Post-Planting Maintenance -- Second and
Third Year
Dr. Clatterbuck suggests a visit to UT's
Hardwood Management Note Series.
The Site Prep and Competition Control Guidelines publication is one
publication in the series.
Phone: (865) 974-7346
Email: wclatterbuck@utk.edu
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Mr. Rick Roark
(21:42)
Hear Conference
Comment |
Gabion Baskets for Special Road Building Projects
Rick Roark is a certified
Erosion Control Specialist with
Midwest
Construction Products, Inc. in Nashville, Tennessee. Forest owners
in north Alabama are frequently faced with building roads in steep
topography and nearly all of us have struggled to build permanent stream
crossings. In a discussion a few weeks ago, someone suggested using Gabion
Baskets and someone else asked, "What are they?" We have seen the wire
baskets filled with rocks stacked on top of one another to build roads in
the steep mountains of Ecuador, but haven't seen them used much in the
eastern U.S. A little search on the Internet let us know right away that
Gabion Baskets were alive and well in the U.S. and we found Rick Roark in
Nashville just waiting to tell us about how the baskets are being used in
Alabama and how they might be used on our land. Go to
www.gabionbaskets.net and scroll
down about midway on the page to see a series of photos on the use of
gabions for retaining walls. It doesn't take much imagination to see how the
baskets could be used to shore up a road on a steep hill or hold the sides
of a stream crossing with the baskets nestled up and over a culvert.
Click here for image ideas. Rick also suggested a visit to the
Innovative Product Applications for Environmental Science website -
www.ipafes.com - for ideas and access to
experts on erosion control.
Phone: 1-800-598-1582
Email:
rick@midwestconstruct.com
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Dr. Christine L. Thomas
(24:22)
Hear Conference
Comment |
On Becoming an Outdoors Woman
Christine Thomas is Dean and
Professor of Resource Management at the
University of
Wisconsin-Stevens Point College of Natural Resources, and she is the
founder of a program we have seen for many years in AFOA's Calendar of
Events, the BOW (Becoming an Outdoors Woman) program.
A listing for March
6-8, 2009 in Shelby County noted that the program will take place at the
4-H Center on Lay Lake and "Participants choose from over 50 courses such
as: backyard wildlife, rock climbing, camp cooking, map and compass,
camping, mountain biking, fishing, hunting, canoeing, and many more." The
cost was $199 and included meals and lodging. We have listed the BOW events
in our Calendar because we thought our female members might be interested in
attending and our male members might want to alert spouses or sisters or
mothers about the programs. A quick look at the
BOW webpage at UWSP
let's us know that BOW is a lot more than shooting a rifle or cooking over a
campfire in Shelby County, Alabama. We are glad we have the founder of the
BOW program with us today and will ask her to describe the program, tell us
how it got started, and explain why it is important to forest owners.
For Questions about the BOW Program
outside Alabama:
Peggy Farrell, Director, Becoming an
Outdoors-Woman
Room 190, College of Natural Resources
(715) 346-4681 or toll free 1-877-BOWOMAN
E-mail:
pfarrell@uwsp.edu
Webpage:
www.uwsp.edu/cnr/BOW
For Questions about the Alabama BOW program:
Sylvia Payne, Alabama BOW Program
1-800-262-3151
Email:
sylvia.payne@dcnr.alabama.gov
Webpage:
http://www.outdooralabama.com/outdoor-adventures/events_for_women/bow
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