April 2001, Volume 2, Issue 1

ABOVE: Henry Vaux Center at Blodgett Forest.

I went to Blodgett to ask Forest Manager Bob Heald to bring me up to date regarding programs and activities on the Forest. As most of you know, Blodgett is the heart of Berkeley's forestry program and consists of 4,300 acres of mixed conifer forest in El Dorado County. The original 2,900 acres was gifted to UC in 1933 by Michigan-California Lumber Company; this was augmented in 1998 with the addition of 1,400 acres of rather steep, high-graded, and lower site quality land adjacent to the Rubicon River just to the north. The Forest's mission is to provide research, teaching, demonstration, and outreach opportunities to increase understanding of management and conservation of the mixed conifer type. To ensure long-term operations, the overriding objective is to conserve biodiversity including air, water, vegetation, wildlife, and soil resources. To enable a broad array of studies the Forest is actively managed using different silvicultural methods to maintain a spectrum of age classes within both even- and uneven-aged stands. An over-arching concern is to retain throughout the Forest the same proportion of tree species that occurs naturally. The diverse stand structures and age classes are developed through annual timber harvests, which are carried out under approved Timber Harvest Plans that meet or exceed all rule requirements of the Forest Practice Act.

ABOVE: Manager Bob Heald

To accomplish its mission Blodgett Forest has developed, through proceeds from timber sales, an infrastructure that in-cludes a road network, power supply, accommodations, laboratories, maintenance buildings, support equipment, and year-round access. Working with Forest Manager Bob Heald, are Assistant Manager Frieder Schurr, Administrative Assistant Sheryl Rambeau, and three maintenance technicians. The Forest is completely self-supporting and no salaries or operational funds are obtained from the University or outside sources. The Forest can house 46 people and there is meeting space for 100 people in the new Vaux Education Center.

Database

The Forest consists of productive, mid-Site Class 1 forest soils, some 400 plants, 21 tree species, 114 animals, 86 birds, 28 mammals, 12 reptiles, 4 amphibians, and 3,000 species of insects, mites, and spiders. But what makes Blodgett so valuable for research and teaching is its extraordinary, long-term, multi-resource database. Blodgett is divided into 109 compartments and intensive (5%) inventories are made by measuring permanent plots every 5-10 years, or before and after every manipulative treatment. These inventories include detailed measurement of all vegetation, fuels, snags, and terrestrial vertebrates. A second set of permanent plots cover 10% of all fish bearing stream channels. Each second order watershed has a stream guaging and weather station. The aim is to detect short-term, small scale (±5%) changes in vegetation, fuel, and stream conditions plus associated changes in vertebrate and macroinvertebrate populations. Targeted surveys are made on species of special interest such as spotted owl, northern goshawk, and red-legged frog.

Research

Currently there are 35 active projects involving faculty and graduate students from three UC campuses, three out-of-state universities, the Forest Service PSW Experiment Station, and forest industry. Research areas include forest management, silviculture, entomology and pathology, wildlife, ecology, soils, sociology, fire, aquatic ecology, stream dynamics, engineering, and atmospheric chemistry (see Blodgett Symposium abstracts at http:/nature.berkeley.edu/forestry/research/blodsym2001.html). The diversity of research and quality of support could enable Blodgett to become a regional or national resource monitoring site.

Teaching

Blodgett supports Berkeley and Davis under-graduate and graduate courses in silviculture, forest entomology, forest pathology, forest operations, forest soils, and a senior capstone course in forest management. Each year two student interns assist in developing the timber harvest plan, silvicultural prescriptions, pre- and post-harvest analyses, and administering sales. In addition, 6-8 students are hired each summer for general operations work including inventory, vegetation control, burning, prun-ing, erosion control, as well as supporting research projects. Every year one or more international forestry students spend the summer at Blodgett gaining experience in ecological and managerial aspects of the mixed conifer type.

Demonstration and Outreach

Blodgett has particular value in enabling comparisons among diverse forest structures produced by single tree selection, group selection, clearcutting, seed tree, and shelter-wood systems, and ecological preserves. Additionally, one can see the same structures at various ages of development. Outreach is done by Blodgett staff and by 1/4-time Extension Forester John LeBlanc. Visits are made by conservation groups, landowners, agency and industry foresters, K-12 school children from three counties, county boards of supervisors, and the State Board of Forestry. Technically advanced training workshops are provided to foresters from state and federal agencies and forest industry. Participants learn techniques for data analysis, computer simulation, projection of stand growth and yield, watershed and habitat assessment, and resource monitoring. They then interpret these analyses by visiting the specific stands from which the data were obtained.

Perhaps the most impressive demonstration at Blodgett is the effect of forest management on forest dynamics. By 1930 Blodgett had been almost completely logged and burned. It reverted mostly to brush fields through which young trees eventually emerged. Over the past 40 years, the annual harvest has been equivalent to about 68% of growth. Despite these harvests, standing volume has tripled, diameter classes now include trees 30-40 inches in diameter, populations of animals and birds have increased, and forest health and diversity have been enhanced.

Conclusion

I'm sure you can appreciate that the four factors that make Blodgett Forest such a remarkable place for research and teaching are: 1) the extraordinarily competent staff, 2) the superb accommodations, 3) the unique array of stand structures and management approaches, and 4) the multi-resource, long-term data base. As for the future, Bob Heald sees Blodgett Forest increasingly being recog-nized as the premier site for research and teaching related to forest ecology, management, and policy development. As the diverse stand structures develop over time, critical information will become available on the sustainability and enhancement of multi-resource values under managed conditions. For more info, see the Blodgett Forest web site at http://ecology.cnr.berkeley.edu/properties/blodgett.html.