Learning About Shimek Forest Management

On a chilly March Saturday morning, John Byrd, Shimek Forster, met with Ann Bennett, Ray & Lora Conrad, Bob & Marsha Achenbach, Tom Pollpeter, Denise Schieffer, Linda Fiordelise, Judy & Art Duke, Donnie & Marilyn Harris, Neal Hartman, Ringo Covert, Doug & Bonnie Moothart and Debbie Miller.

Accompanying John and entertaining the attendees were John's children, 2^nd grader Avery and 6^th grader Adam. John had agreed to educate us about his role and overall forest management at Shimek.

John began the program with an announcement that the Iowa Horse Council had given $1,000 to DNR, with $500 designated for Shimek and $500 designated for Stephens Forest. He provided everyone with the new Shimek Forest brochure.

John clarified that he and his two full time personnel are responsible for the Shimek Forest Units in Van Buren and Lee that include not only the Lick Creek unit with trails and campgrounds but the other forest units in the area, and the Keosauqua Unit adjacent to Lacey-Keosauqua Park with forest land near Lake Sugema....a total of about 9,500 acres. He thus has accountability to three different Bureaus with different priorities. These are the Wildlife Bureau whose number 1 priority is wildlife, the State Recreation Bureau whose priority is camping and recreational uses and the Forestry Bureau whose number one priority is showing sustainable forest management. He is responsible for the buildings, about 80 barricades in all these areas, 8.2 miles of gravel roads (with help from DOT), several miles of fencing, 28 miles of horse trails in the Lick Creek unit, 22 miles of hiking and/or snow mobile trails, and four campgrounds (two equestrian), He and his crew must manage for timber stand improvement 300 to 500 acres each year, harvest timber from 60 to 65 acres each year, manage 35 acres of prairie, plant about 20 acres per year, maintain 5 ponds, as well as the necessary communications with the public, field days, conferences, and personnel training. Since he can not do much cutting after April 15^th due to the protected status of the Indiana bat, it is at that time that his attention turns to the equestrian trails.

[Whew! What a list! So let's be patient when he can't get to something quite as quick as we hoped. No wonder we need to volunteer to help with the trails.]

We drove a car caravan to an area where crop tree release was being conducted for Forest Stand Improvement. John explained that he is trying to restore oak and other native species. One of the major forest management tasks is that since oak requires sunlight to grow, he and his crew cut trees to open up enough to grow oak. White oaks are on a growth rotation cycle of 120 years, starting with planting and concluding with harvesting a mature tree. Some of the other trees have a shorter growth cycle.

The management technique used is call “crop tree release”
 which means he clears around the desired tree, even if this means clearing out (thinning) other desirable trees. This permits the desired tree to grow faster and to develop a larger canopy. Thus the tree will produce more acorns. It takes 3 or 4 years to see any impact from the thinning. After ten years, they must check the area again and re-thin as needed. So, they have to manage about 1000 acres each year. Thinning of trees too small or unsuitable for lumber is done by girdling as this is safer for the operator and for adjacent trees than cutting them down. They cut one inch below the bark, all the way around, making two cuts. His major “Crop” trees are any oak but not shingle oak (the ones with the galls). Hard maple, ash, and elm will grow in the shade so will crowd out oak. Hickory is a secondary crop tree. One of the reasons that Iowa must restore oak forests is that in the 1920's, almost all oaks in Iowa were cut for railroad ties. Fire prevention activity has also worked against the growth of oaks as fire thins out more of the other trees and leaves more oaks due to their thick bark. Moreover, there are several diseases of concern for oaks. One is oak wilt which hits red oak the hardest. During drought periods, wilt will also hit the white oaks. In the wetter areas of Shimek, there are bur oaks and swamp white oaks. In the wettest areas, you will find cottonwood, sycamore and silver maple.

The Indiana bat which is an endangered species is very small and nests under the bark of shagbark hickory and silver maple. They are migratory, going to caves in southern Illinois and Indiana in the winter and coming here from about April 15 until September 15. As a result, foresters can not cut loose barked tress during this time.

Next, we visited a pre-harvest area.

This is an area approaching final harvest in size. A contractor under supervision will cut anything less than 12 inches in diameter, using the wood primarily for firewood. They will cut first any trees with double stems or damage. This lets in enough light that five years later, they return and do a “shelter wood” harvest. This means to harvest about 40% of the remaining trees. During this time period, new oak seedlings are emerging due to the increased light.

 

 

  After ten more years, they clear cut the remaining large trees.

The full sunlight encourages the oak seedlings to regenerate the forest. John's goal is to have between 2,000 and 20,000 oak seedlings per acre using this multi-step cutting technique to promote natural regeneration rather than planting or setting out trees after a single clear cut. Light is so important to oak growth that it is much more a determinant of size than is age.

Revenue from timber sales are returned to Shimek. John would like to use those funds to correct/catchup on forest management but budget cuts have been so severe that he has had to use the revenue for daily operations instead. His goal is sustainability. He is working toward being able to clear cut 65 acres each year ---forever. This rejuvenates forest stands and helps birds and wildlife by providing habitat needed that does not exist if the entire forest is of a single age---the more mature forests stands have very little undergrowth for wildlife, for example.

In areas where the understory becomes too dense for tree growth, he uses a prescribed burn. This is useful in controlling prickly ash, for example. All it takes is a temperature of 180 degrees to kill trees. Oak bark is thick and withstands more fire heat than other trees.

The next site visited was clear-cut in 2005.
 It is covered with lots of young trees and underbrush. He estimates about 2,000 oaks per acre. There is also some cherry, ash, and elm. He contrasted it with nearby area where it was clear-cut in 1986, but without using the multi-cut method he described.




As a result there is not nearly as much oak as he would prefer. This area, after 25 years, is now ready for its first thinning. In discussing the use of different trees, he pointed out that while black cherry is a wood that is in demand, that often the trees rot inside. Shagbark brings only about a third as much money as red oak plus wildlife feed more on acorns than hickory nuts. The thinning/cutting management process reduces the number of young oaks from about 2,000 per acre initially to only about 60 full sized trees when its time to clear cut. He and his crew of two other men will do the thinning on 300-400 acres each year.

We then visited one of the pine sections planted

 by the CCC years ago on areas of poor, over-cropped land added to Shimek. The pines are dying—both the red pines and the white pines --none of them thrived at Shimek ---or in Iowa. There is very little market for them locally so he has engaged in several small projects with the Universities to harvest and use some of the wood.


Large piles of chips remain that they will spread over the clear-cut area as mulch before replanting with hardwoods. He prefers white oak and swamp white oak but does try to keep some diversity in the forest. John said the wildlife prefer the white oak. Black locust is an invasive tree species and very hard to keep from re-establishing the site.

Lastly, we all stopped by a small area being
restored as prairie. There are only 34 acres total in prairie in Shimek State Forest. The project we saw was one that John began when he arrived in 2005. The area had nothing on it at that time. They burned it four times and let nature reseed and restore it. So far, it has developed Indian grass and bird's-foot trefoil. All forestry employees must take training in how to conduct a fire burn. Anyone interested in developing prairie on their place might want to talk to Kevin Anderson, IDNR Private Lands Biologist for the area, based in Fairfield.

Addendum: For comprehensive information on Shimek Forest Management, download the complete plan prepared by John Byrd. It is a PDF document at http://www.iowadnr.gov/Portals/idnr/uploads/forestry/shimek_managementplan.pdf

Note that this is a lengthy document---307 pages. However, it provides a detailed explanation of the forest management activities planned from 2010 through 2029, with each Unit broken down into Section compartments and Stands with parcels as small as an acre. The Lick Creek Unit plan is contained on pages 79 through 101.