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DEP Plan To “Mow The Forest” Should Elicit Same Response As Trump’s “Rake The Forest”

DEP Again Lying About Forest Logging Plan

Coming to a forest near you?

VIEWER CONTENT WARNING – GRAPHIC VIDEOS

“Most of the thinning happens with a mower – its not a lawn mower its a forestry mower. But they’re not really removing any large trees. Most of them are only a few inches in diameter. They’re all short and bent over, those are the things being removed, for the most part. They’ll resprout anyway.” ~~~ Emile DeVito, NJCF

WATCH THIS VIDEO: “A Day In The Woods With The Bandit Forestry Mower”

The DEP wants to “mow” Pinelands forest. We think you should see what that looks like.

Here’s one of mowing pine trees with a smaller mower.

We assume that DEP contractors will have the big equipment – like this one, advertised as “the world’s heaviest forest mower”. Obviously, this equipment can handle far larger than 2 inch caliper trees. Google the term “Forest mowing” and watch all the videos, they’re all over the internet. 

Gee, I wonder what those “mowers” would do to rare plants, wetlands, stream buffers, soils, amphibians, snake dens and other habitat?

You need to see this because NJ Spotlight TeeVee finally got around to covering the huge debate over DEP’s Pinelands forest logging plan, where they tout the “mowing” of forests, see:

• Wildfire prevention plan for Pinelands sparks resistance

I must say that I got a chuckle out of the headline and the thought that a Pinelands Commissioner has become the voice of “environmentalists” and “the Resistance” in NJ’s environmental activist circles.

I really like Commisioner Lohbauer and respect his leadership, but that ought to tell you something about how lame NJ conservationists are.

Anyway, Spotlight provided a platform for DEP and NJCF and PPA to lie (again) to the public, so there’s no gain in me debunking those lies here again.

And Spotlight’s reporting spouted fact free falsehoods – obviously fed to them by DEP – about “forest thinning” and wildfire:

A similar approach helped limit damage during that massive Mullica River fire in June.

There is no evidence to support that statement and as I wrote yesterday, it conflicts with DEP’s own analysis of the factors that drove the wildfire, see:

• DEP’s Own Analysis Of The Dynamics Of The Wharton State Forest Wildfire Illustrates Why Their “Forest Thinning” And “Firebreak” Logging Plan Won’t Work

Assistant Commissioner Cecil also flat out lied by stating that “all” of the 2.4 million trees DEP will cut are “2 inches in diameter or less”.

DEP’s own plan states that the quadratic mean tree diameter is 3.1 inches (see table below). That means the average is LARGER than the 2 inches DEP said “all trees” were and that there could be a million trees are greater than 2 inches in diameter.

The DEP plan would result in radical reductions in the canopy cover that can not be the result of cutting small understory trees. LOTS of medium and large trees will be cut. DEP is flat out lying about this.

An intact canopy will not be maintained. Here’s how the Pinelands Commission’s approval documents quantified the significant tree canopy reductions. You can not get these radical reductions in canopy by cutting only 2 inch understory trees:

• The proposed “low and from below” thinning will reduce the forest from 2,075 trees per acre to 204 trees per acre. Canopy cover will be reduced from 68% to 43%.

• Approximately 255 acres of pine-shrub oak forest type will be subject to a variable density thinning treatment. This thinning will reduce the forest from 1,940 trees per acre to 74 trees per acre. Canopy cover will be reduced from 74% to 30%.

• The applicant indicates that this type of thinning creates a gradual transition in tree density from zero trees per acre created by the proposed forest firebreak to 33 trees per acre for a distance back from the proposed forest firebreak of 75 feet. Canopy cover will be reduced from 74% to 19% by the “feathered” variable density thinning treatment.

Take a look – lots more than tiny 2 inch trees cut in this “thinning” project:

But one new angle on the story that I was surprised that Emile DeVito put on the table was the concept of “mowing the forest” (at time 2:05):

“Most of the thinning happens with a mower – its not a lawn mower its a forestry mower. But they’re not really removing any large trees. Most of them are only a few inches in diameter. They’re all short and bent over, those are the things being removed, for the most part. They’ll resprout anyway.

That “mowing” concept should garner the same belly laughs and media ridicule as Trump’s suggestion of the need to “rake the forest”.

(and vibrant growth of small trees used to be valued as the “understory” and an indicator of forest health and future carbon sequestration, not targeted for “mowing”! And if the trees “resprout”, will DEP be locked into a costly regular mowing program, like beach replenishment?).

So, perhaps I’ve been far too analytical and wonky in my criticism, with all the emphasis on radical reductions in canopy cover and such –

Maybe if people just saw what “mowing the forest” looked like and actually did to the forest, people might rise up in disgust and anger and force DEP to withdraw the plan.

So, watch these short videos and see what Emile DeVito and DEP want to do our ecologically exceptional recognized World Biosphere Reserve Pinelands forests.

We say no way.