Pine Rider Regeneration Project (St. Louis Cty, MN)

Stand Information

State or Province:

Minnesota

Nearest city or town:

Duluth, MN

Landowner:

St. Louis County

Cover-type:

Pine

MN ECS Native Plant Community System:

Fire Dependent

Plant community or habitat classification and growth stage:

White pine with a red pine component -FDN 43

Forest Health Threats:

N/A

Estimated year of stand origin:

1907

Site Index:

feet

Silviculture System:

Shelterwood

Brief silvicultural objective:

Regenerate White and Red Pine

Soils:

Well drained sandy loam

Overview

This project is for White and Red Pine regeneration by shelterwood.

Silviculture Objective(s)

This project is to regenerate the pine types in the stand by

partial harvest
site treatments:

Herbicide to control competition
Seedbed preparation by mechanical scarification
Control of browse damage to regeneration as needed
Final removal of over story when white pine regeneration is established.

Pre-treatment stand description and condition

Stand establishment and management history:

Harvesting of White pine at the start of the 20^th century left large stumps still evident on site. The existing white pine was likely a young understory released by the first harvest.
There was some red and white pine planted in part of the site in the 1950’s, not a large area (3+acres).
There are stumps that appear to be from cutting done in the 1970’s of primarily small sawtimber white pine. This stand had a medium incidence of white pine blister rust. At that time, nearly all cutting of white pine on county land was done to remove “dead top” pine.

Silviculture Prescription

The site is to be harvested to remove a portion of the over story and most of the understory, retaining a target of 60 ft2 basal area of predominantly white pine (77%) and red pine (23%). Post-harvest the site is to be treated to create a seed bed for natural seeding. Control of broadleaved competition species was planned to be done by the means of herbicides. The site will also be treated mechanically to create soil exposure, exact means to be determined later.

What actually happened during the treatment

The original prescription noted the use of herbicide then a mechanical site prep but due to the minimal competition and relatively heavy over story we did not do a herbicide treatment but just trenched the site in fall 2016. We will now hope for a good seed year for that stand and see what nature will produce.

Other notes

The large diameter made it possible to leave a higher basal area in parts of the site and still allow for equipment use between trees. Some areas in the site exceeded the 60 BA target.

Photographs