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RGS

Healthy Forests, Abundant Wildlife, Conservation Ethic

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Ecology

Restoring Forest Diversity Across 110 Acres at Grass Mountain in Vermont

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by Amelia ‘Melly’ Napper, RGS & AWS Vermont Public Lands Forester Grass Mountain is a stewardship project associated with the Early Successional Habitat Creation project. It is located on the only U.S. Forest Service parcel within the Taconic Mountain biophysical region of Vermont. Grass Mountain is unique within the Green Mountain National Forest, featuring a diverse mix of tree species that are less common across the forest. Regenerating red oak is a key goal of the project. While red oak is present on the landscape, heavy competition from diseased American beech sprouts has prevented successful regeneration in the understory. Without disturbance, this forest...

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Planting Projects: Dennis Creek WMA, Cape May County NJ

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The Jersey Shore chapter of the American Woodcock Society and the NJ Fish and Wildlife team have completed our fifth partnership for a habitat/planting project on NJ Wildlife Management areas. This important partnership between the two organizations has delivered 5 successful planting projects in NJ over the past 5 years! The NJ Fish and Wildlife team had begun the reclamation of a series of fields at Dennis Creek WMA, Cape May County NJ by hydro axing a total of 6 acres in February 2023. In May 2023 The Jersey Shore chapter of the American Woodcock Society assisted by providing 17 volunteers...

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Ministry of Fire

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by Tony Jones Images by Courtney Perry “Fire is a force of destruction, but also a symbol of rebirth and renewal.”-Norman MacLean, Young Men and Fire The burn plan application that we filed with the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (MDNR) Forestry Division was anything but poetic. It began, “The parcel to be burned is a 5+ acre unit of mature hardwood with a few mature conifer (little to no conifer regeneration) with a small food plot included. It is a very nice woodlot stocked with large oaks and some basswood and maple besides the few large conifer with the usual understory of...

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Know Your Cover – Champlain Valley, New York and Vermont

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by Luke McNally, RGS & AWS Champlain Region Forester “I used to see a lot of birds around here and now I don’t.” This is the comment I hear more than any other in response to my introduction. Standing in line at the gas station in Addison, Vermont, a farmer, a tradesman or a local cabin-dweller tells me: “We used to see those on the side of the road all the time… I don’t see them anymore.” There are several reasons why folks in the country don’t see “pah-tridge” as much these days. A reduction in wildlife occupancy should always be blamed...

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In the Habitat Business

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by Troy Holcomb, Minnesota DNR Division of Forestry It’s a frosty 10-degree morning in early February—the perfect time to find a northern Minnesota logger in their natural habitat. “It’s a good time to be a logger,” said Gene Ruud of Timber Transport, and he has good reason. Consistent low temperatures and minimal snow cover made accessing timber harvest areas with heavy equipment easier than previous years. To loggers, cutting trees isn’t just a job– they carry out their mission with a zeal and passion akin to an experienced pointing dog in their prime. Each year across Minnesota, between two and three million...

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Improving Woodcock and Quail Habitat on the Delmarva Peninsula and in Southern Maryland

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Developing new collaborations in the Atlantic Flyway  by Ben Larson, Mid-Atlantic Forest Conservation Director  During my time at RGS & AWS, I’ve focused on heavily forested parts of the Mid-Atlantic, including northern Pennsylvania, western Maryland, Virginia and West Virginia. However, for the last year and a half, I’ve started to develop partnerships and projects in the partly forested parts of the region, particularly the Delmarva Peninsula (an abbreviation of Delaware, Maryland and Virginia) and southern Maryland (southeast of Washington, D.C.).  The reason is simple: for migrating woodcock, the Delmarva Peninsula and southern Maryland provide critical stopover habitats along the Atlantic Flyway. The American...

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