Ruffed Grouse Society & American Woodcock Society is pleased to announce that we have recently signed an exciting pilot partnership agreement with Paul Smith’s College in New York. Situated on 14,000 acres of sustainably managed maple, birch, pine and spruce forests, Paul Smith’s is known as the “College of the Adirondacks” and is widely recognized for its nationally acclaimed forestry program.
Our partnership aims to provide hands-on educational opportunities for students in Silviculture, Forest Mensuration II, and Timber Harvesting classes, while also advancing our shared goals around habitat diversity and healthy forests. There is a key public and professional outreach and education deliverable, along with an opportunity to improve the overall composition, structure, and productivity of delineated portions of the College Forest.
Together, we have identified a demonstration site, where students can observe regulated, mechanized harvesting operations while the job is active, and where students and visitors to the College can observe the results of a properly developed regeneration treatment after it is implemented. Additional management objectives include creating early successional habitat, particularly for the benefit of grouse and other bird species and improving the compositional diversity of the forest for long-term timber value production. Students will conduct a timber quality assessment across the area, tallying and mapping the distribution of desirable growing stock. They will also gain hands-on experience with marking the harvest boundary and “reserve” trees within the harvest area.
This initiative expands upon our active participation in Paul Smith’s forestry students’ capstone project field tours and supports our efforts to establish a collegiate RGS & ASW chapter here. Special thanks go to the Camp Fire Conservation Fund for their financial support. For more information, contact Northeast Forest Conservation Director Todd Waldron at toddw@ruffedgrousesociety.org or visit www.ruffedgrousesociety.org.
