Understanding Forest Management Walk

Join Ethan Tapper, the Chittenden County Forester, for “Understanding Forest Management,” a walk of an active forest management project at the Hinesburg Town Forest (HTF).

Done well, modern forest management can be restorative and regenerative, helping create more diverse, vibrant, resilient forests with great wildlife habitat, helping forests recover from the effects of human land use and creating old forest attributes sooner than they would naturally occur. At the same time, forest management generates local, renewable resources which get turned into building materials, paper, power and more. Like local food, local wood supports our working landscape and our rural communities and mitigates the use of resources produced under more adverse ecological and social conditions elsewhere in the country or the world. We will walk the management area and talk about forests, forest management, and forest ecology. Please bring an open mind and all those questions you’ve never had a chance to ask about forest management.

This walk will happen “rain (snow, mud) or shine.” Participants should be ready to spend a couple hours outdoors walking over uneven and potentially slippery surfaces in whatever weather we find ourselves in, and also to spend extended periods of time standing and talking. Directions on where to meet will be sent to participants in advance.

As the Chittenden County Forester for the Vermont Department of Forests, Parks and Recreation, Ethan Tapper advises private landowners, municipalities, conservation organizations, foresters and loggers on the responsible stewardship of forestland, administers Vermont’s Use Value Appraisal (or “Current Use”) program in the County, and manages over 4,500 acres of Community Forests. He writes a monthly column for 11 newspapers and a quarterly column in Northern Woodlands magazine, maintains a YouTube channel with over 100 videos, and leads public events in Vermont and throughout New England which are attended by thousands of people each year. Ethan is the Northeast-Midwest State Foresters Alliance’s 2021 CFM Forester of the Year, the 2021 recipient of the Vermont American Tree Farm System’s Education and Outreach Award, 2020 recipient of Vermont Coverts’ James B. Engle Award, and the 2022 recipient of the Vermont Urban and Community Forestry Program’s Vermont Tree Steward Award.

In his spare time, Ethan manages his own homestead, orchard and 175-acre forest – “Bear Island” – in Bolton, with the help of his trusty Timberjack skidder, “Red.”

Learn more about Ethan’s work at: https://linktr.ee/ChittendenCountyForester