The spring melt is on, and every hike lately means wet feet. We live along the Wisconsin River, so I’ve been thinking about where all that spring runoff goes. In Wisconsin, we have what are called “Best Management Practices for Water Quality”. These are voluntary practices for forestry that help us protect our riparian areas, […]
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Author: Kris Tiles
Five steps for new woodland owners
The New Year is just around the corner, and with it brings a host of resolutions. I’m not sure how many people still keep with this tradition though. This month, we offer 5 first steps for a new landowner, but they might be good resolutions for the seasoned landowners out there as well. The first […]
Winter phenology
“Keeping records enhances the pleasure of the search…”- Aldo Leopold Leaf pick-up is happening in our neighborhood this week, which means it is time to prepare for winter. In fact, we saw our first snow last week. Although the lovely colors of fall are almost gone, I did come across a few hold-outs as I […]
Journaling changes in your woods
This past spring I decided to start a new project, which I’ve chronicled on our Facebook page . On the first of the month, I pack up the dog and camera, and head out to the woods to get photos of whatever is growing at that time of the year. It was such a nice […]
Vernal pools are springing up
My original assignment for this article was to write another wildlife monitoring piece. With the weather warming up though, my mind was wandering to the greener side of things. I’ve seen some green poking through the soil, so instead I’m going to talk about a specific type of wildlife habitat, what wildlife might use it, […]
What’s in your woods this month?
Brrrr, I am shivering as I sit down to write this month’s blog post. Many kudos to you who have headed out in your woods these last few days. My skis and snow shoes are beckoning me, and I see some 20’s and 30’s on the horizon, so may have my chance soon. For those […]
Tracking changes to your trees and woods: Seeing the forest through the trees
This post is the third in a series about watching your trees grow over time. In our first post, we talked about how to identify trees . In the second post, we talked about measuring individual trees , including diameter, height and site index. It’s time to look at your woods as a whole, by […]
Tracking changes to your trees and woods: Measuring growth
In previous posts, we recommended that landowners get out into their woods to keep an eye on any changes that might be taking place, whether that be changes to the health of your trees or boundary problems. We also suggested you keep track of physical changes to your trees by watching them grow and change […]
Tree identification: terms you should know
In last month’s blog post, we introduced a few ways you can track changes in your woods. Knowing which trees were, are, and will be part of your woods is one way to watch it grow over time. When I was a student in my forestry program, Professor Guries would test our tree identification skills […]