A major purpose of the BMDSF timber management program is to demonstrate sustained-yield management with examples of timber harvesting. In simple terms, sustained yield is the yield of commercial wood that an ownership can produce continuously at a given intensity of management consistent with required environmental protection and which is professionally planned to achieve, over time, a balance between growth and harvest. Boggs Mountain Demonstration State Forest provides a good opportunity for development of silvicultural methods for managing-young growth ponderosa pine, ponderosa pine/Douglas-fir and Douglas-fir stands.
The economic tree selection type of cutting used before State acquisition was only incidentally or partially based on silvicultural considerations. Indiscriminate burning for land clearing and hunting was the rule for many years before the timber had value. The past practices have resulted in a forest composed of even aged stands. In the existing timber types, unit areas tend to be young saw timber, either timber, poles, saplings, or brush. Little to no reproduction is present under the saw timber or poles. Units of saplings and poles often have scattered overtopping residual seed trees. Brush sites have varying amounts of regeneration
ranging from none to adequate.
Overall, defect in pine species is low. However, wildfires prior to 1949 were largely responsible for the low quality and large amount of defect found in Douglas-fir.
Because the ponderosa pine, ponderosa pine/Douglas-fir timber types readily lend themselves to even-aged management, an even-aged management silvicultural system was deemed most appropriate for the management of the Forest in the 1986 management plan. Since then, even-aged systems have gained a poor reputation with the public.
Uneven-aged systems have become more common. Two ways to establish and maintain uneven-aged conditions are
single tree or small group selection harvest; both of these methods are used by BMDSF.
Group selection is used to avoid species conversion and to maintain species diversity, Larger openings (0.5-2.5 acre) are created to obtain pine regeneration rather than the more shade tolerant Douglas-fir which is favored by single tree selection. During marking for harvest, pine species are the preferred leave species to help create more pine regeneration. Artificial regeneration may supplement natural regeneration and will used to fill understocked areas in natural regeneration before brush becomes established on the site.
Other harvesting methods used to develop and maintain an all-aged forest composed of a mosaic of small even-aged aggregates and groups of trees and to achieve maximum sustained production are commercial thinning and sanitation-salvage.
Although timber harvesting would focus on the removal of conifers, some hardwoods may also be removed to prevent hardwoods from dominating the residual stands and keeping a balance of species.
Tractor logging is appropriate for BMDSF. The system is appropriate since over 95% of the timberland on the forest is under 50% slope[1] and has an existing tractor road network left over from past harvesting operations. Areas with slopes over 65% are small and reachable with a long line. Rubber tired skidders and track laying equipment may be utilized over most of the Forest. Horse logging has been done primarily for research and demonstration purposes, but may be used in the future.
