Victoria Park, Tree Planting Project in Nova Scotia (2020)

Our organization did quite a bit of tree planting work in Truro this past September (2020).  Truro is located in central Nova Scotia, and is often referred to as "the hub of Nova Scotia."  From Truro, highways branch out in all directions to other points within the province.  Truro is a small town which has an official population of only about twelve thousand people, but when you count everyone within a fifteen minute drive of the town, the number is probably closer to fifty thousand.  That may not sound like much to anyone who lives elsewhere in a dense urban area.  But Truro also has something else rather special.  It has a municipal park, called Victoria Park.  And that park is over three thousand acres in size!  The people of Truro are extremely lucky to have access to such a large and beautiful park, located right inside the town limits.

But exactly how big is three thousand acres?  Well, to put it into perspective, New York City's famed Central Park is less than a thousand acres.  And Central Park has its own police precinct (the 22nd) which polices the 58km of pedestrian trails found there.  Victoria Park also has an extensive trail network.

Here's an overview graphic of eastern Canada, showing the location of Victoria Park:

When we contacted Victoria Park to discuss the possibility of planting some trees there, we soon discovered that there were several areas which could definitely benefit.  There were a few sections where trees had been removed after being killed by insects.  Also, the former municipal landfill (now decommissioned) was relatively barren.  Although some parts of the topsoil cap over the landfill had already been replanted several years ago by the Scouts and other organizations, there was still a great deal of work to be done.

Here's a photo of the truck and trailer, loaded and ready to go for a day of planting:

After meeting with the park forester, and taking a tour, it appeared that there could be as much as fifty to sixty acres of open ground that was suitable for afforestation efforts.  The majority of that area was at the old landfill site, but there was still a significant amount of ground near the head of some of the main recreational trails.  We decided to initially target most of the recreational trailhead areas in 2020, taking account of the realization that this project would obviously require a multi-year approach spread out over two or perhaps even three years.

We spent several days working on-site.  For phase one, in September of 2020, we planted approximately fifteen thousand trees, which was sufficient to cover the majority of the trailhead area.  Here's an overview of that section of the park.  I've circled the areas that the Replant.ca Environmental organization has covered so far:

Those fifteen thousand trees reflected a fairly diverse mix, including four types of conifers (red spruce, white spruce, Jack pine, and a small number of eastern larch) plus six deciduous species (white birch, yellow birch, sugar maple, red maple, mountain ash, and red oak).  Our goal was to ensure that the planted sections grow up looking like a real forest, rather than just a straight pine or spruce monoculture.

We also planted a smaller number of trees in the landfill area, although those were mostly just conifers.  Here's a photo showing the location of those trees:

When we return to continue our work in the fall of 2021, our first priority will be to finish planting the remaining areas within the west side of the trailhead area.  After that, we'll start to tackle the larger landfill areas (and the open patch to the north of those areas) with a similar diverse mix of at least ten or twelve different species.  In addition to the species that we planted in 2020, we expect that we'll be able to add eastern white pine, eastern hemlock, and several additional new deciduous species.

Here's a photo of Dee, finishing up some survey work a day before we started planting the seedlings:

The first phase of planting on this project went very smoothly.  We typically get a number of curious passersby any time we're working in any sort of a park, but the pedestrian and cyclist traffic on this project was incredible.  We got to talk to dozens of people each day about the work that we were doing.  We're really looking forward to going back to this project in 2021.

If you'd like to learn more about Truro's Victoria Park, visit their website:

www.victoriaparktruro.ca

Victoria Park is the #1 rated attraction in Truro, and has over fifteen hundred very positive reviews on Google.

Update for 2021:  If you're looking for information about Phase 2 of this project, planted in 2021, visit this link:

replant-environmental.blogspot.com/2021/10/tree-planting-project-in-victoria-park.html

Thanks for reading!

- Jonathan Clark

www.replant-environmental.ca

Replant.ca Environmental is a Canadian company that plants trees for carbon capture and builds community forests.  We also plant trees in national, provincial, and municipal public parks to mitigate damage from wildfires, storms, insects, and forest diseases.  We operate thanks to numerous small contributions from the general public, in addition to larger project sponsorships from businesses and corporations around the world.  If you'd like to learn how to show your support, visit our donations page.  Even if you aren't able to make a contribution, we very much appreciate when people are able to share our posts or our website link on social media, to help spread the word about the work that we're doing!

To learn more about the various species that we plant, visit the conifers page or the deciduous (hardwoods) page on our website.  Thanks so much for your interest!

Incidentally, our organization is often seeking additional land for our carbon capture projects.  Please visit this link if you might know of a recently-harvested property that we could rebuild into a permanent legacy forest.

Five Islands Provincial Park, Environmental Tree Planting Project

Our work at Five Islands Provincial Park has been a multi-year project.  This blog post was written as a review of our initial efforts in 2020.  We have an updated post about our 2021 work at this link.  However, if you're curious about the work that we did in 2020, please read on ...

 

Our organization did some tree planting work at the Five Islands Provincial Park this past September (2020).

This provincial park is located in north central Nova Scotia, on the north side of the Minas Basin.  This is on the south side of the arm that connects most of mainland Nova Scotia with New Brunswick.  The town of Truro is about an hour to the east.  Here's an overview graphic of eastern Canada, showing the location of this park:

This project was put together to initiate afforestation on some open areas, and to repair some of the extensive damage done by Hurricane Dorian in 2019.  This storm battered central Nova Scotia quite strongly, and was the costliest storm in history when it came to damages to the provincial power grid.

Damages within the park were not as bad as in some of Nova Scotia's other provincial parks.  However, since there were open areas in the park from previous insect damage, this park was a prime candidate for the planting of some new seedlings.  When we offered to assist with this work, the park staff were very happy to accommodate.

The park foresters estimated that a series of openings along the upper sides of Camping Area B would be amenable to the addition of seedlings.  We decided that this project would be approached in two phases.  We would plant several thousand trees in the fall of 2020, and follow that up with a second phase of planting in the fall of 2021 to complete the project.

Before our team arrived on site, we were given some maps outlining the approximate area that the foresters recommended we focus on.  For context, here is one of those maps:

The first day that we arrived on site was cool and somewhat overcast, with high humidity in the air.  We were given a tour of the area, and we spent some time with the local forester doing a final review of the areas which would be covered.  This project was completed over a three-day span.  The second day of planting was sunny with cloudy periods.  The final day was rainy.  While some people don't like to work in the rain, we always like to see our new seedlings getting watered right away.

The ground covered was generally a shallow slope, with a full cover of vegetation and a few existing juvenile conifers.  Here are two representative photos:

Our species mix for this project included a total of seven species.  We had three conifers (red spruce, eastern white pine, and eastern hemlock), and four species of deciduous hardwoods (sugar maple, red oak, mountain ash, and yellow birch).  We planted almost nine thousand trees in this park in 2020, and will double that number in 2021.

Here's a photo of Chris (the head forester at the park), examining some of our red oak stock:

Here's a photo of some of the sugar maple seedlings that we planted:

Here are a few more photos taken while working on this project, including the welcome sign at the front entrance, a photo of myself (Jonathan) getting ready to plant some trees, a tree with a large burl, and three photos taken down near the beach:

The first phase of planting on this project went very smoothly.  We're looking forward to returning during the fall of 2021 to finish the work!  A post about that work will be linked here in late 2021.

If you'd like to learn more about the Five Island Provincial Park, visit their web page:

parks.novascotia.ca/park/five-islands

Thanks for reading!

- Jonathan Clark

www.replant-environmental.ca

Replant.ca Environmental is a Canadian company that plants trees for carbon capture and builds community forests.  We also plant trees in national, provincial, and municipal public parks to mitigate damage from wildfires, storms, insects, and forest diseases.  We operate thanks to numerous small contributions from the general public, in addition to larger project sponsorships from businesses and corporations around the world.  If you'd like to learn how to show your support, visit our donations page.  Even if you aren't able to make a contribution, we very much appreciate when people are able to share our posts or our website link on social media, to help spread the word about the work that we're doing!

To learn more about the various species that we plant, visit the conifers page or the deciduous (hardwoods) page on our website.  Thanks so much for your interest!

Incidentally, our organization is often seeking additional land for our carbon capture projects.  Please visit this link if you might know of a recently-harvested property that we could rebuild into a permanent legacy forest.

Blomidon Provincial Park, Environmental Tree Planting Project

Our work at Blomidon provincial park has been a multi-year project.  This blog post was written as a review of our efforts in 2020.  We have an updated blog post about our 2021 work at this link.  However, if you're curious about the work that we did in 2020, please read on ...

 

Our organization did some tree planting work in Blomidon Provincial Park this past September (2020).  Here's a photo taken from the front end of the park, overlooking the waters of the Minas Basin in the Bay of Fundy:

 

 

 This provincial park is located slightly west of central Nova Scotia, in a very picturesque part of the province.  The park is located just north of Canning, and just 20km from the town of Wolfville (home to Acadia University).  It overlooks the highest tides in the world.  Here's an overview graphic showing the location of the park:

This project was initiated to repair some of the extensive damage done by Hurricane Dorian in 2019.

Here's a photo, taken coming into the park:

Dorian hit central Nova Scotia on September 7th, 2019.  Eighty percent of the residents of the province lost power, and in the aftermath, Dorian turned out to be tied for being the strongest hurricane in recorded history to have ever hit Atlantic Canada.  The destruction was widespread.

Damage within Blomidon Park was extensive.  The park staff did an excellent job of cleaning up the mess, but the open spaces that resulted invited some further restoration work.  We discussed our desire to assist with this work, and the park staff were very happy to accommodate.

The park foresters estimated that approximately five acres (two hectares) of the core camping area within the park had been hit the hardest.  In addition, there was another five acre section in front of the camping area that had been cleaned out several years earlier (due to an insect problem) and that area could also use more trees.  Beyond that, there were some other isolated areas that would also benefit from reforestation work.  We decided that this project would be approached in two phases.  We would start by planting several thousand seedlings in the fall of 2020, and follow that up with a second phase of planting in the fall of 2021 to complete the project.

Before our team arrived on site, we were given some maps outlining the approximate area that the foresters recommended we focus upon.  For context, here is one of those maps:

This photo shows two areas highlighted in red.  The section on the left is the older area that was damaged by insects.  Some trees had been planted in that area several years ago, but the coverage was sporadic and there was certainly room for more.  The section circled in red on the right side of that photo shows the main camping area, prior to the devastation by the hurricane.

The day that we arrived on site was sunny yet humid.  We were given a tour of the area, and we spent some time doing a final review of the areas which should be targeted as the highest priority for our seedlings.

Our species mix on the first phase of this project was very basic.  We only brought in two types of trees, red spruce and white pine, in order to start planting a base layer throughout the main camping area within the park.  Some of these trees were planted in open ground where the previous mature trees had been completely destroyed and removed.  Other seedlings were planted in partial understory adjacent to camp sites, which again had suffered some wind damage.  Red spruce and eastern white pine are both fairly shade tolerant, and represented a very suitable choice for phase one.

Here's a photo showing our tree trailer.  We brought a full load of five thousand trees to get the project started:

We prioritized the camping area, as already noted, to ensure that our base layer of red spruce and eastern white pine could be completed in 2020.  Once those areas were finished, we still had some trees left over, so we were able to plant part of the area that was damaged by insects several years ago.  That area has started to regenerate partially.  Some of the trees in that area had been planted, and others are the result of natural regeneration.  The trees and brush in this area were quite patchy.  In some parts, the trees were looking quite healthy and were taller than we were.  In many other places, we only found consistent brush up to our waist.  You can see some of the area that I'm referring to in the background of this photo:

The first phase of planting on this project went very smoothly.  We're looking forward to returning in 2021 to finish the work.  We expect to bring several deciduous (hardwood) species when we return.

If you'd like to learn more about Blomidon Provincial Park, visit their website:

parks.novascotia.ca/park/blomidon

 

Thanks for reading!

Jonathan Clark

www.replant-environmental.ca

 

Replant.ca Environmental is a Canadian company that plants trees for carbon capture and builds community forests.  We also plant trees in national, provincial, and municipal public parks to mitigate damage from wildfires, storms, insects, and forest diseases.  We operate thanks to numerous small contributions from the general public, in addition to larger project sponsorships from businesses and corporations around the world.  If you'd like to learn how to show your support, visit our donations page.  Even if you aren't able to make a contribution, we very much appreciate when people are able to share our posts or our website link on social media, to help spread the word about the work that we're doing!

To learn more about the various species that we plant, visit the conifers page or the deciduous (hardwoods) page on our website.  Thanks so much for your interest!

Incidentally, our organization is often seeking additional land for our carbon capture projects.  Please visit this link if you might know of a recently-harvested property that we could rebuild into a permanent legacy forest.

Caribou Provincial Park, Environmental Tree Planting Project

Our work in Caribou/Monroes Island Provincial Park has been a multi-year project.  This blog post was written as a review of our efforts in 2020.  We have an updated blog post about our 2021 work at this link.  However, if you're curious about the work that we did in 2020, please read on ...

 

Our organization did some tree planting work in Caribou-Munroes Island Provincial Park this past September (of 2020).

 

This provincial park is located on the north shore of Nova Scotia, near Pictou.  Here's an overview graphic of eastern Canada, showing the location of this park:

 

This project was put together to repair some of the extensive damage done by Hurricane Dorian in 2019.

Here's an aerial photo of the park, taken before the hurricane:

 

The hurricane hit on September 7th, 2019.  Here's another aerial photo, taken after the hurricane:

Damage within the park was extensive.  The park staff did an excellent job of cleaning up the mess, but the open spaces then invited some restoration work.  We discussed our desire to assist with this work, and the park staff were very happy to accommodate.

The park foresters estimated that approximately fifteen acres (six hectares) of the core camping area within the park had been hit the hardest, with lesser damages elsewhere.  We decided that this project would be approached in two phases.  We would plant several thousand trees in the fall of 2020, and follow that up with a second phase of planting in the fall of 2021 to complete the project.

Before our team arrived on site, we were given some maps outlining the approximate area that the foresters recommended we focus upon.  For context, here is one of them:

This photo was taken prior to the devastation by the hurricane.

The first day that we arrived on site was cool and clear, a crisp day in the middle of September.  We were given a tour of the area, and we spent some time doing a final review of the areas which should be targeted as the highest priority for new seedlings.

Our species mix for this project for 2020 included a total of eight species.  We had two conifers (red spruce and eastern white pine), and we had six species of deciduous hardwoods (white birch, yellow birch, sugar maple, red maple, mountain ash, and red oak).  We had also hoped to be able to plant some eastern hemlock in these areas, but due to a seedling shortage, we decided that the eastern hemlock could be added in a second sweep through the same areas in 2021.  When we return in 2021, we also expect that we will probably have some additional hardwood species that were not available to us in 2020.  If that's the case, we will be able to sprinkle those trees through the already-planted areas, to enhance the diversity.

Here's a photo showing our tree trailer.  We brought five thousand trees to get this project started:

Here's a photo showing one of the sugar maple seedlings (left) and a red maple seedling (right):

The first phase of planting on this project went very smoothly.  We're looking forward to returning in 2021 to finish the larger phase of the work that is needed.

If you'd like to learn more about Caribou-Munroes Island Provincial Park, visit their website:

parks.novascotia.ca/park/caribou-munroes-island

Thanks for reading!

- Jonathan Clark

www.replant-environmental.ca

Replant.ca Environmental is a Canadian company that plants trees for carbon capture and builds community forests.  We also plant trees in national, provincial, and municipal public parks to mitigate damage from wildfires, storms, insects, and forest diseases.  We operate thanks to numerous small contributions from the general public, in addition to larger project sponsorships from businesses and corporations around the world.  If you'd like to learn how to show your support, visit our donations page.  Even if you aren't able to make a contribution, we very much appreciate when people are able to share our posts or our website link on social media, to help spread the word about the work that we're doing!

To learn more about the various species that we plant, visit the conifers page or the deciduous (hardwoods) page on our website.  Thanks so much for your interest!

Incidentally, our organization is often seeking additional land for our carbon capture projects.  Please visit this link if you might know of a recently-harvested property that we could rebuild into a permanent legacy forest.

The Sugar Maple tree (Acer saccharum)

Today's post will be talking about the sugar maple tree.  The Latin name for this species is Acer saccharum.  This tree is sometimes referred to as the sweet maple, curly maple, or rock maple.

While many Canadians immediate think of the red maple when they think of maple trees, this probably isn't the case if you're from Quebec.  That's because the sugar maple is the main source of maple sap, which is distilled to make Canada's famous maple syrup!  Of course, maple syrup can also be made from the sap of red maple and black maple trees, but sugar maple is unquestionably the best choice.  Incidentally, if you've never heard of black maple, some people consider it to be a distinct species, and others consider it to be just a variety of sugar maple.

Within Canada, the range of the sugar maple is a very close overlap to the range of red maple.  Here's a range map courtesy of Wikipedia:

If you're familiar with the range of red maple in the US, you'll immediately notice that sugar maple has a much smaller range.  Sugar maple is not as tolerant of heat as red maple, so it's not found in southern ranges.  This may be a problem someday.  While red maple will probably continue to thrive in our climate as temperatures increase, sugar maple will have a harder time.  Sugar maple needs cooler temperatures.

Sugar maples grow to be about the same size as (or just slightly larger than) red maples.  A mature tree can often grow to thirty or even thirty-five meters in height (100-115 feet), and can be a meter (three feet) in diameter near the base of the tree.  However, sugar maples generally live to be quite a bit older than red maples.  It isn't uncommon for a sugar maple to live 200 years or more.

Sugar maples are quite fast growing, like red maples.  A sugar maple can easily grow to five meters in height (15-18 feet) in less than a decade.  However, unlike red maples, which start producing seed after just four or five years, the sugar maple doesn't start producing seeds for about thirty years!

The leaves of the sugar maple are unlike the red maple, because sugar maple leaves are not serrated.  They do, however, have points on the ends of each lobe.  Although the leaf on the Canadian flag is a generic stylized maple, it is very close to the shape of the sugar maple.  Here's a photo:

Sugar maples are an important economic tree for many Canadians.  Canada produces more than seventy percent of the world's maple syrup, and ninety percent of that comes from Quebec.  If you've never spent a day working in a sugar shack, you're missing out!

The sugar maple's sugar content is usually rated around 2.0 or slightly higher.  This means that the sap is 2.0% sugar.  When the sap is boiled, most of the extra water needs to be boiled off, strengthening the concentration of sugar.  If you start with about forty litres of sap before boiling it down, you're left with only about a litre remaining by the time the sugar is concentrated enough to be a good syrup.  Since a single mature tree only produces anywhere from twenty to sixty litres of sap in a harvest year, you can often only produce roughly one full 1-litre jug of maple syrup from a mature tree.

Here are a few fun facts about sugar maples:

1.  The oldest known sugar maple is a tree known as the "Comfort Tree."  It's located in North Pelham (in Ontario's Niagara region) and it is estimated to be around 500 years old.  This tree is a protected heritage tree.

2.  When the leaves change colour in the fall, sometimes the leaves of the sugar maple will change past a bright red and turn a deep purple before they then turn brown.

3.  Sugar maples produce huge numbers of seeds.  It's a good thing that they do, since a lot of small animals seek these seeds as a preferred source of food.  If you want to have rabbits and other small animals in your yard, plant some sugar maples!  Just remember that it takes a long time before they'll bear seed.

At Replant.ca Environmental, we frequently include sugar maples in our species mixes, especially when planting in public parks and higher-visibility sites.  They are a beautiful tree, and since they grow faster than many conifers, they're very visible within new forests during the months that they have leaves.  Here's a photo of some of the sugar maple seedlings that we were planting on several of our projects this past fall:

Thanks for reading!

- Jonathan "Scooter" Clark

www.replant-environmental.ca

Replant.ca Environmental is a Canadian company that plants trees for carbon capture and builds community forests.  We also plant trees in national, provincial, and municipal public parks to mitigate damage from wildfires, storms, insects, and forest diseases.  We operate thanks to numerous small contributions from the general public, in addition to larger project sponsorships from businesses and corporations around the world.  If you'd like to learn how to show your support, visit our donations page.  Even if you aren't able to make a contribution, we very much appreciate when people are able to share our posts or our website link on social media, to help spread the word about the work that we're doing!

Teachers are welcome to use content from this post for their classes.  If you know a teacher who might like to use this information, please share it with them!  The more that people learn about trees, the better our world will be.

To learn more about the various species that we plant, visit the conifers page or the deciduous (hardwoods) page on our website.  Thanks so much for your interest!

Incidentally, our organization is often seeking additional land for our carbon capture projects.  Please visit this link if you might know of a recently-harvested property that we could rebuild into a permanent legacy forest.

The Red Maple tree (Acer rubrum)

Today we'll talk about the red maple tree, which many people think of as "Canada's tree."  After all, a red-coloured generic maple leaf is featured on Canada's national flag.  The Latin name for the red maple is the Acer rubrum.  Some people also refer to this species as the water maple, the swamp maple, or the soft maple.

Red maple gets its name due to the brilliant red colour of the leaves before they drop in the fall.  Here's a photo of a red maple, which stands out brilliantly in the early fall when surrounded by other species with leaves that stay green.

Even though many Canadians think of the red maple as "our" tree, it only grows throughout parts of Canada.  Its range in the US is much larger!  In Canada, red maple can be found very commonly throughout southern Ontario, southern Quebec, and the Maritime provinces.  However, in the US, the range extends through all of the northeastern and southeastern parts of the country, right down to the southern tip of Florida and west into Texas.  That's great, because if global warming raises our average temperatures in Canada in the next few decades, the red maple (and many other hardwoods) will thrive.  Here's a range map, courtesy of Wikipedia:

This species can grow to be a fairly large tree.  It is common for mature trees to be as much as thirty meters in height (100 feet) and to have a diameter at breast height that is a full meter thick (three feet).  Of course, a tree grown in the open can have an even thicker trunk than one grown in a forest, which is the case with most species.

Red maple has a fairly thin bark.  It is easy for this bark to become damaged by animals or other reasons, in which case fungi may be able to get into the tree, eventually leading to heart rot of the core of the tree.  Although this maple can grow to be fairly large, it is not an extremely long lasting tree like many conifers.  A mature red maple will often live for more than a century when left alone, but this is still not as long as species such as red spruce or eastern white pine.

Red maple has an ability to thrive in many types of ecosystems.  It's a pioneer species, coming in rapidly after a forest has been disturbed.  Thanks to its versatility, it can grow in direct sunlight or shade, in elevations from sea level to almost a thousand meters (3000 feet), in a wide pH range for soil acidity, and in everything from dry ground to poorly drained swamps.  In fact, its ability to thrive in swampy areas is why it is often referred to as water maple or swamp maple.

As a forest matures, it is common for the red maples to eventually die out and be replaced by shade-tolerant succession species.  However, due to widespread die-off of American elms and American chestnuts during the last couple of centuries, red maple is slowly becoming a more important component of mature forests throughout the eastern United States.

The leaves of the red maple are a very distinct feature of the species, as we've already mentioned.  Here's a photo of some leaves before they start to turn colour in the fall:

And of course, you can compare their shape as being somewhat similar to that of the Canadian flag:

 

I should note that the maple leaf on the Canadian flag is NOT actually the red maple.  It's a generic or stylized maple design, sort of a blend between red and sugar and a few other maples.  There are about ten types of maple trees in Canada.

Red maple leaves have a very distinct shape.  They also have slightly serrated edges, which helps distinguish them from the leaves of other maples.  In the fall, as they are getting ready to die and fall from the tree, they lose their green colour and turn yellow/orange and sometimes to a bright red.  Trees with male flowers are more likely to turn a brilliant red than trees with female flowers.  Also, trees in colder areas (further north, higher elevation) are also more likely to be be a bright red instead of a more subdued orange.

One drawback with red maples:  If you have horses, don't plant red maples in their paddocks or pastures.  The leaves are toxic to horses.

Here are a few fun facts about red maple trees:

1.  The red maple is the state tree of Rhode Island.  Rhode Islanders love their reds, it seems.  Their state bird is the red hen, and even the name Rhode Island comes from a Dutch reference to "reddish."  That could refer to the reddish clay, or it may refer to the reddish colour of the maples.

2.  Wood ducks often like to nest inside the cavities of swamp maples.

3.  Red maples grow quite quickly, and can start producing seed when they are just four or five years old.

4.  Red maple seeds are called samara, which is a seed type that means "dried fruit with wing."  The seeds grow on the tree in pairs.  As they fall, they separate and rotate slowly to the ground.  This means that the wind is able to carry the seeds a fair distance away from the tree, to help propagate the species more widely.  These seeds are fairly large (about an inch long) and are quite easy to spot.  Here's a photo of a connected pair:

At Replant.ca Environmental, we sometimes plant red maple seedlings.  There's no need to plant them in harvested or damaged areas that held red maple previously, because they regenerate quite well naturally.  However, it can be helpful to plant this type of tree as part of a broader species mix in some afforestation projects where natural regen is unlikely, such as when turning unused pastureland back to forest.  Here's a photo of some of the red maple seedlings that we were planting on several of our projects this past fall:

Thanks for reading!

- Jonathan Clark

www.replant-environmental.ca

Replant.ca Environmental is a Canadian company that plants trees for carbon capture and builds community forests.  We also plant trees in national, provincial, and municipal public parks to mitigate damage from wildfires, storms, insects, and forest diseases.  We operate thanks to numerous small contributions from the general public, in addition to larger project sponsorships from businesses and corporations around the world.  If you'd like to learn how to show your support, visit our donations page.  Even if you aren't able to make a contribution, we very much appreciate when people are able to share our posts or our website link on social media, to help spread the word about the work that we're doing!

Teachers are welcome to use content from this post for their classes.  If you know a teacher who might like to use this information, please share it with them!  The more that people learn about trees, the better our world will be. 

To learn more about the various species that we plant, visit the conifers page or the deciduous (hardwoods) page on our website.  Thanks so much for your interest! 

 

Incidentally, our organization is often seeking additional land for our carbon capture projects.  Please visit this link if you might know of a recently-harvested property that we could rebuild into a permanent legacy forest.

The Balsam Fir tree (Abies balsamea)

Today's post is about the balsam fir tree.  The Latin name is Abies balsamea.  This tree is found very commonly throughout eastern and central North America, and though parts of the northeastern US.  This tree is known by several alternative names in different regions, such as blister fir, silver pine (a name which really confuses some people), northern balsam, Canada balsam, eastern fir, and the balm fir.  The last name refers to balm of Gilead, a medicinal perfume described in the Bible.  This name is very deceiving since the biblical perfume was derived from a completely different species found in the Middle East, which is quite unlike balsam fir.

Here's a photo of showing some juvenile balsam fir trees on our Walker Road Managed Forest project:

As mentioned, the balsam fir can be found easily throughout central and eastern Canada.  Here's a range map, courtesy of Wikipedia:

In New Brunswick, balsam fir allegedly comprises twenty percent of all the trees found in the forests throughout the province.  That's a enormous presence for just one single species.  And it's impact on logging is even greater, as twenty-two percent of all harvested trees are balsam fir.  Those numbers came from this CBC article:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/new-brunswick/forests-nb-anthony-taylor-balsam-firs-1.5486499

Certainly, balsam fir is of huge value to the lumber industry throughout eastern Canada.  It's a great option for pulpwood, and can also be used for some types of plywood and OSB products.

Before I go further, I'll clarify that I'm not a huge fan of planting balsam fir with respect to environmental reasons.  For one thing, it has a short life span.  It also has a very high success rate when it comes to natural regeneration after land is harvested, so there isn't much need to go to the effort of planting it.  Despite this, we occasionally plant small numbers of this species in some park projects, and in areas where natural regen is not a factor.  Even though we don't utilize it much for Replant.ca Environmental projects, balsam fir is planted quite frequently in post-harvest commercial work through eastern and Atlantic Canada.  Let's look at the physiological attributes of this species though, to understand more about the tree.

First of all, balsam fir is a true fir (as indicated by the genus Abies) rather than a false fir (such as Douglas fir).

Balsam fir is a pioneer species.  It tolerates shade, but loves sunlight.  If you travel along a logging road or highway, you'll probably see hundreds of tightly-packed young conifers along the road edges and in the ditches (such as the photo at the top of this post).  Most of these trees are balsam fir.  They take advantage of strong sunlight and grow very readily compared to spruce and many other conifers.  They also survive for quite a few years in very high density, with trees growing successfully just a few inches apart, although some of these clusters will die eventually.  You'll probably also see hundreds of tiny balsam fir germinants if you walk through any mature wooded area that contains even just a few trees, although if the overhead canopy is closed, most of these trees won't survive.  Spruce trees, hemlock, and cedar almost always win the race in shaded areas.

Balsam fir regenerates very easily, as I already mentioned.  In some places, it comes in thicker than a shag carpet.  It's not the fastest growing tree, usually putting on about a foot of height per year, although it seems to grow more quickly than spruce.  However, it has a short life span.  In theory, it can live to be a few centuries old.  However, they very frequently seem to die off very early, with large numbers of them dying by the time they are forty or fifty years old.  This of course is a problem, because a hardier species could have been planted there which will grow larger and last for centuries (and have better carbon uptake).  On some parts of some of the projects that we're managing, pre-existing balsam fir account for more than sixty percent of the trees, and the vast majority of them are dying.  This is also a bit of a safety hazard for recreational users.  We've spent several weeks this fall cleaning out a lot of the standing dead fir trees on one of our projects, leaving all the healthy spruce and hardwoods, and we'll do an eight-species underplant project through that particular area in 2021.

I'm not entirely certain what kills off so many balsam fir in the Maritime provinces.  Perhaps it is the spruce budworm.  Perhaps it is the balsam wooly adelgid.  It may also be a fungi that targets balsam fir.  More likely it is a combination of all three of these problems.  Certainly, the fact that balsam fir prefers much colder weather is an issue for the local fir population.  If any arborists read this and have insights, I'd love to see comments.  Here's a photo of a fairly young (50 year old) balsam fir that I'm removing from our Walker Road project for safety reasons.  You can see how rotten and unhealthy the tree has become:

Here's another photo of a younger and much smaller balsam fir.  Again, this one is rotten to the core:

Incidentally, it is common to see Old Man's Beard lichens on balsam fir.  These are definitely not what is hurting the trees!  This lichen (which is actually a fungus and an alga growing symbiotically in a relationship with each other) only uses the tree as a surface to grow on.  It doesn't draw nutrients from the host tree, nor does it interact with it.  The only reason that many people think it's hurting the trees is because the tree was dying first, and as needles are lost, it's easier for sunlight to get into the canopy, which encourages growth of the Old Man's Beard.  The fungus part of this lichen provides the visible structure, and embedded within it is the alga.  The alga are single celled organisms that photosynthesize in the sunlight and produce food for the lichen.  The water and nutrients needed by Old Man's Beard come entirely from the air around it.  Here's a photo of some Old Man's Beard, taken in our Walker Road Managed Forest:

Back to the balsam fir, this doesn't typically develop into a large tree.  A mature tree will rarely exceed 20 meters in height (65 feet).  What is more interesting is the needles and bark.  The needles are fairly flat, and stand out because if you look closely, the bottom side has two long white bands running up and down the length of the needle.  When the tree is still a juvenile, the bark is quite smooth (usually a grey or silver in colour) and has lots of blisters (full of resin).  Sometimes these blisters will pop, and the resin is quite sticky if you get some on you.  Here's a photo of some balsam fir needles:

Here are a few fun facts about the balsam fir:

1.  It is the provincial tree of New Brunswick.  That's fitting, considering how common it is, and how important it is to that province's economy.

2.  Balsam fir is a very popular choice for Christmas trees.  Large plantations of balsam fir are grown somewhat like vegetables, with careful pruning and maintenance to ensure a balanced and symmetrical shape before they are harvested and sold.  They have the strongest pleasant fragrance of any species used for Christmas trees.

3.  The needles of the balsam fir can be boiled into a tea.  This tea is quite healthy because the needles contain a lot of Vitamin C.  Balsam tea is reputed to have kept many early explorers from contracting scurvy.

4.  Balsam fir is VERY tolerant of cold!  This species can live in areas where winter temperatures consistently drop to well below -40 degrees for extended periods of time.  Many species cannot tolerate this kind of cold, and there are only about a dozen types of trees in Canada that grow in areas with extreme cold.  Balsam fir is one of the hardiest.

It's likely that some of the die-off of balsam fir that we see at low elevations in southern New Brunswick may also be related to this last point.  Balsam fir is better suited for colder climates.  The balsam fir forests of the Maritimes and southern Canada may be in great danger if global temperatures warm up by several degrees in the future.

Even though we plant very small quantities of balsam fir on our environmental projects, it's great to have a better understanding of this common North American tree.

Thanks for reading!

- Jonathan Clark

www.replant-environmental.ca

Replant.ca Environmental is a Canadian company that plants trees for carbon capture and builds community forests.  We also plant trees in national, provincial, and municipal public parks to mitigate damage from wildfires, storms, insects, and forest diseases.  We operate thanks to numerous small contributions from the general public, in addition to larger project sponsorships from businesses and corporations around the world.  If you'd like to learn how to show your support, visit our donations page.  Even if you aren't able to make a contribution, we very much appreciate when people are able to share our posts or our website link on social media, to help spread the word about the work that we're doing!

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