Beech management and control in the context of beech leaf disease
October 22 @ 9:30 am - 3:00 pm
Start time where you are: Your time zone couldn't be detected. Try reloading the page.
October 22, 2024
9:30 a.m. – 3:00 p.m. ET
Varney Memorial Building
24 Veterans Highway Brooks, ME 04921
The event is free and lunch will be provided.
New England Forestry Foundation will co-host this event with the E D Bessey and Son company.
This event will include several presentations indoors and then a field visit to the managed forests of the E D Bessey and Son company in Brooks, Maine. 4WD is preferable for accessing the field sites but carpooling will be posssible. Learn about the prospects for beech health and survival under the double pressure of beech bark and beech leaf diseases, and what approaches are being researched to maintain some healthy beech in the landscape. Then we will see a decade of field experiments in working forests to diversify stands dominated by low-vigor beech towards a broader range of commercial species.
Part of the event will take place on E D Bessey and Son company lands, where we will see how they have been trying to diversify beech-dominated stands using silviculture and vegetation control. In the morning we will hear from the leading experts on beech leaf disease from the US and Maine Forest Services about current understanding of beech leaf disease dynamics, mortality and survival, and how they are experimenting with keeping a healthy component of beech in the landscape.
We think this event will be useful for foresters and landowners who want a holistic understanding of beech management: both how we can help this species survive in northeastern forests, but also how to manage for more diversity when unhealthy beech sprouts have come to dominate a stand.