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Webinar: Permanent retention of exceptional trees can improve ecosystem integrity in managed forests
December 3 @ 3:00 pm - 4:00 pm
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December 3, 2025
12:00 – 1:00 p.m. PT / 1:00 – 2:00 p.m. MT / 2:00 – 3:00 p.m. CT / 3:00 – 4:00 p.m. ET
Please join us for a webinar with Drs. Stephen Sillett and Marie Antoine (Cal Poly Humboldt) as they share research on the contributions of exceptional trees—the most robust, fastest-growing individuals—to stand-level productivity and biomass in managed forests.
The discussion will highlight recent work conducted across 20 locations where exceptional trees were paired with nearby co-dominant trees. Trees were climbed and cored at multiple heights for growth history reconstruction. The same areas were scanned with airborne lidar, and new algorithms were developed for crown-level canopy segmentation. Lidar data were linked with direct measurements to allow precise estimates of landscape-level aboveground biomass.
Findings show that exceptional trees grow faster than typical trees and contribute disproportionately to forest biomass, yet are largely restricted to creek drainages protected by forest practice rules. If long-term carbon storage and forest resilience are management priorities, then silvicultural approaches to restore more large trees across the landscape should be considered. Permanent protection for a subset of robust, undamaged trees is a twist on retention forestry well-suited to all forests where tree longevity exceeds rotation ages used in timber extraction. Setting exceptional trees aside now offers a hopeful action for the future