Weiskittel quoted in CBC report on fast-growing trees on Crown plantations

Aaron Weiskittel, an associate professor of forest biometrics and modeling and the Irving chair of forest ecosystem management at the University of Maine, was quoted in a CBC report about faster tree growth on Crown plantations, or replanted conservation land, in New Brunswick, Canada. A recent decision was made to place conservation protection on 150,000 hectares of land after it had been removed several years earlier. New Brunswick government forecasters are projecting much higher yields of wood from replanted areas on Crown land than previously thought, the report states. The province has not provided official statistics on wood yields from the land. But researchers have explored the benefits of improved management strategies. Weiskittel is developing a model for forecasting wood yields in the Acadian forest, according to CBC. He said recent projections from properly managed plantation forests in both areas show a 200 to 300 percent increase in productive wood over yields from just natural growth. “I think they’ve learned from the past and have really good plantations,” he said of New Brunswick forecasting. “I would not be surprised if they would be over-yielding what expectations were. I think you are going to see even higher over-yielding in the years to come.”