Is selective cutting or strip cutting better?

Is selective cutting or strip cutting better?

It depends on who you ask. According to NASA, clear cutting is much more damaging to a tropical rain forest because when all of the trees are removed, the soil loses its nutrients and becomes barren (NASA, 1998). However, according to Ashton, in some cases, it is better to clear-cut a forest than to selectively log it.

Is Strip cutting sustainable?

The strip clear-cutting system is not economically sustainable due to slow tree growth, low income from timber products, and high costs for this system. Cutting cycles longer than 40 years may be required to increase timber yields and make this system profitable.

What are disadvantages of clear-cutting?

Clearcutting cons:

• They look bad. Until the newly planted trees “green up” a hillside, a clearcut is not considered appealing to the general public.
• Habitat disturbance. Clearcutting alters the habitat where trees once stood, and forest wildlife is displaced into new areas.
• Increased stream flow.

What are the benefits of selective cutting?

When practiced correctly, selective cutting has the following benefits.

• Removes trees that are low quality while they are young.
• Removes some of the profitable mature growth.
• Allows more light to penetrate the upper story of growth.
• Allows trees that are shade intolerant to receive more light.

What locations are vulnerable to logging?

Although exact figures are difficult to calculate, given the illegal nature of the activity, decent estimates show that more than half of the logging that takes place globally is illegal, especially in open and vulnerable areas such as the Amazon Basin, Central Africa, Southeast Asia and the Russian Federation.

What are the 3 types of logging?

The Three Types of Logging Systems

• Clearcutting. Many large-scale logging companies use the clearcutting method to harvest timber.
• Shelterwood. Another common logging technique is the shelterwood system.
• Selective Cutting.

How long does it take a forest to recover from clear cutting?

How Long Does It Take A Forest To Recover From Clear-Cutting? Forest regeneration takes around thirty years on average. New saplings typically appear after five years after clear-cuts and grow about ten feet tall by the age of fifteen.

How does clear cutting cause floods?

After rainfall, water moves more rapidly out of the ecosystem. This results in larger flooding and greater property damage downstream from clear-cutting. Without shade, the snow melt becomes more rapid, increasing the spring flooding.

Is clear cutting illegal?

In California, clearcutting is no longer generally practiced on US Forest Service (public) lands due to the negative impacts on forest resources and wildlife habitat. However, California forestry laws and rules still allow clearcutting on private lands.

Does clear cutting affect soil?

Summary: Clear-cutting loosens up carbon stored in forest soils, increasing the chances it will return to the atmosphere as carbon dioxide and contribute to climate change, a new study shows. Carbon is stored in soil by binding only to certain soil structures.

How does clear cutting affect soil?

Clear-cutting loosens up carbon stored in forest soils, increasing the chances it will return to the atmosphere as carbon dioxide and contribute to climate change, a Dartmouth College study shows. The findings appear in the journal Soil Science. Soil is the world’s largest terrestrial carbon pool.

Is selective cutting profitable?

Although selective thinning doesn’t present the large-scale initial profit of other methods such as clear cutting, it can create a more productive and better yielding forest that provides a harvest every season.

What are the disadvantages of strip-cutting?

(Cons) Disadvantages of strip-cutting: • When the trees are cut, the seed source is lost. • Bare strips still allow for soil erosion and soil thinning. • Still destroys large sections of the ecosystem. • Not as efficient as clear-cutting, and therefore more expensive.

Is strip cutting a good alternative to clear cutting?

We believe that strip cutting is a very good alternative to clear cutting. Strip cutting maintains the biodiversity of the land a lot more than clear cutting does. However, strip cutting leads to habitat fragmentation, soil erosion, and water runoff because there are no more trees in that strip cut area.

How does strip cropping help stop soil erosion?

Strip cropping helps to stop soil erosion by creating natural dams for water, helping to preserve the strength of the soil. Certain layers of plants will absorb minerals and water from the soil more effectively than others.

What is strip cutting in forest management?

Strip Cutting. Strip cutting means to harvest trees in narrow strips to minimize damage and try to allow for natural forest regeneration. Heavy machinery is used, leaving sections between the strips uncut, especially among lakes and rivers to reduce soil and limit wind erosion.