Aldo Leopold said: “Harmony with the land is like harmony with a friend; you cannot cherish his right hand and chop off his left. That is to say, you cannot love game and hate predators…the Land is one organism.” If Aldo Leopold were still around, he might also agree with me that you cannot love softwoods and hate hardwoods for the same reason that you cannot love game and hate predators; moose might agree with the former, but not the latter. Moose might also agree with the recently released Chief Forester’s guidelines on stand- and landscape-level retention in forests now targeted for sanitation and salvage logging in spruce leading forests of the Omineca Region. Unfortunately, moose are having a hard time articulating what they’d like to see happening on the landscape, so I will attempt to speak for the moose (as Dr. Seuss’ Lorax did when he claimed he would speak for the trees). I suggest that moose are better served when we leave more mature forests for thermal and security cover and promote the growth of young mixed hardwood/softwood stands for foraging.  In essence, I will make an argument for why we should be practicing Jerry Franklin’s “1980s New Forestry” that urges us to “consider not only how much we take, but also how much we leave behind” and why this benefits not only moose, but also myriad other species.

This special presentation is being funded by the Fish and Wildlife Compensation Program. For those interested in listening to the presentation but who are unable to travel to Fort St John can join through Blue Jeans. Go to http://www.unbc.ca/nres-institute/colloquium-webcasts to view the presentation remotely. Please note that the 7 pm start time is Mountain Time - if joining in from Prince George the local start time is 6:00 pm. 

Past NRESi colloquium presentations and special lectures can be viewed on our video archive, available here.