Marking Timber

A small excerpt from this interesting article:

"You spend all day weaving your way back and forth through the hardwood forest, examining each tree in turn and deciding whether it should live or die. You repeat this each day, considering perhaps 30,000 or 40,000 trees and selecting perhaps 300 of them to mark with a blue paint spot. Each decision involves factors such as age, size, health, soil, slope, aspect, economic value, competition, potential growth, wildlife values, and more. You calculate all these in your forestry-educated brain. You raise your paint gun to deliver the death sentence, and then something unnamable crawls up from your belly and asks: Is this the right thing to do? How well does this action fit into the natural flow of the forest? What harm is this causing? What does this have to do with me? What is the best way to balance your love for the forest, your desire to keep it healthy and functioning well for wildlife and other benefits, and your need and the landowner’s desire to earn money?"

Northern Woodlands - Marking Timber