For those unfamiliar with the term “silviculture”, I’ll begin with a basic definition.

Silviculture is the art and science of managing a forest to maintain and enhance its productivity based upon the objectives of its owner and the ecological capabilities of the land.

Darren Doherty is hard at work over in our Black Wattle (Acacia mearnsii) and Sugar Gum (Eucalyptus cladocalyx) plantation which he designed and planted back in 1999. It’s pruning time for these trees, and so I popped by today to learn some more about silviculture and tree maintenance.

Darren is a fine educator, and conducts a variety of courses ranging from keyline design to silviculture, permaculture, earthworks and more.

So I’ve put this short video together in which he offers an introduction to tree pruning in silviculture. Also featured is a brief segment on the use of our Caravaggi Bio 150 wood chipper / hammer mill that we’re using to process the pruned branches. If you’re interested in learning more about Darren, visit his website at www.permaculture.biz.

Enjoy.

Darren Doherty dropped by today with his Logosol M7 portable one man mill today and gave us a quick demonstration of on-the-spot timber milling. Darren is quite fond of cypress pine - something that we have in abundance in the yard surrounding our house.

Until recently our cypress pine trees have been viewed with frustration. They have gotten quite old and recently two large trees have fallen during storms. One of these trees fell through and destroyed the roof of our shed. So we must decide the fate of these trees and the easy option (which too many people choose) is to fell and burn them. But there is better way!

I shot and edited a 10 minute video of Darren demonstrating this fine piece of equipment. This device can easily turn - what many see as junk - into highly valuable materials.

Enjoy.