Environmental Sustainability

Westwind strives to manage the French-Severn forest in an environmentally sustainable way. From planning to operations, ensuring that the forest and forest values will be present and healthy in the future is incorporated at each stage.

The planning process incorporates modelling which helps to determine the level and type of harvesting that will allow adequate forest habitat and values for the current plan period and for many plan periods into the future. The forest management plan protects and enhances species at risk and their habitat by creating specific area of concern prescriptions for each species at risk and their associated habitat. Tree marking before harvest ensures that wildlife trees are left in every stand, values are protected, and that areas of concern are identified. During harvesting, compliance inspections assess damage to the environment such as rutting and requires actions if issues arise. Finally, regeneration assessments determine whether regeneration has been successful or further action needs to be taken to renew the forest.

Areas of Concern

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Tree Marking

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Oversight and Compliance

http://www.westwindforest.ca/planning/oversight/

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Monitoring

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Did you know?

As a result of proximity to Georgian Bay, the management unit lies within a snow belt and receives some of the heaviest snowfall in southern Ontario.

The reduced depth of snow and winter protection beneath hemlock canopies is essential for the winter survival of the white tailed deer. To avoid loss of the “umbrella” effect, Hemlock must be carefully managed.

Area of Concern Scenario

Red-shouldered hawks prefer dense tolerant hardwood canopy around their nests, and will utilize the same patch of trees for nesting purposes for several years. A nest would be identified as a value requiring protection and the forest management plan would prescribe the area of concern. In the case of a red-shouldered hawk, a 150 m reserve would be placed around the nest (approximately 7 ha of forest) with an additional 150 m reserve as a modified zone in which clearcutting cannot occur and no harvesting could take place during the nesting season of March 1 to July 31. Tree markers are often the individuals who find, report and protect these values.

Myth Busters

Myth: Cutting trees eliminates wildlife habitat.

Fact: Beavers, although heavily trapped, experienced an increase in habitat availability as the cutting and burning of mature forest during the 19th century released aspen and created an abundant food supply.

In addition, many other bird and wildlife species prefer young, early successional forest and/or second growth, such as the American woodcock, ruffed grouse, white-throated sparrow, Nashville warblers, deer and moose.

Sustainable Forest Management