A tragic error in watershed management.

Once I read a story in "Trees", an yearbook of the Agricultural department of the U.S.A.. It consists of a mountain to manage adjacent to farmlands. They wanted most of the water coming from the river that feeds the mountain. They have to thin the forests of the watershed. The possibilities range from light to heavy thinnings. So the possibilities range from five to fifty percent of the forest canopy. Preposterously, they decided that the more heavy the thinning, more water will be available. So they cut at forty percent the forest lands. So they thinned the forest lands about forty percent. The reasoning was that then with fewer trees to absorb water, more water will be available. They neglected to verify what will happen with light thinnings. If you are scientific, you have to verify all the options. You cannot decide of what will be the results. It is the same people who decided that prescribed burning should be banished in resinous forest management.

Within a resinous stand, you cannot cultivate, one by one, the trees as in a hardwood forest. Because, once the stand is thinned, the seedlings will not sprout.
So, they decided that forty percent was a good measure and so, more water will be available for the farmlands. And that was a big error.

I say, if they had thinned with five or ten percent the forests regularly, the output of the river will have increased after a brief adaptation. The adaptation is the time required for seedlings to establish. At the start they would have had to thin at about the five years. After a long time, the thinning must be done at about the two years. But there is the problem that such stands were resinous (Pines). You have to do "prescribed burning" or "controlled burns". I don’t know if it will work, but prescribed burning may be replaced by raking the surface for liberating the mineral soil, as for permitting the seedlings to establish on a surface free of soil litter. It is time consuming while prescribed burning is not but requires strategy.

So, as the Quebec may lose its hydroelectric plants of the North, I say that if they had chosen thinning, prescribed burning and tree seeds planting, then there will be no problem with water out there.

As for the science behind my conclusion, be sure I would have wanted to find an university willing to evaluate my theories. I still hope to prove my point one day.

Wildfires.

We cannot fight wildfires. It will only forestall the inevitable; you will get monsters. As for now there is the British Columbia of Canada which has experimented with controlled burns. I still prefer “prescribed burning”.

Prescribed burning had been banished since the year 1920. They decided they preferred large cut areas over light ones.

It is the seedlings will not sprout; the litter is too acid. You must have large areas for the rains to wash the acidity. Or, you burn your forest.
A fire, for a forest, is a Victory.

With gentle prescribed burning you do it when the winds have the good condition; that is the stability and the strength.

With harsh conditions, you must create lines of counter-fires. Make sure the fire goes in the good direction, and let go. The burned lines will encounter and nullify.

The mentality of being afraid of fires was a big error. The true problems may be the universities which failed producing Students able to understand what is at work.

With natural fires you have acid rains and global warming gases. Acid rains, you know the words. What is “acid rain” and what is the purpose of acid rains.
Your universities failed to produce someone able to tackle the problem.

There is no democracy in Sciences.

Fail to undergo the right conclusions and it may become disastrous. As to say, you have a worldwide desertification problem. With the better of the intentions, you have prepared your end. Worst, you believe in a global warming.
I have demonstrated that the oxygen of photosynthesis be exothermic. That implies a reset of many a science. I provoked the questioning about that. Now we will see if with new theories there would be new strategies. Someone has succeeded healing a corner of the desert.
It is simple. They dig a trench, put some mulch and have a lot of planting. The level of salt in the soils has receded. Greening the desert, he called it. So, you have the strategy and must have the theory if there is to be better strategies.