[Sca-cooks] Forest management (was ovens)

[Terry Decker]

I'm more familiar with German practice.  The owner of a woodland hires ein
Forstmeister to take care of the woods.  The Forstmeister hires foresters as
need to help him with the task and it was common when I was living in
Germany to have had one family serving as a region's foresters for
centuries.  The forest law, while tempered by modern jurisprudence and
forestry practices, was based on forestry regulations over a thousand years
old.

The forest law (as I remember it) permits anyone to use any part of the tree
that has fallen to the ground, nuts, pine cones, limbs, whole trees, etc.
There were fines for damaging live trees and causing a wildfire was a
serious offense.  The forester is responsible for seeing that trees for
lumber are harvested for the owner, that diseased and trash trees are cut
down for use by the locals,  and that the forest land is kept within the
dictates of the law and the owners directives.  In return, the Forstmeister
receives wages and some privileges to the harvest and sale of forest
products.

One of the key duties which was becoming less important was to be sure that
enough trees would be downed to ensure firewood for the locals during the
winter.  In a completely managed forest, the "dead and downed" timber
changes as much through the dictates of economics as from natural causes.

Bear


> This brings up a question that has nagged at me for years. We moderns
> look at forests, woodlands and unkempt urban lots and see lots and lots
> of "dead and down" wood. Those of us who live in the West also see a
> catastrophic wildfire waiting to happen. But it took many, many years
> for those forests to get that way.
>
> Here's the question: how much "dead and down" does a managed forest
> generate? If the pressure from the local population is constant, there
> should be very little. So it is up to the professional foresters to
> trim/thin the trees to maintain a constant supply of firewood while
> protecting the forest from wholesale destruction - yes? I seem to recall
> that there were penalties for ordinary folk cutting live wood. Bear?
>
> MD/Marged
> surrounded by BLM, National Forest and other public lands in the
> northern Outlands
>
> Terry Decker wrote:
> > It doesn't require a forester to collect downed limbs to make bundles of
> > faggots to sell to the baker and it was common many of the feudal
countries
> > to allow the locals to collect downed wood for personal use or for sale
thus
> > reducing the fire danger to the more valuable standing wood.  I'm not
sure
> > of the Norman practice in this regard.
>
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