90's Direct Seeding Effort Revisited

In 1990 Doug Smith, a MetroParks staff member at Carriage Hill Farm noticed there was something wrong with succession in the nearby Carriage Hill MetroPark.  Doug was the Restoration Specialist at the Farm, in charge of restoring the farmstead there to its condition in the 1880's.  Doug knew (and knows) a lot about woodworking, and was really good at making just about anything from historic bridges to period furniture.  He also knew quite a bit about trees, and noticed that the natural succession taking place on the nearby abandoned farmland was not growing trees that would ever be useful to a woodworker.  Oak, hickory, walnut, and tuliptree, his favorites were few and far between, with virtually no small ones around.  Doug proposed planting these hardwoods into a designated timber management area to produce lumber for future generations.

In 1991 we designated about 20 acres for this task and the farm staff had the ground plowed and disked up.  For trees we went to see my dad, Gervais Nolin, in Fairborn.  I knew Dad had LOTS of acorns in the fall and to him disposing of them was a big nuisance.  We went to his place and hauled off many bags stuffed with acorns of white and bur oak and took them back to Carriage Hill.  The acorns were mixed with some black walnuts and hand broadcast over the field.

The first few years we could see some little oaks sprouting, but mostly very tall goldenrod and other herbaceous species.  Then we started noticing that rabbits were chewing the little oaks in the winter, sawing them off like little beavers.  At the same time white-tailed deer were having a population boom, and they loved eating the oaks that got by the mice.  Should any oak have the temerity to withstand this browsing they inevitably were used by bucks to rub the velvet of their antlers.  As a result the trees were cut, eaten, or de-barked every year.  This was pretty discouraging so we admitted defeat and pretty much gave up on the project.  A few years later the staff at the farm decided they needed some more ground for crop production and plowed up much of it for that purpose.

Conservation Technician Rob Ligas standing in thick stand of white and bur oak planted  by seeding in 1991.

Fast forward to 2010.  Conservation Biologist Mike Enright was laying out zones for the new controlled bowhunting program at Carriage Hill.  One day he came into the office and asked if anyone knew where all theyoung oaks out there came from.  What?!  How many?  Oh at least a couple hundred.  We went out there soon after that and I was delighted find it just as he said, several hundred bur and white oaks ranging in size from 2 -20 feet high.  Some had obviously been chewed, eaten, rubbed many times only to sprout again.  Many had multiple stems, and the whole area had become overgrown with shrubs, particularly Amur honeysuckle and autumn olive.  Mike and his staff went to work clearing out the invasive shrubs and found that many more stunted survivors were out there.

Since then the trees have been pruned to allow one lead stem, additional tree species have been planted (and protected by tree shelters), and the failure has turned into a least a partial success.  It could have been a much greater success if we had not given up and allowed it to be plowed for crops.  Oh well, live and learn.  In this case, don't give up!