[Stoves] MUST CHARCOAL BE A CAUSE FOR CONCERN?

[Tom Miles]

Chris Maser elegantly described this process for our Pacific Northwest
environment in his 1984 publication, "The Seen and Unseen World of the
fallen tree." Gen. Tech. Rep. PNW-GTR-164. Portland, OR: U.S. Department of
Agriculture, Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station. 56 p
http://www.treesearch.fs.fed.us/pubs/5625

 

There is an online chapter at www.fs.fed.us/pnw/pubs/164part2.pdf

 

Unfortunately these references seem to be offline at the moment. 

 

A similar story can probably ne told for most environments. 

 

Tom

 

On Sat, Oct 16, 2010 at 10:20 AM, Jeff Davis <jeff0124 at velocity.net> wrote:

Dear All,
One statement that is constantly written on this list is, "use the small
limbs from the trees and do not cut the whole tree." This is a false
economy. A tree is a conductor of current, nutrients flow from the soil
up the stem to the top of the tree then the leaves and limbs fall back
down to the ground to be recycled. In this case the tree is not
conducting electricity but nutrients. People need to be able to see this
fundamental process. If you have the capacity to understand this you
will see the reason for selectively harvesting the tree trunks and
leaving the tops and small diameter wood. The nutrients in the tree are
in the branches, bark and leaves, the stem having the least amount. It's
also good to leave the bark in the woodlot. Otherwise, in time, you will
kill off your woodlot. It is not the tree that cleans the air it is the
whole system that cleans the air and if you steal the small diameter
wood your essentially shorting out this system.

It doesn't matter whether your fuel is wood, grass, weed or crop residue
there still is a common denominator. If you care for the soil the soil
will take care of your biomass.


Best regards,


Jeff




-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.bioenergylists.org/pipermail/stoves_lists.bioenergylists.org/attachments/20101016/00e61249/attachment.html>