Forest management efforts in Connecticut paying off as American chestnut tree makes a comeback | The Republic

via Ct Environmental Headlines

• Scientists have been working on restoration since the 1930s, and in the last several years, American chestnut specialist Sandy Anagnostakis has been breeding blight-resistant trees by crossing the American species with its Chinese cousin, which carries a resistant gene.

   

  Some 200 of those blight-resistant seedlings were planted on 2.5 acres at Belding in 2009, and while mortality is eventually expected to reach 50 percent due to die-off from natural competition, Seymour said the vast majority of the trees are thriving.

• Eventually, the native trees will reach maturity and begin cross-pollinating with the newly planted blight-resistant strain, creating seedlings genetically similar to trees native to the site that also carry genes resistant to blight.

Fearing Climate Change’s Effects on the Adirondacks – NYTimes.com

By LISA W. FODERARO

• Mr. Jenkins, who is the author of the book “Climate Change in the Adirondacks: The Path to Sustainability,” spends much of his time on the water and in the woods, documenting the ecosystem with a notebook and a camera. He thus brings an unusual perspective to the scene. Where a casual observer might behold diversity and continuity, he projects decades into the future and finds absence and loss.

nsf.gov – National Science Foundation (NSF) News – Are New England’s Iconic Maples at Risk? – US National Science Foundation (NSF)

• On city streets, the ALB invades many different types of hardwood trees.  But in forests, the beetle disproportionately attacks large maple trees.

The invasive species war – The Boston Globe

• When it comes to what we should actually do for the environment, the two sides of this debate might not be quite as far apart as their denunciations of one another might indicate. Just as most ecologists accept that only a fraction of non-native species are harmful, the anti-nativists, when pressed, will admit that unequivocally destructive species like the Asian longhorned beetle should be reined in., how we justify our interventions and how we label the species we want to eradicate.
• A Path through Phragmites in the Brine Garden.
• (Occasionally, making use of adversaries.)

Keeping it wild: an interagency strategy to monitor trends in wilderness character across the National Wilderness Preservation System

• Keeping it wild: an interagency strategy to monitor trends in wilderness character across the National Wilderness Preservation System

  Author: Landres, Peter; Barns, Chris; Dennis, John G.; Devine, Tim; Geissler, Paul; McCasland, Curtis S.; Merigliano, Linda; Seastrand, Justin; Swain, Ralph

• The Interagency Wilderness Character Monitoring Team–representing the Department of the Interior (DOI) Bureau of Land Management, DOI Fish and Wildlife Service, DOI National Park Service, DOI U.S. Geological Survey, and the U.S. Forest Service-offers in this document an interagency strategy to monitor trends in wilderness character across the National Wilderness Preservation System.