I will begin by adding my feelings, these are open to criticism and opinion of course, my intent is to only ensure healthy forests and ecosystems AND at the same be able to work with this healthy forest and ecosystem to get materials for the craft of timber framing.
Tree Sizes sustained (long-term economics) and Forest maturity encouraged (ecological and aesthetic reasons).
1. Top-sizes of trees need to be maintained or increased to old-growth characteristics of the local bioregion with each and every harvest.
Top Soil preserved, maintained, protected and increased, not eroded.
1. Stand diversity and eneven stand management preferred over mono-culture and clear-cut management.
2. Ratio of filtered light reaching forest floor maintained.
Symbiotic relationship of animals and insects recognized, understood and respected (ecological and aesthetic reasons which leads to long term economic reasons).
1. Each cut-block needs to have marked and clearly labelled all nurse trees (seed bearing trees), habitat trees (standing dead trees that house full strata of insect populations and nesting birds that feed off of insect populations, and dead-down trees (large dead down for moisture conservation in times of drought).
Recognition that like our fish, this is a finite natural resource, and there needs to be a cap/ceiling put on consumption.
1. Merv Wilkinson measured the basal metabolic rate of his woodlot (the volome of wood that grew in one year). From this number he decided to cut 80% of it and leave 20% "in the bank." He did this selectively and followed the rules as outlined above. When his quota was met for the year, if there was not enough money in the bank to get by, he sold eggs, other produce from his garden, worked with his hands, got by and sat down with pencil and wife to figure out how to do it better next year. His forest is a testimony to this type of responsible lifestyle. (Read Wendell Berry for more understanding of it or 'Small is Beautiful' by economist E.F. Schumaker.
Please excuse any errors or ignorances i may have admitted. This is open to correction in the pursuit of truth and honest, hard work. Hopefully we can come to some sort of list and agreement as to what a working forest should look like for us timber framers.
