Frame conditions of forestry are changing quickly these days, regarding both climate and society. Future Forests organised an excursion to Germany in October, gathering 41 participants. These included 16 forest owners, 10 professionals, 8 researchers and 7 PhD students.
The journey initially went (by bus) from Malmö to Lübeck. It then continued to the Harz Mountains and even more south, almost to the border of Switzerland and the Southern Black Forest around Freiburg before heading back to Malmö a week later. The participants returned home with new insights into various approaches to sustainable forest management that each in their own way balance ecological, social, and economic factors while building resilience against climate change impacts.
Thanks to the financial support from Stiftelsen Seydlitz MP-bolagen the participant fee could be lowered for all participants, enabling the diverse participation.
(Almost) lost in translation
Almost all forests visited during the excursion are managed according to some variety of close-to-nature forestry and continuous cover forestry, which would be translated into in German Naturnahe forstwirtschaft, Plenterwald or Dauerwald depending on which forest we visited. It was a challenge to not be stuck in translation! The terminology in three languages was confusing so one learning outcome was that Swedish terms like blädning and plockhuggning are not easily translated and it can useful to think about guiding principles instead.
The main common principles for the forest management studied during the excursion was
- the avoidance of clear felling,
- relying on natural regeneration in smaller or larger gaps and
- aiming for structural diversity on stand level including uneven-aged structure and mixed tree species.
Dividing lines
One point were the different areas and philosophies differed was the use of native or exotic tree species and another point was the level of intensity and frequency of treatments.
Together with forest managers from both state and private forests, we discussed how to create mixed-tree species stands for increased resilience, with the most telling example from the Harz mountains. Here, 30 000 ha of forests died dead after being hit first by a storm in 2017, then three years of strong heat and drought with bark-beetles finishing off the last remnants of the once vast spruce forest planted here after WWII. The reforestation with spruce was after done after the war debt had been paid largely in timber.
Today and for many years to come, the managers of the Harz forests have a massive challenge to replant thousands of hectares in the midst of a popular recreational area and where the close-by National Park does not allow hunting and new drought years are probably waiting around the corner. Ever since the 90’s the state of Lower Saxony has aimed to convert to more mixed and broadleaf forests. Hendrik Rumpf, the forest manager responsible for the reforestation in Lauterberg forest district, now says that they would have executed the conversion faster and more thorough had they known what would come. They reforest with natural regeneration of maple, birch, and rowan and by planting for example beech and Douglas fir among other tree species, and never more than two-hectare large plots with the same tree species.
When asked what they think of the future on of the forest managers Markus Pfeffer said, “We will see what happens! It is an exciting job”. We wished them good luck and continued driving through the dead trees and cleared forests towards the south while hoping this would be the worst example of climate damages on the journey (spoiler alert: it was!).
A look at the Lübeck model
In the Lübeck City Forest, we had a closer look at the famous Lübeck Model of close-to-nature forest management and received a presentation by the new head of the forest department Hannes Napp who succeeded Knut Sturm in January 2024. This year the model celebrates 30 years since its implementation and while much remains until the ambitious goals of the model have been reached and the forest resembles a natural ecosystem, we learned a lot about the process how the forest managers Jonas Gardlo and Eckhard Kropla plan to get there by minimizing human interventions and mimicking natural forest processes.
The Lübeck model is often criticized for its economic sustainability and the practice of cutting the largest and most valuable oak trees without a plan for their regeneration. The managers of today hope to have large oaks as valuable timber trees in the future, but they also point to the higher goal of creating a healthy and resilient forest that can cool and mitigate climate change.
At the University of Freiburg the participants learned from Jürgen Bauhus and others about their own Future Forests initiative that is being proposed and possibilities for future collaborations with both researchers and practitioners in Sweden. The visit to the Freiburg city forest together with manager Nicole Schmalfuß highlighted the importance of good communication with the public and showcased new technologies for how to use low-quality beech wood for long-term carbon storage in buildings (more info and pictures here). Many participants needed no translation to understand the comics presented by Carol Großman from the forest research institute of Baden Württemberg (FVA) depicting the conflicting perspectives of foresters and environmental activists (see comics here).
The organizing team from Future forests including Ida Wallin, Emma Holmström (both SLU) and Janina Priebe (Umeå University) are all very satisfied with the excursion content wise but are also very pleasantly surprised of how well this excursion format worked out. Says Ida:
- The excursion has been a truly unique learning experience with having so many diverse participants for an entire week in one bus! We were initially worried about the many hours in the bus, but it turned out to be very precious time for exchanging and reflecting on what had been said during the day or just having a well-deserved sleep on it! The participants’ reflections and engagement really made this excursion into something special – in a positive sense.
