Project Code:	HLFP-01-005
Sponsor:	High Level Forest Products Ltd.

This multi-year study tested the application of alternative silviculture systems as a means of improving reforestation success on moist-to-wet ecosites that are subject to fluctuating water tables and grassing-in following conventional clearcutting. The study has four major components: regeneration silviculture, wind damage monitoring, groundwater hydrology, and instrumentation for local meteorological conditions, windfirmness, understory microclimate and plant water relations.

A white spruce-black spruce/Labrador tea/Horsetail plant community (ecosite phase G1) within the Central Boreal Mixedwood Subregion, 110 km north of Red Earth, Alberta was selected for the research. Two harvesting systems are being evaluated: narrow clear-cut alternative strips and a patch clear-cut. Performance of planted white spruce, black spruce and larch, as well as seeded white spruce is being monitored on scarified (mounded) vs. non-scarified areas. The site was harvested and site prepared in March 1997.

This study is not yet completed and will continue as research project DMI-01-014 “Testing Alternative Silvicultural Systems for Harvesting and Regenerating Mineral Wetlands.”