Controlled Burn ===

Awhile back we talked about how a burn helps the forest to re-generate... Clear Creek had one today in one of the fenced areas...

Doc,
 
Serious question, and please don't read anything into it, I just want to know.  Is this fenced area one that was inteneded to keep the deer out in order to study regrowth?  If so, why is it being burned? 

One could only hope they would burn only half of the enclosed area.
Then they could have a good place to study the affects of burning in a somewhat controlled area.

ORIGINAL: bingsbaits

One could only hope they would burn only half of the enclosed area.
Then they could have a good place to study the affects of burning in a somewhat controlled area.

 
You mean to have a one-variable-at-a-time DOE with a control group?
 
 

ORIGINAL: DarDys

ORIGINAL: SilverKype

Because they weren't getting the regeneration they had hoped for, so they are burning the evidence !(my conspiracy theory)

That's funny.

I know. It was supposed to be.

8 days of showers coming. I may head up stripperville over the weekend. If not, sulplhurs.

I'm always booked up babysitting. The wife took off today so I'm tempted tonight. Something closer to home... vietnam or the school.

Another attempt at getting rid of the un-desirable growth and hopeing for better re-generation.. personally in that section I think it is a waste of time... nothing good has grown back there in 10 years since the fence went up.... no matter what they have tried (lime, chemicals, sprays, etc, etc)

I wish I had a picture of it over the years but they are all on video before I switched to a digital camera...

If I get a chance later this week I'll take a pic of across the little dirt road.. it's fenced and was done at the same time and you'll be able to see why they want SOMETHING to grow back besides ferns and JUNK....

ORIGINAL: Dr. Trout

Another attempt at getting rid of the un-desirable growth and hopeing for better re-generation.. personally in that section I think it is a waste of time... nothing good has grown back there in 10 years since the fence went up.... no matter what they have tried (lime, chemicals, sprays, etc, etc)

I wish I had a picture of it over the years but they are all on video before I switched to a digital camera...

If I get a chance later this week I'll take a pic of across the little dirt road.. it's fenced and was done at the same time and you'll be able to see why they want SOMETHING to grow back besides ferns and JUNK....

 
So, is it your opinion that completely eliminating deer from the area by fencing it in and them out did not do one bit of good with regard to the regeneration that was desired in a ten year period?

ORIGINAL: Dr. Trout

In that particular section I would have to say the only way for re-generation of a valued species would be planting... It even gets sunlight.. everytime I ask the forester he just says "we don't know why " ... interesting ...

One thought I have is wondering about a big gas line that runs thru it buried in the ground ?????

But DCNR says " no" ..

 
So, if the forester doesn't know why the area didn't regenerate as expected, and because the deer were controlled via being fenced out and therefore were obviously not a factor with regard to regeneration, then would you agree that it is possible for other elements besides deer to have an adverse impact on regeneration?

Doc - ask your DCNR guy if deer get in the fences.

ORIGINAL: DarDys

ORIGINAL: Dr. Trout

In that particular section I would have to say the only way for re-generation of a valued species would be planting... It even gets sunlight.. everytime I ask the forester he just says "we don't know why " ... interesting ...

One thought I have is wondering about a big gas line that runs thru it buried in the ground ?????

But DCNR says " no" ..

So, if the forester doesn't know why the area didn't regenerate as expected, and because the deer were controlled via being fenced out and therefore were obviously not a factor with regard to regeneration, then would you agree that it is possible for other elements besides deer to have an adverse impact on regeneration?

Where are you going with this?

There are deer in the clear creek fences all year long.. at least a couple... one guy spends 80% of his time in the fall riding an ATV around all the fences repairng them where deer tear under them to get the acorns etc inside after eating all the ones outside. Also pretty common to see rubs and scrapes along the outside of the fences...

There is at least one gate on every side of the fenced areas so it's pretty hard to get lost

several years ago I rescued a 6 pointer that was on the inside trying to get out and had his antlers caught in the bottom of the fence, after releasing the antlers he walked off and just stood there for a couple minute exhausted but thankful he was free then walked off to places inside the fence... probably to try again another day

I have lots of stories about inside the fences

ORIGINAL: DanesDad

ORIGINAL: DarDys

ORIGINAL: Dr. Trout

In that particular section I would have to say the only way for re-generation of a valued species would be planting... It even gets sunlight.. everytime I ask the forester he just says "we don't know why " ... interesting ...

One thought I have is wondering about a big gas line that runs thru it buried in the ground ?????

But DCNR says " no" ..

So, if the forester doesn't know why the area didn't regenerate as expected, and because the deer were controlled via being fenced out and therefore were obviously not a factor with regard to regeneration, then would you agree that it is possible for other elements besides deer to have an adverse impact on regeneration?

Where are you going with this?

Danes,

I originally wasn’t headed anywhere with the questions, I simply wanted to know why they were doing a controlled burn in an enclosure that had been used for a deer impact experiment.  Nothing less, nothing more.  As I stated, inquiring minds want to know.

However, when Doc answered with the information from the forester that they did not get the regeneration that they had hoped for and they had no idea why, it raised more questions.  One of those questions was – if deer were eliminated from the possible contributors to non-desired regeneration (please see my other post concerning the design of the experiment so that I don’t need to reiterate it here), then what exactly, in singular or combination, was leading to the non-desired regeneration – whether that non-desired outcome was a non-desired mix of species, amount of growth, etc.  In other words, if the deer were not primarily responsible, and that is what the experiment results says and if the experiment is not deemed flawed, what is causing the problem?

It all goes back to the DOE (design of experiment).  Looking at it in generic terms, so that one cannot say but what about this minute thing or that once-in-a-blue-moon situation by bringing specifics into it, let’s say that there is a condition that is non-desirable and the experimenters wish to determine the root cause.  A typical way of going about that determination is to use a fishbone diagram that places possible causes on the rib bones of a fish.  Typically these fall into what is known as the 4 M’s – man, material, machine, and management.  Obviously, those would need to be renamed here – man becomes animals, material becomes the plants, machine becomes the environment, and management becomes anything that steps away from nature just taking its course.

Under each of those categories, possible causes of the issue are listed.  As an example, under the animals, deer, rabbits, and other herbivores would be listed; under plants other competing species would be listed; under environment soil quality, sunlight, water, etc. would be listed; and under management logging, permitting old growth, controlled burn, etc. would be listed.

To design the experiment then, each of the viable causes is isolated and becomes the sole variable.  The experiment would have a control area, and preferably areas, that had whichever element that was being studied in a normal population/condition as the control group (in other words nothing changed) and an experimental area that had that element removed (if it was deemed detrimental) or added (if it were deemed lacking).  By conducting the experiment in such a manner, the difference between the control area and the experimental area determines the affect that the studied element has on the cause.  This should be done with each possible root cause in order to determine which were contributing to the non-desired outcome.

If that portion of the experiment did not yield conclusive results, then the experiment needs to go further and use a matrix that creates combinations of possible root causes and the experiment starts over.  This is done until a Pareto graph shows the top few causes of the non-desired effect.

Once those root causes are known, the corrective actions are developed to mitigate those issues.

What seems to have happened here, however, is that deer were considered the only plausible root cause, so they were the focus of the experiment – something that is often done when time and/or funding is an issue.  From the results of the experiment, it seems that the deer were not the root cause of non-desired regeneration, at least in this area, because when they were removed (please see the other post which posses questions pertaining to whether the experiment designers considered the deer that did get in as significant or not) the area still did not revert to the desired regeneration and the forester was left saying that they didn’t know why it did not.  The experiment removes the deer as a possible cause, so it has to be something else.

However, presuming the outcome of the experiment was going to point decidedly to deer, a corrective action, reduce the number of deer, was put into action before the results of the experiment were compiled and proven, again, at least in this area, that deer were not the sole or even the primary cause of the non-desired regeneration.   It would seem that by not waiting until the experiment ruled the deer in or out as the root cause, the corrective action was in error.

Again, when I asked the original question, I wasn’t headed anywhere.  I still am not.  I am just trying to understand the logic, or perhaps lack thereof, of the DOE and the possible premature corrective action.

 

Do you know if this was an experimental test exclosure or was it just one of the many exclosures DCNR is using in an attempt to get advanced regeneration before a cut? Is the stand primarily oaks and how large was the fenced area?

Ya see dars needs all that mumbo-jumbo and all I need is to use common sense and look inside fences and then look outside... and realize something is wrong/different ....much simpliar....


The same rain hits both areas and the soil is basically the same in both areas...and even on a clear cut that parts get fenced the same sunshine hits it all at the same rate.. that sure narrows the field to what the differences are...

YEP-- When you consider that generally they use herbicide, lime, and fertlizer inside the enclosers along with some seedling plantings in addition to sometimes burning and generally outside the enclosures they do not. It's them damm songbirds eating the good seeds I tell you. There is a OVERABUNDENCE of them.