Selected Plantations & Health research projects
Productive and Sustainable Plantations
Sponsor: Department of Primary Industries (Victoria).
Contact: Tom Baker.
The aims of the four components of this project are:
Species and Sites
Contact: Tom Baker, Paul Feikema, Yue Wang.
• Undertake research to better understand the inter-relationship between species, sites (edaphic and climatic factors) and silvicultural management for wood production (quantity and quality) from plantations.
• Use this understanding to improve models and tools that: (i) facilitate financial analysis of investment and management options for wood production, (ii) provide for estimating the potential impacts of climate change, and pests and diseases, on wood production, and (iii) can be integrated into landscape/catchment scale models to determine water, salinity and carbon sequestration impacts of plantation establishment.
Silviculture
Contact: Tom Baker, David Forrester, Yue Wang.
• Undertake research to design silvicultural systems for production of logs of optimal dimensions and quality for processing into high-value solid and engineered wood products.
• Use research results to improve growth and yield models and tools that facilitate financial analysis of silvicultural management options for wood production.
• Develop fully-documented silviculturally-managed stands that can be used in cooperation with studies into the impacts of silvicultural management on wood quality and wood processing.
Plantations in the Landscape.
• Develop an industry-accepted system for predicting the catchment-scale impacts of tree plantations from site characteristics and proposed management, incorporating process-based prediction of water uptake by plantations and alternative vegetation.
• Undertake research to support the development of an integrated water yield and water quality model applicable to mixed land use catchments.
Healthy and Diverse Plantations.
Contact: Nick Collett, Ian Smith.
• Undertake research into remote sensing and field monitoring systems as part of the development of plantation health surveillance to enable early detection and management intervention where required.
• Undertake research into fungal and insect biodiversity in relation to pest and disease outbreaks.
• Undertake research into potential control options with delivery systems with reduced impact to non-target organisms.
• Evaluate biotic and abiotic threats to the sustainability and productivity of Victorian plantations.
Forest Health
Sponsor: Department of Sustainability and Environment (Victoria). Contact: Nick Collett, Ian Smith.
The aims of the project are:
• Develop a forest health surveillance program consisting of a network of long-term monitoring plots across a range of forest types and uses on which to evaluate status, changes and trends in forest health over time.
• Undertake forest health monitoring of target insect pests and tree pathogens to provide information to forest managers on the status of damaging agents to enable timely control measures being implemented where appropriate.
• Undertake research to enhance silvicultural systems and operational procedures to mitigate the impact of pests and pathogens.
• Provide scientific advice to Department of Sustainability and Environment ( Victoria ) to meet their national and state obligations to forest protection.
• Provide teaching and training in plantation and forest health to forestry students and workers.
Predicting and Managing the Impacts of Commercial Plantations on Catchment Water Balances
Sponsor: Forest and Wood Products RDC. Contact: Tom Baker, Pat Lane.
This project will parameterise and validate the Catchment Analysis Tool (CAT) model with added flow duration functionality against data from up to six monitored catchments in southeastern Australia . Existing data sets of stream flow, vegetation and environmental conditions will be supplemented by new measurements of plantation water use and updated growth assessment. The validated model will be applied to predict the hydrologic consequences of multiple plantation establishment and management scenarios in four catchments selected in consultation with plantation and catchment managers.
Silviculture for High-Value Solid and Engineered Wood Products
Contact: Tom Baker.
This is Research Project 2.2 in the CRC Forestry. The overall objective is to design silvicultural systems for eucalypt plantations to produce logs of optimal dimensions and quality for processing into higher-value solid and engineered wood products. The component objectives include:
• Measure and model tree growth (e.g. basal area, height) and wood yield and quality responses (e.g. volume, log diameters, decay incidence) to silvicultural management (e.g. thinning, pruning, fertiliser application).
• Understand how the ecophysiological responses of trees to crown removal (by pruning) and reduced competition (by thinning) affect the balance between wood yield and wood quality.
• Develop fully-documented silviculturally-managed stands that can be used in cooperation with CRC Forestry Projects 2.1 (Breeding Objectives), 2.3 (Impacts of Silvicultural Treatments on Wood Quality and Wood Processing) and 2.4 (Improved Sampling Methods and Estate Evaluation) for studies of the impacts of silvicultural management on wood properties (e.g. density profiles, decay incidence, tension wood development) relevant to product yield and value from solid/engineered wood processing systems, taking into account residual pulpwood value.
Plantation Site and Resource Evaluation
Contact: Tom Baker, Paul Feikema.
This project sits across CRC Forestry Research Sub-project 1.1.1 Site Evaluation, Sub-project 1.2.1 Sustaining Site Resources, and Project 1.3 Models for Precision Forestry. The aims are:
• Use current and emerging technologies to monitor and measure tree growth and environmental site variables important to plantation productivity.
• Apply a validated process-based model to quantify the effects of forest growth on water, soil nutrients and carbon through successive plantation rotations.
• Capture this information into decision support tools for future management.
Measuring and Managing Forest Health
Contact: Ian Smith.
This is Research Sub-Project 1.2.2 in the CRC Forestry. The aims are:
• Develop real time alert systems of tree damage/mortality for pest and disease attack based on improved and refined field monitoring systems, risk prediction models, and the acquisition of remotely sensed imagery or site specific telemetry data.
• Formulate those intervention strategies which, based on the timing, severity and probability of a real time alert, will be cost effective, minimize pesticide use and assist in meeting certification requirements.
• Develop predictive models of rotation length impacts of selected pests and disease agents on yield and economic impacts.
• Develop the technology and spatially explicit models to produce site hazard ratings for pests, relevant to both silvicultural planning and certification.
Biodiversity Outcomes of Plantation Expansion into Agricultural and Native Forest Landscapes
Contact: Nick Collett.
This is Sub-Project 4.2.2 in the CRC Forestry. The aims are:
• Assess the biodiversity values of the matrix of native forest remnants in a predominantly plantation landscape and contrast with native forest remnants in a predominantly agricultural landscape.
• Examine landscape-level biotic interactions that affect the risks of pest and disease outbreaks, specifically the dynamics of pest populations at the interface of plantations and native forests.
• Evaluate the persistence and effectiveness of retained habitat, including habitat trees and fallen logs.
• Formulate cost-effective strategies to manage remnant native forests to maintain or enhance their biodiversity benefits.
Modelling of carbon sequestration in native forest ecosystems in Victoria
Sponsor: Department of Sustainability and Environment (Victoria). Contact: John Kaye.
This project aims to use the extensive data from the Department of Sustainability and Environment (Victoria) State Forest Resource Inventory (SFRI) to develop biomass estimates for Victorian forests, for comparison with previous biomass estimates and for mapping standing biomass at higher resolution than previously available. The results will be compared with biomass estimated by the Australian Greenhouse Office and by the Carbon Tender 3PG+ based modelling process adopted by DSE for mature and fixed age forests. The detailed site and biomass information derived from the SFRI results will be applied to further validation, development and application of the 3PG+ model, including: biomass estimation for forests in National Parks; examining the effect of forest growth stage on water yield; a review of the SFRI spatial layer for bias and appropriate resolution; relation to fire severity mapping; and assessment of the effectiveness of forest stands as protective stream buffers, in relation to stage of development.
Water Use and Water Use Efficiency in Mixed Species Plantations of Eucalyptus and Nitrogen Fixing Trees
Sponsors: The University of Melbourne, CSIRO, The Institute of Foresters of Australia. Contact: David Forrester.
Recent work in a mixed species stand in Victoria has found that mixtures of Eucalyptus globulus with the N 2 -fixing species Acacia mearnsii can produce twice the aboveground biomass of E. globulus monocultures. However, while the E. globulus and A. mearnsii mixtures were more productive than the monocultures, it was the A. mearnsii monocultures that fixed the most N, cycled the most nutrients (nitrogen and phosphorus) and intercepted the most light (photosynthetically active radiation). Therefore it appears as though there was another factor influencing the growth of these mixtures. Two such factors may be differences in the efficiency of resource use between species or interactions between species that influence their resource use efficiencies. That is, increasing the availability of one resource (e.g. through N 2 -fixation), could increase the efficiency with which that and other resources (such as water) are used.
The objectives are:
• Quantify and compare the water use of mixed species plantations to monocultures.
• Compare the water use and water use efficiency of E. globulus and A. mearnsii trees.
• Determine whether the water use efficiency, of either species, is different in mixture compared to its respective monoculture and hence the influence of the inter-specific interactions that occur in the mixtures.
• Alternatively, determine whether water use is directly related to leaf area, in which case it will be highest in Acacia monocultures.
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