“You’d calculate the proper amount of explosive, and then fix that on the tree with shrink wrap,” Ash said. “You’d put it right where a face-cut would be, and sever it off right at the point where you put the explosive, almost like a directional fall. The idea is to link as many of those trees as possible to be efficient. In three and a half days, we did 500 trees.”

To be clear, this job went for quality, not quantity. Ash’s targets were beetle-killed pine trees overhanging parts of the Pioneer Mountain Scenic Byway in the Wise River Ranger District. Assuming the project pencils out, more blasters could take out stands of dead timber along highways in the Helena National Forest.

Blasting trees makes sense in certain situations, Ash said. Insect-killed trees in particular can pose hazards that healthy forests don’t. They often rot from the inside, making them prone to shattering or falling in unpredictable directions. Put that rotten tree on a cliffy hillside over a road, and there’s no safe way for a lumberjack or mechanical cutter to cut it down.

From The Missoulian: http://missoulian.com/news/local/2ccac418-9cbb-11e1-afb2-0019bb2963f4.html

Tam’s study of minute particles in tree pulp known as nano-crystalline cellulose (NCC) led to an “a-ha” moment for the young innovator. She had unearthed a super-durable material that had the power to fight disease and prevent aging. This unbelievable discovery won Tam the 2012 Sanofi BioGENEius Challenge Canada, a national competition for young scientists.

NCC is similar to antioxidants Vitamin C and Vitamin E in terms of its ability to fight damaging free-radicals, but it may even be superior insofar as it is more stable and therefore potentially longer-lasting.

“It would be really nice to commercialize this,” Tam told AFP. “I envision it more as an ingredient that would be added to existing formulations, so it could be added to tablets or band-aids for a wound dressing or it could be added to cosmetic cream.”

Her game-changing innovation, which could literally shape the face of the anti-aging product industry, earned Tam a $5,000 award from the National Research Council of Canada.

From The Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/10/janelle-tam-canadian-teen_n_1506262.html?utm_source=Week+in+Trees+-+sign+up+-+May+11&utm_campaign=WIT&utm_medium=email

“The National Water Quality Initiative signifies a bold step by USDA to improve water quality in some very challenging watersheds,” Vilsack said. “American farmers are good stewards of the environment, and this initiative provides them with additional tools to protect and improve fish and wildlife habitat and water quality.”

Using funds from the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, NRCS will provide financial and technical assistance to producers for implementing conservation practices such as cover crops, nutrient management, filter strips and terraces.

To deliver the initiative, NRCS worked in collaboration with local partners and state conservation and water quality agencies to identify watersheds where on-farm investments have the best chance to improve water quality. NRCS also will work with state and federal partners, such as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Geological Survey, to assess results over the long term. The initiative will build on ongoing efforts in the Mississippi River Basin, Great Lakes, Chesapeake Bay and other landscape conservation initiatives across the Nation.

From Water Online: http://www.wateronline.com/doc.mvc/usda-advances-water-quality-conservation-across-the-u-s-0001

The Minnesota Department of Agriculture hopes trained sniffer dogs can become a new line of defense against the invasive pests, which threaten ash trees across the state and across the country.

The department is partnering with Working Dogs for Conservation, which has experience in detecting invasive species and has found encouraging results in training dogs to find ash wood material and emerald ash borers.

Liz Erickson of the Agricultural Department says it’s never been done before. “These dogs, sniffing out ash and the Emerald Ash Borer, are the first of their kind,” said Erickson. “Minnesota is the first state to try this out.”

Officials demonstrated the dogs’ capabilities at the Ramsey County compost site in Arden Hills on Tuesday, and said the dogs may be ready to start sniffing mulch piles, yard waste sites and commercial vehicles as early as July. If it works, the two labs and two German Shepherds may be hired by other states to help battle the ash borer.

From CBS Minnesota: http://minnesota.cbslocal.com/2012/05/08/minn-to-test-dogs-against-emerald-ash-borer/

New trees planted in neighborhoods now come with a smartphone-readable QR tag. Snap a picture, and it will direct the potential parents to D.C.’s Canopy Keepers website to sign up for their own tree with their mobile phone. Those who volunteer receive a free watering tub and deliveries of 10 gallons of water once a week, and agree to clear away weeds through the fall.

The harsh urban environment can take its toll. Many trees do not survive their early years due either to lack of water, vandalism, or vehicle damage. Keeping urban forests growing has become a major effort for some cities, which have seen the benefits grow along with the trees: higher property values, better storm water management, cleaner air, and more.

For now, the only D.C. neighborhoods in the program are Adams Morgan, Brookland, Fairlawn, and Tenleytown, but the program is scheduled to go citywide next year. About 1,300 Canopy Keepers signed up in 2011, and even more are expected to sign up this year; the city is finding it isn’t the only one that cares about trees.

From Co.EXIST: http://www.fastcoexist.com/1679728/dc-puts-its-trees-up-for-adoption

A previous issue of the magazine contained information on how to construct remote-controlled explosives, and helpfully listed the needed parts along with instructions and photos.

ABC News has been calling around to find a wildfire expert who can be interviewed on camera for a piece they expect to be on an upcoming episode of Good Morning America. One person they called was Dick Mangan, a past President of the International Association of Wildland Fire (IAWF), but ABC was not able to work out the logistics of quickly getting a camera crew to his house in Montana. The last we heard they found someone in the Sacramento area who works for CAL FIRE.

It’s odd, or maybe that is why ABC contacted Dick, because he wrote an article for the March/April 2005 issue of Wildfire, a magazine published by the IAWF, titled “Terrorists in the Woods,” about the potential for terrorists to set vegetation fires in wildland areas. In the article he mentioned that police and structural fire departments receive funding for the possibility of terror-related incidents, but the land management agencies receive little or nothing to plan for or prevent threats such as these.

From Wildfire Today: http://wildfiretoday.com/2012/05/02/al-qaeda-magazine-encourages-forest-fire-arson-in-the-us/

The Arizona state Senate, on a 19-9 vote, gave final legislative approval last week to a measure calling for federal agencies to relinquish roughly 48,000 square miles of acreage they own in the Grand Canyon state by 2015.

The Republican-backed bill was approved by the state House of Representatives on Monday. It now goes to Republican Governor Jan Brewer, who has five days once the bill reaches her desk to sign or veto it. Otherwise, it becomes law automatically.

Arizona would be the second U.S. state to enact such a law after Utah Governor Gary Herbert signed a bill last month seeking to reclaim some 30 million acres of federally owned land in his state, shrugging off warnings from state attorneys that the measure was likely unconstitutional and would lead to a protracted yet futile legal battle.

From Reuters: http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/25/us-usa-arizona-lands-idUSBRE83O1KP20120425?feedType=RSS&feedName=domesticNews

The Secretaries described federal capability to respond to wildfires that are becoming more complex, particularly in areas where urban populations are situated near forested and rangeland areas. Firefighting capabilities are available to handle the fire season, they declared, with more than 15,000 firefighters available in 2012, including permanent and seasonal federal and state employees, crews from tribal and local governments, contract crews, and temporary hires.

“We are ready to meet the challenge,” said Secretary Vilsack. “The National Cohesive Wildland Fire Management Strategy provides a strong, new blueprint to ensure community safety and the restoration of ecosystems to benefit all Americans, especially those who live in the urban-wildland interface areas. Our concern does not stop at the border of federal lands, but rather a strategy that is an all-lands approach for safety and wildfire management.”

On average the USDA Forest Service and the Department of the Interior bureaus respond to more than 20,000 wildfires per year, suppressing all but a small percentage of them on initial attack.

From The USDA: http://www.usda.gov/wps/portal/usda/usdahome?contentid=2012/04/0135.xml&contentidonly=true

The proposed ban involves horizontal drilling, or hydraulic fracturing, which pumps chemicals, sand and water into shale to separate natural gas from rock. Critics say the process threatens groundwater supplies and air quality.

The analysis of the public comments was conducted by the Shenandoah Valley Network and the Land, Air, Water Stewardship Action Group, both opponents of the drilling technique often called “fracking.” Of the 6,700 comments received from Virginia residents, 70% supported the ban, their analysis found.

Approximately half of the George Washington National Forest sits atop the Marcellus shale formation, which contains a vast deposit of natural gas running from upstate New York to the Virginias. The formation’s richest deposits are generally believed to be in states such as West Virginia and Pennsylvania, rather than in states on the fringes, including Virginia.

From The Richmond Times-Dispatch: http://www2.timesdispatch.com/news/2012/apr/24/va-residents-back-horizontal-drilling-ban-national-ar-1864564/

Created in 1998, the Hardwood Tree Improvement and Regeneration Center (HTIRC) is developing several varieties of trees under the Greatwoods name. Greatwoods varieties include black cherry, black walnut, red oak and white oak that have been developed by selective breeding. The center has a staff of 60, including 25 Purdue graduate students.

Charles H. Michler, HTIRC director and a Purdue adjunct professor of forestry, and his colleagues breed trees for specific traits to increase planting and production in Indiana. The Indiana State Department of Agriculture reports on its website that hardwood products have a state economic impact of more than a $16 billion annually, supporting 35,000 jobs in the industry and more than 80,000 others in economic sectors that support the industry.

“Production has to increase to keep up with the industry,” Michler said. “Urbanization and the price of land and crops are forcing farmers to grow more trees with less land. The Greatwoods program was developed to address this issue of increasing hardwood production.”

Greatwoods trees grow faster than wild trees, allowing for more production. Greatwoods grow six-tenths of an inch in diameter a year while wild trees grow about a quarter inch over the same time. They also grow 2% taller a year than wild trees. Greatwoods also are bred for a reduced number of knots and an improved taper, which encourages consistent volume of growth to the top.

From The Purdue Office Of Technology Commercialization: http://otc-prf.org/node/1206