One-Day Field Tours – July 13th
These one-day field tours will take place on Thursday, July 13th. Each tour will cost $50/person and will be capped at 18 participants. The cost will include transportation, lunch, and refreshments. Field Tours will leave between 7:00 and 8:00 am and return to Corvallis by 6:00 pm. You will be able to sign up for the tours during the registration process for the conference. Register early for the best selection!
Post-Wildfire Reforestation in Central Oregon
Travel over the Cascade Mountain range and spend a day in Central Oregon to learn about our fire-adapted forests, local fire ecology and history, and post-wildfire reforestation strategies. We will visit small-scale private, federal, and industrial forestland to see the various strategies employed by different land managers and management objectives. Topics will include post-wildfire reforestation assessment and planning, reforestation strategies including site preparation, spatial arrangements and planting of alternate species, and opportunities and challenges to reforestation in the dry forests of Central Oregon. Please dress for a day in the field, including sturdy shoes for walking on uneven ground and bringing proper clothing to avoid sunburn in our high elevation early seral forests.
Pathogen Resistance, Tree Improvement, Seed Orchard and Seedling Production
Travel 70 miles south of Corvallis to the US Forest Service’s Dorena Genetic Resource Center, the regional service center for genetics in the Pacific Northwest Region. The Center houses the regional seed storage for individual tree collections of conifer species, the disease resistance breeding programs for five-needle pines and Port-Orford-cedar, and the National Tree Climbing Program. We will also visit the nursery facilities of PRT Cottage Grove. This modern container greenhouse uses high technology to produce superior quality seedling of Douglas-fir, redwood, cedar and hemlock. After lunch we will visit the Bureau of Land Management’s Travis Tyrrell Seed Orchard, which produces conifer seeds for forests across Oregon and Washington. The Seed Orchard also has an arboretum that contain over forty trees native to the western United States.
Western Oregon Intensive Silviculture
Travel West of Corvallis through the Oregon’s Coastal Range visiting timber production-oriented plantations. In Western Oregon reforestation challenges are multiple, including steep terrains, frozen winters, harvest residue management, animal browsing, competing vegetation, soil nutrition and disease management. We will visit stands reforested using site specific silviculture for different conifer species under varying conditions. The tour will also include visiting long-term studies of the OSU’s Vegetation Management Research Cooperative.
Post-Conference Field Tour- July 14-17th
This multi-day tour will provide a broad introduction to regeneration issues associated with dry forests in the rain shadow of the Cascade Mountain Range in Oregon and Washington. The tour will head east from Corvallis on Friday, July 14th, stopping in Bend, Warm Springs, Mt. Hood, The Dalles, and Toppenish. The tour will be a combination of stops to learn about regeneration issues on federal, tribal, and private forestlands, as well as recreational stops to ice caves and a hops farm. Tour participants will be dropped off at the Portland International Airport (PDX) the morning of July 17th. PLEASE NOTE: if you attend this tour, please don’t book any travel before 11am on Monday, July 17th. The cost of this tour will be $575/person- this will include transportation, same gender double occupancy lodging, meals, and parking and entrance fees during the trip. We will accept 20 participants for this tour. Sign up for this tour during the conference registration process.