April 24, 2024 • 54 mins
We return this week with our own Senior Forest Conservation Manager, Dave Pearce, to cover the wider implications of Wildlands’ Logging Scars report.
In our last episode we learned that Wildlands League’s study showed an average of 14% of the forest is not regenerated after one cycle of full-tree harvesting. While that may not seem like a significant impact to the forest, Dave explains why this isn’t the case. In addition to reducing our resilience to climate change, logging scars spell serious trouble for biodiversity as well. We give context to degradation in Canada’s forests and why there’s a need for higher quality data to better understand the impacts of logging on the landscape.
Check out the Logging Scars webpage to read the report and see the eye-opening images.
Make sure to check out the show notes on the podcast webpage for more links and helpful resources.
You can help this community grow by sharing the podcast with your friends.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Janet Sumner (00:00):
Welcome to the Clear Cut.
Hi, I'm Janet Sumner, ExecutiveDirector at Wildlands League.
Kaya Adleman (00:08):
And I'm Kaya Adelman, Carbon Manager at
Wildlands League.
Janet Sumner (00:14):
Wildlands League is a Canadian conservation
organization working onprotecting the natural world.
Kaya Adleman (00:21):
The Clear Cut is bringing to you the much-needed
conversation on Canadian forestmanagement and how we can better
protect one of Canada's mostimportant ecosystems, as our
forests are reaching a tippingpoint.
Janet Sumner (00:40):
So here we are this morning with the second
episode of Logging Scars,talking to Dave Pierce from the
Wildlands Office and KayaEdelman, who is my co-host, on
the Clear Cut.
In terms of how much land isdeforested or has been left
barren after a clear cut, wecan't technically call it
(01:10):
deforested even though there areno trees and they're barren
after 30, 35 years plus, andthat's because of international
definitions et cetera.
But the real point here is toget into well, what is actually
happening in the forest, notjust what's happening according
to a model.
And so this is actually quiterevealing about logging scars
and it does suggest that we needto take a look at how we do our
(01:34):
calculations and how we thinkabout forestry, and then we
can't just rely on models thatwe actually have to get out
there and figure out what'sgoing on.
But it also represents anenormous carbon loss if those
trees are not coming back, ifthose areas essentially remain
barren, and we didn't even dothe calculations on what might
be happening in the soil carbonor how that might be changing if
(01:57):
you're drying out an area, etcetera.
So, kaya, I'm looking forwardto today's conversation.
Kaya Adleman (02:02):
Right, I'm looking forward to it as well, and I
think what this episode alsoreally gets at for me is how
widespread the logging scars isin terms of its implications.
Wildlands League did thisgroundbreaking work and produced
this information that 14% onaverage of the forest doesn't
(02:23):
grow back after clear-cutlogging has gone through.
But what does that mean?
And those implications arefar-reaching.
So I think that's what'sinteresting about this
conversation and, like always,if you're listening to this for
the first time, welcome hello,and you have no idea what we're
talking about.
This is part two of our loggingscars episode.
(02:44):
So before you dive into thisone, go back, check out part one
, called what are logging scars,and then check back in with us.
All right, I'm excited to getinto it.
Janet Sumner (02:54):
Yeah, let's go.
Kaya Adleman (03:00):
Why is that finding, though significant in
the context of forestry?
So that, like after logging,goes through some of the areas
where logging has's lost tothese landings and to the roads
(03:27):
is somewhere in the range of 3%to 6%.
Dave Pearce (03:31):
Again, my numbers might not be totally accurate,
but Ontario's estimates are waylow ball lengths.
So 14% is a lot different than3% and it has repercussions for
our carbon accounting becausethose trees are not there,
(03:56):
they're not sucking up carbon,they're not storing carbon.
Also has implications for theforest industry.
So you can imagine when thetime comes to harvest those
areas again, if they're notcorrecting their calculation,
their yield is going to be atleast 10% less than what a
(04:17):
company would expect to get.
And again, multiply it over thesize of the province, that's a
lot of.
That's a big wood shortfall.
Kaya Adleman (04:28):
That sounds significant and I can imagine
that if a company is assumingthat there's going to be forest
there to cut down or to harvesttrees from and then there's not,
they're probably going to say,oh look at this other area where
there's untouched forest, whydon't I just get the trees from
there on my forest managementunit?
Dave Pearce (04:48):
That is a great point, what we are saying.
Because of this legacy oflogging, scars and other reasons
, we want to see the forestindustry constrained to areas
that have already been logged.
And you're right.
If they can't get the fiberthat they need from those areas
when they go back, then there'sgoing to be increased pressure
(05:09):
to further expand the footprint.
Janet Sumner (05:13):
Is it possible to regenerate those places, Dave?
Because that's one of the bigquestions we get asked all the
time.
It's like oh well, thencouldn't we just regenerate
those areas, and do you have atheory on that, or what's your
thinking?
Dave Pearce (05:27):
Well, it's technically possible but there's
a, you know, so you could go inagain with pretty heavy
machinery.
It would be very hard to domanually.
So you have to go in withsomething that would penetrate
and remove that, logging theslash like the waste wood and
uncompact the soil.
So it'd be almost anagricultural operation with
(05:50):
really heavy machinery to get inthere.
And so you'd have to open theseroads up again, which, you know
they're still logging scars andthey are slowly healing, very
slowly.
They won't heal before the nextrotation because if they're 30
years old they'll be, um, youknow, another, uh, 30 or 40
(06:12):
years.
They're going to open up thatarea to cut those trees that
were planted or that regenerated, um, and you know, based on
what's happened in the last twoor three decades, you're not
going to have another forestthere.
So, anyways, they're slowlyhealing and it would be a high
(06:34):
cost to go in and basically openup the roads just to regenerate
it again, and then they'regoing to slowly heal and then
they'd have to come back in withheavy machinery in another, you
know, another few decades.
So it's quite costly and therehas been in some of these cases,
there's been some attempt to uh, limit access into these areas
to kind of again we talked aboutit in the in the previous
(06:58):
podcast to mitigate some of theimpacts of forestry.
So they will pull culverts outor they'll pull bridges, uh, to
try to keep access to a minimum,to to give a faint hope to
these roads, regenerating forwildlife and and uh and uh,
protecting, you know, fisheriesfrom, from over harvest or
(07:18):
whatever.
But um, all to say is therewould be an impact to go in and
try to regenerate these sites,and then you're already, um 20,
30 years behind the rest of theforest.
So, um, there might be somewildlife benefits to having
those trees, but they're justgoing to be starting to store
carbon again.
(07:39):
You know it's there's a 20 yearlag before a planted tree
really starts to grow carbon,and then it's not going to be
very long after that beforethese areas are going to be
opened up again for forestry, um, if they come back.
So there's, um, it'stechnically feasible, um, it's
much better to prevent thesescars in the first place uh,
(08:01):
than it than it is.
And or try to do immediateamelioration while the area is
still fresh, then to go backafter two decades or three
decades and try to fix it.
Janet Sumner (08:17):
So one of the areas I just want to talk about
is that I've often heard thephrase that we're trying to
mimic fire, like the boreal is afire-dependent ecosystem, so go
in and harvest and that will bekind of look like a fire.
Right, because we're going toharvest big areas like a fire
(08:40):
would take out.
But one of the big differencesbetween a fire and a forestry
operation is that there's a roadinfrastructure, and I guess
this is one of the ways in whichlogging scars was really a
confirmation for us that roadsactually are, if not permanent,
(09:01):
semi-permanent as aninfrastructure in the forest,
like once you've gone in andbear cut and certainly with
field poultry harvesting used it, you've left behind this road
infrastructure, whereas a firewouldn't leave that.
It would go in and take out acertain area.
It might be large but itwouldn't have a supporting
(09:23):
infrastructure.
And I think Anna talked aboutthis in her podcast.
Is that one of the reasons thatcaribou are disappearing off
the landscape is becausepredators have greater access
and they get that access.
It's facilitated through theroad network that's left behind
by forestry, whereas fires don'toperate that way.
Can you maybe just speak tothat?
Dave Pearce (09:43):
Well, yeah, and that's a really good point.
So the impacts of these it'snot just visual, there's an
ecological impact, and I thinkJustina talked about the
functional response of wolves toeven if their population didn't
go up.
They're more effective atscouring the landscape for prey
(10:05):
If there's a road network thatthey can run along.
Um, and it takes a long, longtime.
It was difficult after 20 or 30years for Trevor to get a truck
in to these areas, but it's noproblem for a wolf.
There's still.
We've seen enough of these oldlogging roads there, so there's
growth that would prevent atruck going in.
(10:26):
But you look closely andthere's kind of a tunnel that's
a perfect size for a game to runthrough, um, under the shrubs
and whatnot, or through the,through the shrubbery.
So they're still using that.
Uh, other animals use it too,because it's just easier to get
around that.
Uh, other animals use it too,cause it's just easier to get
around.
(10:47):
So, um, uh, there I would saythey are permanent from a, uh, a
wildlife, uh, almost a wildlifefeature.
Uh, after the fact that I'veworked in Algonquin park where,
um, you know, I've been in incutovers that have been older
than these and the old loggingroads and the landings are still
(11:10):
around and there's game trailson them now and that's wolves
actually use that to run aroundAlgonquin Park as well.
Janet Sumner (11:21):
That's a whole nother podcast.
Dave on logging in.
Algonquin Park.
We Um, that's a whole notherpodcast Dave logging in
Algonquin park.
We're not going there today.
Dave Pearce (11:29):
No, no, but it's um , this, this, uh, the footprint
of roads is not confined to theboreal.
Um, but um, but, and, and it's,and, it's um, and it's impact
(11:56):
on wildlife and the wildlifeassemblage that comes up, you
know that is there after logging.
Janet Sumner (11:58):
It's pretty much permanent as far as I can see.
So 1990 was my very first EarthDay.
I was working at PollutionProbe, I was working on issues
around waste management andtoxics in the Great Lakes and
pesticides and all that kind offun stuff.
I hadn't yet graduated toworking on carbon or nature or
(12:19):
thinking about all the greatwork that we do in terms of
protecting areas at WildlandsLake.
But 34 years later, we stillvery, very much need an Earth
Day, because we needenvironmental groups and the
public, and one of the greatthings that I've seen happen in
my 34 years working onenvironmental issues is this
(12:41):
transition where the public iseven more engaged, where we have
a democratization.
That's happened because of theinternet, because of AI, because
of all of these ways in whichwe can now see into the world
and see what's going on, and soI'm more encouraged than ever
that the public and the peopleare paying attention and are
(13:01):
hungry for information, and ifyou're hungry for information,
you want to be listening to thepodcast and you want to be
supporting the podcast, soanything that you can do on this
Earth Day to help us keep thepodcast going would be greatly
appreciated.
Thanks so much for listeningand tell all your friends about
it.
Thank you, okay.
I was just going to ask aboutedge effect.
(13:23):
This is something that I had noidea about until I joined
Wildlands Lake and Dave taughtme a lesson on edge effect.
Go, dave, tell everybody aboutedge effect.
Dave Pearce (13:34):
Well, edge effect is where you have the edge of
the forest right and there couldbe a natural opening or it's
it's more it's it's moreproblematic if it's an
artificial opening ofdisturbance and um, so you can
(13:54):
imagine a forest was covered, anarea, and then you have a road
going through and now you havetwo edges of the forest where it
was complete forest coverbefore and, uh, that part of the
forest is opened up to manythings sunlight, wind, um, it's
more accessible to predators, um, and so it'll dry out the
(14:17):
forest more than a closed forestwould be.
Uh, there'll be differentspecies growing there because
the sunlight can penetrate, um,you know, well, beyond the exact
edge of the forest, cause the,you know, the morning sun shines
through on this side and theafternoon sun shines through on
the other side, and you get, youget light penetrating well
beyond the edge of the road intothe forest.
(14:39):
And the same with predators, um, that are.
It makes predator, it makes iteasier for predators to move
along the road, but also to makeforays into the, into the
forest, off the road.
So you can imagine a wolf or awolf pack traveling along a road
.
Uh, it's pretty easy goingrelative to going through the
bush and then they see or smella caribou you know, maybe you
(15:00):
know up to a kilometer off theroad, and then they can peel off
and and uh go after thatcaribou which you know, maybe
you know up to a kilometer offthe road and then they can peel
off and and uh go after thatcaribou which you know they
wouldn't.
It wouldn't be as easy for themto see.
So there, yeah, there'smultiple, I guess, impacts uh
from an edge effect point ofview, of roads and cutovers too,
but uh, as we've seen, I mean,the cutovers do grow back.
(15:21):
Uh, as we've seen, I mean, thecut cutovers do grow back uh to
one extent or another, but it'sthe roads and landings that are
really uh persisting.
Kaya Adleman (15:53):
Wow, the presumption of regeneration that
exists in the Canadian forestmanagement frame.
But what about from a climatestandpoint?
Or perhaps from a policystandpoint?
Dave Pearce (16:09):
You want me to go yeah go for it.
Okay.
So I mean, yeah, so you've gottrees that have been removed
that are not growing back at thesame rate as the rest of the
cutover area, so thoseconstitute additional carbon
debt because there's the trees.
There aren't trees theresucking up carbon that would
(16:33):
have been there Right.
And so and Trevor, you know,found out, there's 14% of the
clear cut on average isn'tcoming back.
Um, that's, you know, 14%, uh,less, less carbon being absorbed
by trees compared to what, uh,what would have been there, uh
and um, and so there's a real,real impact on uh, on the
(16:59):
environment.
There's more carbon as a resultof these areas.
There's more carbon in theatmosphere than there would have
been.
But there's also a glaring holein Canada's accounting and maybe
Janet can speak to this a bitmore but where they're not
considering this.
And so Canada is supposed to bereporting on the carbon, you
(17:21):
know, gains and losses caused byCanadian activities, and
they're not reporting on thisparticular one and many more.
There's others that kind of flyunder the radar too.
So we're doing worse, I guess,as a country, than we think we
(17:42):
are because of these types of ummiscalculations.
And then there's the actual,actual impact, and then uh,
additionally um, and this wehaven't quantified this.
In a sense you can kind ofquantify the CO2 equivalent
because you know how much, howmany trees should it should be
there and and you can kind ofand we've done the the
(18:03):
calculation how much uh, co2equivalent um is in the
atmosphere.
That shouldn't be.
But then there's the methane uhportion because of all this um
decomposing wood, that's um, the, the deeper stuff is
decomposing in the absence ofoxygen and the result of that is
a methane production.
(18:24):
You think of a stinky old, likea swamp or a bog.
If anybody's delved into themuck there or even pulled their
boot out of a deep hole in themud, it smells because there's
methane and associated sulfurstuff.
You can't actually smell themethane, but it's the associated
(18:45):
sulfur that goes along with itthat you smell, but anyways the
methane production.
And methane is even worse thanCO2 in terms of trapping heat in
the atmosphere.
Janet Sumner (19:01):
Yeah, just to add a little bit to what Dave was
saying.
The reason we don't account forit is because under the
international agreements, canadaadmits to almost no
deforestation and that's becausewhen we look at the forest and
(19:21):
it's being used for forestry, ifyou go in and you clear, cut
that forest, it is still goingto be used for forestry at some
point in the future.
So you haven't changed theactual land use on it, even
though you've maybe taken allthe trees off it, maybe even
you've regrown some of thosetrees, but you've got 14% of it
(19:43):
on average.
As this logging scar study andyou can go see all the math it
goes anywhere from as little as10%.
That's been what I would callsort of de facto deforestation,
because it's still barren orlargely barren.
That forest is not coming backanytime soon, as Dave has, you
(20:05):
know, explained.
Kaya Adleman (20:09):
And that's the assumption right under the
international agreements is thatthe forest grows back.
Therefore, you don't have tocount it against your carbon
emissions.
Therefore, you don't have tocount it against your carbon
emissions.
Janet Sumner (20:18):
Yeah, but it's also the assumption that you
would still have to count it if,for example, you turned it into
a shopping mall, maybe treesaround it, because it's not a
different land use.
And so, for example, in a placelike Brazil, they're often
cutting trees down to turn itinto agriculture, or maybe it's
a city or a shopping mall andthat's a different land use.
(20:44):
So they have to claim it.
Canada, we don't have to claimthose because it hasn't changed
land use and also because it wascut down as part of the logging
operations, it's assumed thatregeneration will be successful.
In fact, we model that.
We model it as if it's going tocome back.
I think Ontario admits to maybe3% to 7% that might be
(21:05):
attributable to landings androads and, as I said, our math
looked at it and said it's morelike 14%.
That's a big difference.
And I'll just speak tosomething that I worked on.
We had looked at one of theplaces of a forestry company
(21:26):
who's actually very progressive.
We can stay out of this areaand we wanted to understand a
little bit about how much wouldbe preserved if that didn't
happen, if you didn't have thatlogging scar there, if that 14
(21:47):
percent wasn't logged.
And I think the area they werewilling to stay out of was
something like 450 000 hectares.
And then then you know Trevor,when he and I talked about this,
the subject he said well, wewill have to discount the water,
of course, because that's notgoing to come back.
So we did a rough estimate ofthat being about 150,000 of the
(22:07):
hectares, and so that meant300,000 hectares that you
wouldn't be harvesting and itwas phenomenal when it came back
.
It was like 13 megatons CO2over a 20-year period.
You would avoid releasing intothe atmosphere by not logging
there, and that's just based onhaving a 14% barren footprint
(22:33):
from roads and landings.
So it's not insignificant andwe're not counting it.
It's not included in our math.
We don't admit to that asdeforestation, although Trevor
and I both agreed it's actuallyin the document.
We call it de factodeforestation because it's
essentially like most peoplewould think deforestation is
(22:55):
there's no trees.
So that's why we call it defacto deforestation, even though
the international definition isa land use change.
For us it's like well, it'sbarren, it had trees on it, now
it's barren.
So from our perspective that'sde facto deforestation.
And so that 14% really is amassive carbon loss, and one
that is going well under theradar carbon loss and one that
(23:19):
is going well under the radar.
And it's unfortunate because Iactually think if companies were
given the choices and theycould say well, you know, we're
going to change our practicesand we would realize this
because we met with severalcompanies after we did this
study and presented the findingsof this study and they, without
a doubt, looked at us and said,well, that's not happening in
my forest, because they believethat when they're cutting, that
(23:45):
the regeneration is going to besuccessful.
In fact, in fact, they go outand they test whether or not it
is at the stage of what I callit's called free to grow.
Right, dave, it's, it's, it'slike, basically, it's reached a
certain height, it can now grow.
And and we, we talked toauditors and auditors said well,
you know, we kind of wewondered about those roads and
landings, but we just sort ofassumed it was going to come
back.
So that's what's sogroundbreaking about the work
(24:05):
that Trevor did, that he justwouldn't let go of it because he
could see it and he just wantedto know what it was.
And, as I said, dave and I wereboth of the opinion like, well,
you know, it probably probablycomes back, but this is the
first time somebody looked at itand said, you know what, based
on almost 300 sites, this is notcoming back.
(24:26):
Now, some of them might besuccessful, but we've got, on
average, 14 percent.
It's not, it's essentiallybarren.
After 30 years.
That was a game changer for me,I know, for dave, for the
entire organization.
We just were like wow, that'ssomething that people are not
(24:48):
talking about.
Want to add anything there,dave?
Dave Pearce (24:54):
yeah, well, you talked about the sort of the
bureaucratic loophole.
I guess that prevents theseareas from being counted as
deforestation.
But then there's also theresolution of the imagery that
Canada uses right to assess fordeforestation.
(25:16):
So I kind of dug into Trevor'sreport a little bit and he talks
about the deforestationinterpretation guide that um, uh
, is used by uh, NRCan, naturalResources, canada to assess
deforestation and so there's aprovision in there, if it's, if
it's big enough and they can seeit and they can measure it,
(25:37):
they could count it asdeforestation.
But because they use landsatimagery that only the pixels are
uh, 30 meters across right andand uh, so that means, um, when
they look at that lens, theseindividual scars, the road and
(26:00):
the landing, they don't show upbecause they're too small, it's
just a blurry something, youknow.
It's a light colored blurry,whereas when Trevor was looking
at high resolution aerialfootage, I mean it's very
obvious aerial footage and itmeans very obvious um, and so
(26:22):
they're just not looking at it,um, you know, kind of using the
right lens and I think, uh, Iwas interviewed once about this
and it was, and I was, you know,it's similar to coming in out
of a cold weather and cominginto a hot uh, you know uh or a
warm and moist environment andyour glasses, my glasses, fog up
.
I wear glasses so I can't see.
Right, I can see that there's acouch over here or whatever,
(26:44):
but I can't see if there's a caton the couch, which I've sat on
the cat a couple of times.
Janet Sumner (26:52):
I said you're a good family man, Dave.
I didn't know you were going totalk about your cats that way.
Dave Pearce (26:59):
But Family man, Dave, I didn't know you were
going to talk about your catsthat way, but I mean yeah.
Kaya Adleman (27:06):
So the resolution issue, yeah, I mean if you, even
if you ever just look at apicture that has terrible
resolution and you zoom in onyour computer and then you start
seeing the pixels, like that'swhat it looks like.
If you see the governmentimagery, it looks like a bunch
of pixels that are just asingular color that you can't
decipher.
Or if you look at a higherresolution imagery, you're able
(27:27):
to see more specific things atthe same level of zoom.
I have this screen background,or my screensaver on my laptop
is a photo, is a screen grab, ofthe Sopranos which we were just
talking about, and it's TonySoprano looking at lawn
(27:53):
furniture at the famousFountains of Wayne Garden Store
garden store in New Jersey rip,it's out of business.
But also, um, the inspirationfor my favorite band name,
fountains of Wayne, shout out,but it's terribly pixelated.
Like it's horrible.
If you see, if you watch itlike on crave or on HBO, it
looks amazing, like the visualslook amazing, but because it's a
(28:14):
screen grab that someone took,probably just from watching it
on their computer or something,it looks terrible and I don't
know why.
I have it on my laptop but itmakes me happy.
So, even if it's terribleresolution.
So that's all to say.
The government of Canada looksat forestry like looking at this
(28:34):
terrible picture of TonySoprano shopping at a garden
furniture store.
Janet Sumner (28:39):
That's our Soprano moment we actually had this
conversation before we started.
And Kaya has another claim tofame, which is what's near your
family home.
Kaya, what were you telling usbefore?
Kaya Adleman (28:52):
The famous Holston's Restaurant.
It's not a diner.
I wouldn't define it as a diner, contrary to popular belief,
but it's the restaurant.
That's from where they shot thefinal scene of the Sopranos.
They have really good ice creamfloats, so I would recommend.
Yeah, that's what they'refamous for is their ice cream
(29:14):
and their chocolate and fudge,but Tony Soprano goes there for
some reason to eat onion ringsand then the series is over.
Won't spoil it for anyone.
Janet Sumner (29:24):
Yeah, and just to make note, I called that the
golden age of television, whichDave correctly said.
No, that was actually thehoneymooners.
So just to dive deep into thedifferences there, but yeah, so
we had a bit of a soprano'smoment before we started this.
No, I think that's a reallyimportant piece.
Is the?
Is the resolution?
(29:45):
Um, and just to be very uhprecise about that resolution,
uh, trevor's work in loggingscars looked at essentially a
resolution of 40 centimeters, soso under a meter, and the
federal government resolutionwhen looking at the state of
Canada's forests is 30 meters.
And these roads are how wide,dave?
(30:07):
What would you say?
Dave Pearce (30:09):
Well, they're less than 30 meters across.
Janet Sumner (30:15):
So you can't see them.
Dave Pearce (30:16):
Yeah, they can't see them.
You can see a bit of a smudge.
Do we have show notes?
Janet Sumner (30:21):
Yeah, we'll have show notes and we'll include
anything you want to in thoseshow notes.
Dave Pearce (30:25):
Well, you know the famous image, the aerial image
at 40 centimeters and then theLandsat sort of superimposed
over it.
Janet Sumner (30:36):
Yeah, it's great because it looks like those
old-fashioned coke bottles, likeif you were to look through
those it just kind of looks likethis fuzzy green.
You can't really tell what itis yeah so you might have
included in that.
Kaya Adleman (30:49):
Earth day is upon us by the influx of green
messaging likely flooding yoursocial media feeds, and some of
this messaging may be mentioningCanada's forests, which has, as
we know, become an increasinglypopular flashpoint in the
greater environmental discourse.
The language surroundingCanadian forests can be
confusing, though, like whatdoes sustainable mean in the
(31:12):
context of our forests?
What is the difference betweendeforestation and forest
degradation?
That's why, on the Clear Cut,we're committed to weeding
through the words and connectingwith experts to unpack the
issues facing Canada's forests.
As listeners, you've becomeinstrumental in bringing us
these important conversations.
(31:34):
Like what does a transition ofthe fiber economy look like, and
should we really be consideringbiomass fuels a climate
solution?
There's a lot more beyond thetree line, with warnings that an
even worse wildfire season iscoming this summer and Canada's
slow progress towards meetingits 2050 climate and nature
goals.
Your support keeps us bringingthese critical issues to life.
(31:58):
You can show your love for thepodcast by giving us a donation,
linked in the episodedescription below, leaving us a
review or sharing the podcastwith your friends From all of us
at Wildlands League.
Thank you.
Janet Sumner (32:14):
So where I wanted to go next with this or where I
wanted to ask your question wasoh, maybe I'm just going to
recount the day.
So I remember one of the bestthings about my job is I get to
work with some incredibly brightpeople and I get to ask
questions that just are buggingme or that I think, oh, I'd
really like to know the answerto this, like to know the answer
(32:40):
to this.
So one day I was in the officeand we used to have a great big
table in the middle of ourcentral office and a big screen
so that we could look at thingson the screen, and Dave and
Trevor were on Google, I thinkit was, and they were looking at
maps of the forest, et cetera,and I decided to ask this
question.
That was just.
I just had to know the answer.
(33:00):
I said so we can see thisfootprint, like you can see that
signature.
You can see lines in the forest.
You can clearly see these scarsthat go across it.
You can see it, and we hadlooked at almost 300 sites in
Ontario, and so one of thethings that I wanted to know
that day was can you see thisanywhere else in Canada?
Well, didn't Dave and Trevor'sfaces light up and they were
(33:24):
like, oh yeah, and they startedusing Google just to fly over
Canada and say, well see, youcan see it here, you can see it
there, you can see it here, youcan see it there, and you know,
then they gave me explanationsof why it looks slightly
different here but morepronounced there, et cetera.
And so, dave, can you maybebecause I found it fascinating
to basically be able to go anduse Google and basically go find
(33:47):
that footprint, dave, can youtell us a little bit about that
day, because I found itfascinating.
Dave Pearce (33:52):
Well, I, just as you're starting to tell the
story, I just thought I'd openup Google Earth and see and I
haven't.
I haven't quite landed on it,but it would literally pretty
much take that amount of timethat you told the intro to for
me to find a site, uh, anywherein Ontario or Quebec that has
that signature, uh footprint,because logging poultry logging
(34:17):
was so, was so ubiquitous.
I don't know what the stats arenow Like I said, I think and I
hope they're moving away from itto more cut to length, but it's
still.
It's still used a lot in Canadaand over the last 20 or 30
years was the predominant methodof clear cut harvesting in the
boreal forest.
So, um, yeah, and that, and theclear cut harvesting in the
(34:39):
boreal, you know, is all ofNorthern Ontario, all of
Northern Quebec, uh, theNorthern prairie, so-called
prairie provinces, which aremore than half forested, um and
uh, and the interior of BC theyuse the same, they um would use
full tree harvesting and allthose areas.
So the potential for thatfootprint and to be able to find
(35:02):
those sites, you know, again,it would take me five minutes to
find a site that had that Justrandomly kind of scrolling in an
area that I know has forestrygoing on in the boreal.
Janet Sumner (35:13):
Yeah, did you look at it?
Oh yeah, as well yeah, it's uh.
Kaya Adleman (35:22):
It's pretty crazy to look at um and I, I believe,
if I'm correct, I the thesatellite imagery um the time
scale or if you know how, likegoogle earth works, um, they,
it's a mosaic of differentsatellite images that are is
available.
So it would be harder to dojust using um, the google earth
(35:47):
satellite or the google earthsoftware to do a logging scars,
ask uh project, but it gives youa good uh baseline for for the
extent of the footprint, forsure.
Janet Sumner (36:03):
You can find the signature, but you can't
necessarily do the Because youdon't know where the cut block
ends and you can't sort of, youcan't get that denominator, as
Dave was saying, and you don'tnecessarily know when it was cut
, so you can't say that'sexisted for 20 years or 50 or
whatever it is right, like youcan't do that?
Dave Pearce (36:23):
yeah, because you don't know.
So I just found one, and it's anew one.
It looks like it was just.
I mean, you know the image is.
I don't know when the image wastaken, but whenever the image
was taken it was freshly cut andit looks like it was a winter
harvest up in you know, uh, kindof a wet area in northern
ontario where they do winterroads.
(36:45):
But you can see the line of theroad and then you can see like
masses of of.
They look like logs that havebeen run over by a machine
because they have mud on top ofthem.
This is how good the imagery is.
Um, and that is like that's ababy logging scar.
Now, how long it's going topersist, I don't know, because
(37:06):
maybe winter roads are a littlebit.
You know they've got a lightertouch on the foot, on the on the
landscape.
You know they've uh, that'swhat we've been told, but it
would be interesting.
But you definitely can findthem.
That's how long it took me.
Janet Sumner (37:29):
It took me less than five minutes to find one.
Yeah, so if you're out there andyou're listening to this and
you want to go see Logging Scars, you can definitely see.
We've actually got a map on theLogging Scars website and you
can actually see the ones thatwe looked at.
You can even find I think it'sgot the GIS points for most of
the ones that we have and youcan click on those and then see
the Google imagery.
But if you want to go for atour around Canada now you've
(37:52):
seen what they look like you canactually use Google to find
those Logging Scars acrossCanada and you have to get into
a certain resolution before youcan see them.
So, but I invite our listenersto to go and take a tour of
Canada looking for these loggingscars and maybe start out with
logging scarsca, just to to getyourself oriented, because that
(38:14):
will give you an approximationof how, what, what to look for
on the landscape and how you cansee them, et cetera.
You won't be able tonecessarily do the math because
you can't draw that line ofwhere the harvest block was or
things like that, but you cancertainly.
Well, you're saying you can Dave.
Dave Pearce (38:31):
Not for all of them , but for some of them, no, I
mean for some of them.
You can.
I mean it's not as precisebecause Trevor was again, he was
being very diligent and sayingyou know, this is where I think
the line would be, and let mesort of verify that and
calibrate it based on actuallybeing on the ground.
But you can kind of you can dothe rough math, especially with
Google earth.
You know it's got the tools.
(38:51):
You can.
You can throw a, um, uh, apolygon down around the
perimeter and it'll tell youwhat the area is of the whole
cutover.
And then you can kind of gowell, there's the road and the
landings.
I'll just take that, I'll putanother polygon and then that
gives you that area and you justdivide the uh, the scars, by
the total area and then thatgives you your, your proportion
(39:13):
right there, um, so again, youcould do in five minutes you
could have a.
It would be rough, I wouldn't,I wouldn't publish that, but
it's a rough estimate andhopefully with AI and better
technology, you know, we'll beable to, either through machine
learning or crowdsourcing, beable to replicate this and get a
(39:36):
bigger sample size.
Janet Sumner (39:38):
Yeah, to replicate this and get a bigger sample
size.
Yeah, it was interesting to me.
The criticism that has beenleveled by some of the industry
association has been oh well,they cherry-picked the sites.
And I always find that a funnycriticism because it didn't say
our calculations were off, itdidn't say our methodology was
how.
It said we cherry-picked, and Ifound that interesting because
(40:00):
we did almost 300 sites and thenground truth, a representative
sample yeah, and I don't knowanybody who's ever done more
than that or looked at even atleast that and yet, um, the
criticism is that we, we cherrypicked, um, and, as I say, you
can use Google Earth to go andsee all of these sites.
(40:20):
It feels like the defense ofthis is rather weak, or the
defense of those who would thinkdifferently is rather weak and,
as I said, canadians shouldknow this.
This is our forest.
We're handing out 10 years onour forest and this is how
things are being cut and this isthe de facto deforestation or
(40:41):
the legacy of logging and I'lljust make one more point that
you and trevor have presented tonatural resources uh, canada
and our can, right?
Dave Pearce (40:54):
yeah?
And to who else have youpresented to?
But you've been taken veryseriously, right oh?
Janet Sumner (41:02):
absolutely.
Dave Pearce (41:05):
Some of the industry folks have come back
with, like you said, rather lamecriticisms.
But within NRCan, what's beenthe response?
Janet Sumner (41:15):
No the response from NRCan was yeah, they
replicated the study, which wasgreat from our perspective.
We were confident that we'ddone a good job and I remember
the day we were in there and wepresented it was taken very
seriously and in fact theyreplicated and said we might
have been a bit moreconservative than we needed to
(41:35):
be.
So I thought that wasinteresting and I'm hoping it
gives Canada the impetus or thedesire to actually get.
And what I've been asking forfor some time is, you know,
based on this study, it would bereally helpful if Canada could
do a mapping of Canada's forestsat a higher resolution, ie,
(41:56):
instead of using 30 meters, I'vebeen asking for 4 to 10 meters,
and that would allow us, andthen it's not just based on our
opinion, then it's.
You know, the federalgovernment can do a 4 to 10
meter resolution map of Canada'sforests and all Canadians can
know what's the footprint in theforest, all Canadians can know
what that looks like, and evenforestry companies, because the
(42:16):
other thing about this is, ifthose trees are not there, when
and dave, you can speak to thiswhen you do the forest model,
like when you.
We talked about this in thebeginning.
Dave has experienced in runningthe swam model and he'll tell
you what that stands for,because I always get it wrong.
Um, but that is a black box ofbasically being able to run a
(42:38):
forestry model and figure outhow many trees you're going to
have to cut.
Well, if you're missing 14% ofyour trees so they're
essentially those areas arebarren that's going to reduce
the fiber when you get out thereto cut.
So it's even helpful for theforest industry to know exactly
what's not there.
And wouldn't it be great if wehad that four to 10 meter
(42:58):
resolution and then people couldactually see what was not there
?
And wouldn't it be great if wehad that four to 10 meter
resolution and then people couldactually see what was going on?
Dave, do you want to speak tothat?
Dave Pearce (43:08):
Well, yeah, my recollection of SWAM and just
force management.
They would assume a certainamount would be lost to the
roads and maybe to the landings,but it's way less than what, uh
, trevor, um, um discovered.
So around two, three percent,right.
(43:29):
So they, they would say, ohwell, we're gonna, we're gonna
lose two to three percentpercent of of the cut block to a
road, roads and landings, whenit's you know, it's an average
of 14.
So there's, there's going to beat least 10 less wood out there
than they, they think when,they, when, uh, the companies go
back yeah, so I'm hoping canadasteps up and does that.
Janet Sumner (43:52):
Uh, four to ten meter resolution.
That would be a benefit toeverybody.
It would allow us to look atthat.
And also something you saidbefore we started the podcast.
We were talking aboutdegradation.
Can you just speak?
Kaya Adleman (44:05):
to that I was going to ask about that yeah,
yeah.
Dave Pearce (44:13):
Where do you want me to start?
Janet Sumner (44:16):
Well, I think your comment to us was and this was
part of our discussion becauseyou know, we've got several
episodes that we're inproduction with and one of the
things that's come up is theEuropean Union is looking at
procurement policies that willtalk about where fiber comes
from and they don't want to takeit from places that have
(44:38):
deforestation or degradation.
Kaya Adleman (44:41):
And so Canada has to.
Janet Sumner (44:43):
Yeah, go ahead, Guy.
Kaya Adleman (44:45):
Just to define what a procurement policy is.
It's the EU saying they're notgoing to import fiber products
into the EU based on certaincriteria.
Janet Sumner (45:00):
Right.
So this degradation definitionis really important, and Dave's
remark to us before the micstarted recording was that
logging scars are probably oneof the clearest examples of
degradation.
Give us your take on that, dave.
Dave Pearce (45:17):
Yeah, I mean, it's undeniable.
And when we set this up wetalked about our sort of our
skepticism of of trevor'sconcerns.
We knew there were problemswith forestry.
I don't want to underplay that.
We kind of knew in general thatyou know, um, caribou were
disappearing, other species werehaving trouble, um, we thought
(45:38):
we were at the time in the early2000s.
Uh, that, uh, you know, um, wewere over harvesting and um, but
this actually um illustratesone of one of the mechanisms of
of the damage right and and is aclear example of damage of long
(45:59):
lasting.
Once you go into an area, um,you know, at least in the
examples, that we've seen thetrevor ground truth and and you
know, saw remotely, you've got14 of that land is not coming
back.
The roads are essentiallypermanent.
There's been a change not onlyin the carbon regime and the
carbon cycle, uh, the naturalcarbon cycle, but also in the
(46:23):
flora and fauna and species atrisk are are suffering like like
caribou, uh, because theseareas are degraded to the point
where they'll they will nolonger support caribou, and
justina talked, uh in previousepisodes.
Justina Ray talked veryeloquently about how that works,
(46:45):
but the logging scars are avery clear indication and
example of that degradation andthat damage.
Janet Sumner (46:54):
So that's a lot.
I think we might have exhaustedlogging scars.
Dave Pearce (47:03):
Yeah, think so I'm gonna sit down you're gonna say
oh, you're standing are youstanding up yeah, yeah, oh, my
goodness, just in two hours ofyou standing way to go, kaya,
I've been lying down.
This is a.
This is a.
This is actually my couch backhere.
I've just put it back.
You're not going to record thispart right.
Janet Sumner (47:30):
Okay, so we've finished two episodes now of
Logging Scars.
We've learned that when you goin to do full tree harvesting
into a forest or certainly inthe northwest of Ontario what
(47:52):
happened was we see a footprintthat essentially is the legacy
of the access of full treeharvesting into an intact oil
landscape.
And that is, you get the roadsthat you needed to drive the
heavy machinery in to get at thetrees, the heavy machinery in
to get at the trees, and then,as the harvesting occurs, you're
dragging those full trees tothe roadside, delimbing them,
taking the tops off, et cetera,and piling some of the
unmerchantable trees or thetrees that you can't sell and
(48:12):
you're putting them by theroadside and those are building
up what are called the landings.
That's where the trees land asyou're processing them and you
leave the forest and you domassive regeneration and a lot
of the regeneration works and itgets to that state of free to
grow.
And what we were assuming andwhat many people were assuming
not just foresters or industryor auditors, et cetera, but also
(48:37):
many environmental groups wewere assuming, okay, the
regeneration from the air lookspretty good, but what?
Trevor was just a dog with abone about and he couldn't let
it go was he wanted to figureout what was going on in this
forest and why.
From the air, you could seethese long lines with areas of
(48:57):
regrowth that were not occurring, sort of either brown that were
not occurring, sort of eitherbrownish or light green, because
they might have a lot of berrybushes on them, etc.
And then when he got down ontothe ground, he could really
start to see that these landingareas sometimes the debris pile
was 10 feet high and you hadthis rutting in the roads that
was not coming back and it wascompacted and compressed and the
(49:21):
landings were smothering theregrowth for trees, even if
regeneration had been successfulin all the adjacent areas and
it looked like a robust numberof trees coming back.
And so all of this leads to allkinds of challenges in the
forest, and for me, what it alsosays is what else don't we know
(49:41):
?
What else don't we know interms of the forest across
Canada and I think I talk aboutthis in one of the episodes is
just that if you do a Googleflyover and you know what to
look for, you can go to forestmanagement units.
You can actually see that theforest is not coming back.
(50:03):
It may not be the same quantumof area Like in this we found it
was 14% on average wasn'tcoming back, but it was anything
from like 10% to 27%, dependingon the forest management unit.
So as we look across Canada andwe look at whether it's full
tree harvesting or partial tree,we do see a footprint in the
(50:25):
forest that remains and you cansee that on Google Earth.
You can go take a look at it.
But it suggests that Canadaneeds to actually figure that
out If we really truly want tobe responsible about our
forestry and figure out what isthe footprint, what is the
carbon impact?
What is the impact to species?
How much disturbance have weactually increased?
(50:46):
How much is not coming back?
I mean even the caribou.
Science suggests that after 30or 40 years that once you've let
an area be regrown, that thoseareas will come back and be
caribou capable is theterminology I've heard.
But if you've still got thatdisturbance profile or you've
(51:06):
got that access for predators,that's going to keep caribou
away from those areas.
Even if you've been able toregrow trees and I keep talking
about it as regrowing treesbecause you're not regrowing a
complex ecosystem like a forestand check out our conversation
with Michelle Connolly, if youwant to hear any more about that
, in terms of the complexifyingagents of insect outbreaks and
(51:28):
fires, but that forestry isactually a simplifying of the
forest and it takes that complexsystem and simplifies it.
Anyway, I've gone on enough,but that is that is what I take
away from today's conversationand the previous conversation.
Kaya Adleman (51:44):
Yeah, I mean I guess just to add to that, in
addition to the many takeawaysfrom logging scars, from the
carbon impacts to the impacts tobiodiversity, caribou impacts
to forestry, like if these areasaren't growing back, are we
going to have to go into morenew intact areas to get our
fiber supply from.
(52:05):
And I think what's alsointeresting is this argument of
if logging scars exist, then isthere more of a need to go in to
do regeneration, and thepossible consequences of that,
as Dave was mentioning having todrag out heavy machinery back
into that area continue tosmother the soil.
(52:25):
For me it strengthens the needfor a precautionary approach
when it comes to forestry.
Also, logging scars drawsattention to the need for better
data and oversight of what'sgoing on in Canada's forests on
behalf of the government.
Logging Scars is a smallsnapshot into what's going on in
(52:47):
Canada's forests but, like wetalked about on the episode,
this pattern is seen on GoogleEarth satellite imagery across
Canada.
It's actually been mentioned bya few of our guests before on
previous episodes.
So Canada only maps at a 30meter resolution and logging
scars is definitely an argumentfor a greater resolution of
(53:11):
what's going on in the forest.
Of those takeaways, that was abig takeaway for me and I think
just generally like loggingscars is such a referential work
.
When you talk to environmentalorganizations who work on a
variety of different issuessomewhat related to forestry,
logging scars is always broughtup.
(53:31):
You mentioned Wildlands Leaguelogging scars.
Oh yeah, you guys did thatlogging scars work.
I always refer to that, and soI really encourage everyone
who's listening to this to go tologging scarsca and take a look
for yourself.
The images are really, reallygreat.
In addition to being verythorough in his scientific
(53:54):
methods, trevor is also a verygreat photographer.
The photo of his partner,victoria, like just standing
next to that huge pile ofslashes Pretty, pretty cool.
Yeah, yeah, all right, thanks,kaya, all right, thank you.
Janet Sumner (54:13):
If you like listening to the Clear Cut and
want to keep the content coming,support the show.
It would mean a lot to Kaya andI.
The link to do so will be inthe episode description below.
Kaya Adleman (54:24):
You can also become a supporter by going to
our website atwwwwildlandsleagueorg.
Slash the clear cut and alsomake sure to leave us a review
on your favorite podcaststreaming platform.
It would really help thepodcast and stay tuned for new
episodes by following us onsocial media.
Janet Sumner (54:45):
That's at Wildlands League on Instagram,
twitter and Facebook or LinkedIn, of course.
Kaya Adleman (54:51):
See you next time.
Welcome to the Clear Cut.
Hi, I'm Janet Sumner, ExecutiveDirector at Wildlands League.
Kaya Adleman (00:08):
And I'm Kaya Adelman, Carbon Manager at
Wildlands League.
Janet Sumner (00:14):
Wildlands League is a Canadian conservation
organization working onprotecting the natural world.
Kaya Adleman (00:21):
The Clear Cut is bringing to you the much-needed
conversation on Canadian forestmanagement and how we can better
protect one of Canada's mostimportant ecosystems, as our
forests are reaching a tippingpoint.
Janet Sumner (00:40):
So here we are this morning with the second
episode of Logging Scars,talking to Dave Pierce from the
Wildlands Office and KayaEdelman, who is my co-host, on
the Clear Cut.
In terms of how much land isdeforested or has been left
barren after a clear cut, wecan't technically call it
(01:10):
deforested even though there areno trees and they're barren
after 30, 35 years plus, andthat's because of international
definitions et cetera.
But the real point here is toget into well, what is actually
happening in the forest, notjust what's happening according
to a model.
And so this is actually quiterevealing about logging scars
and it does suggest that we needto take a look at how we do our
(01:34):
calculations and how we thinkabout forestry, and then we
can't just rely on models thatwe actually have to get out
there and figure out what'sgoing on.
But it also represents anenormous carbon loss if those
trees are not coming back, ifthose areas essentially remain
barren, and we didn't even dothe calculations on what might
be happening in the soil carbonor how that might be changing if
(01:57):
you're drying out an area, etcetera.
So, kaya, I'm looking forwardto today's conversation.
Kaya Adleman (02:02):
Right, I'm looking forward to it as well, and I
think what this episode alsoreally gets at for me is how
widespread the logging scars isin terms of its implications.
Wildlands League did thisgroundbreaking work and produced
this information that 14% onaverage of the forest doesn't
(02:23):
grow back after clear-cutlogging has gone through.
But what does that mean?
And those implications arefar-reaching.
So I think that's what'sinteresting about this
conversation and, like always,if you're listening to this for
the first time, welcome hello,and you have no idea what we're
talking about.
This is part two of our loggingscars episode.
(02:44):
So before you dive into thisone, go back, check out part one
, called what are logging scars,and then check back in with us.
All right, I'm excited to getinto it.
Janet Sumner (02:54):
Yeah, let's go.
Kaya Adleman (03:00):
Why is that finding, though significant in
the context of forestry?
So that, like after logging,goes through some of the areas
where logging has's lost tothese landings and to the roads
(03:27):
is somewhere in the range of 3%to 6%.
Dave Pearce (03:31):
Again, my numbers might not be totally accurate,
but Ontario's estimates are waylow ball lengths.
So 14% is a lot different than3% and it has repercussions for
our carbon accounting becausethose trees are not there,
(03:56):
they're not sucking up carbon,they're not storing carbon.
Also has implications for theforest industry.
So you can imagine when thetime comes to harvest those
areas again, if they're notcorrecting their calculation,
their yield is going to be atleast 10% less than what a
(04:17):
company would expect to get.
And again, multiply it over thesize of the province, that's a
lot of.
That's a big wood shortfall.
Kaya Adleman (04:28):
That sounds significant and I can imagine
that if a company is assumingthat there's going to be forest
there to cut down or to harvesttrees from and then there's not,
they're probably going to say,oh look at this other area where
there's untouched forest, whydon't I just get the trees from
there on my forest managementunit?
Dave Pearce (04:48):
That is a great point, what we are saying.
Because of this legacy oflogging, scars and other reasons
, we want to see the forestindustry constrained to areas
that have already been logged.
And you're right.
If they can't get the fiberthat they need from those areas
when they go back, then there'sgoing to be increased pressure
(05:09):
to further expand the footprint.
Janet Sumner (05:13):
Is it possible to regenerate those places, Dave?
Because that's one of the bigquestions we get asked all the
time.
It's like oh well, thencouldn't we just regenerate
those areas, and do you have atheory on that, or what's your
thinking?
Dave Pearce (05:27):
Well, it's technically possible but there's
a, you know, so you could go inagain with pretty heavy
machinery.
It would be very hard to domanually.
So you have to go in withsomething that would penetrate
and remove that, logging theslash like the waste wood and
uncompact the soil.
So it'd be almost anagricultural operation with
(05:50):
really heavy machinery to get inthere.
And so you'd have to open theseroads up again, which, you know
they're still logging scars andthey are slowly healing, very
slowly.
They won't heal before the nextrotation because if they're 30
years old they'll be, um, youknow, another, uh, 30 or 40
(06:12):
years.
They're going to open up thatarea to cut those trees that
were planted or that regenerated, um, and you know, based on
what's happened in the last twoor three decades, you're not
going to have another forestthere.
So, anyways, they're slowlyhealing and it would be a high
(06:34):
cost to go in and basically openup the roads just to regenerate
it again, and then they'regoing to slowly heal and then
they'd have to come back in withheavy machinery in another, you
know, another few decades.
So it's quite costly and therehas been in some of these cases,
there's been some attempt to uh, limit access into these areas
to kind of again we talked aboutit in the in the previous
(06:58):
podcast to mitigate some of theimpacts of forestry.
So they will pull culverts outor they'll pull bridges, uh, to
try to keep access to a minimum,to to give a faint hope to
these roads, regenerating forwildlife and and uh and uh,
protecting, you know, fisheriesfrom, from over harvest or
(07:18):
whatever.
But um, all to say is therewould be an impact to go in and
try to regenerate these sites,and then you're already, um 20,
30 years behind the rest of theforest.
So, um, there might be somewildlife benefits to having
those trees, but they're justgoing to be starting to store
carbon again.
(07:39):
You know it's there's a 20 yearlag before a planted tree
really starts to grow carbon,and then it's not going to be
very long after that beforethese areas are going to be
opened up again for forestry, um, if they come back.
So there's, um, it'stechnically feasible, um, it's
much better to prevent thesescars in the first place uh,
(08:01):
than it than it is.
And or try to do immediateamelioration while the area is
still fresh, then to go backafter two decades or three
decades and try to fix it.
Janet Sumner (08:17):
So one of the areas I just want to talk about
is that I've often heard thephrase that we're trying to
mimic fire, like the boreal is afire-dependent ecosystem, so go
in and harvest and that will bekind of look like a fire.
Right, because we're going toharvest big areas like a fire
(08:40):
would take out.
But one of the big differencesbetween a fire and a forestry
operation is that there's a roadinfrastructure, and I guess
this is one of the ways in whichlogging scars was really a
confirmation for us that roadsactually are, if not permanent,
(09:01):
semi-permanent as aninfrastructure in the forest,
like once you've gone in andbear cut and certainly with
field poultry harvesting used it, you've left behind this road
infrastructure, whereas a firewouldn't leave that.
It would go in and take out acertain area.
It might be large but itwouldn't have a supporting
(09:23):
infrastructure.
And I think Anna talked aboutthis in her podcast.
Is that one of the reasons thatcaribou are disappearing off
the landscape is becausepredators have greater access
and they get that access.
It's facilitated through theroad network that's left behind
by forestry, whereas fires don'toperate that way.
Can you maybe just speak tothat?
Dave Pearce (09:43):
Well, yeah, and that's a really good point.
So the impacts of these it'snot just visual, there's an
ecological impact, and I thinkJustina talked about the
functional response of wolves toeven if their population didn't
go up.
They're more effective atscouring the landscape for prey
(10:05):
If there's a road network thatthey can run along.
Um, and it takes a long, longtime.
It was difficult after 20 or 30years for Trevor to get a truck
in to these areas, but it's noproblem for a wolf.
There's still.
We've seen enough of these oldlogging roads there, so there's
growth that would prevent atruck going in.
(10:26):
But you look closely andthere's kind of a tunnel that's
a perfect size for a game to runthrough, um, under the shrubs
and whatnot, or through the,through the shrubbery.
So they're still using that.
Uh, other animals use it too,because it's just easier to get
around that.
Uh, other animals use it too,cause it's just easier to get
around.
(10:47):
So, um, uh, there I would saythey are permanent from a, uh, a
wildlife, uh, almost a wildlifefeature.
Uh, after the fact that I'veworked in Algonquin park where,
um, you know, I've been in incutovers that have been older
than these and the old loggingroads and the landings are still
(11:10):
around and there's game trailson them now and that's wolves
actually use that to run aroundAlgonquin Park as well.
Janet Sumner (11:21):
That's a whole nother podcast.
Dave on logging in.
Algonquin Park.
We Um, that's a whole notherpodcast Dave logging in
Algonquin park.
We're not going there today.
Dave Pearce (11:29):
No, no, but it's um , this, this, uh, the footprint
of roads is not confined to theboreal.
Um, but um, but, and, and it's,and, it's um, and it's impact
(11:56):
on wildlife and the wildlifeassemblage that comes up, you
know that is there after logging.
Janet Sumner (11:58):
It's pretty much permanent as far as I can see.
So 1990 was my very first EarthDay.
I was working at PollutionProbe, I was working on issues
around waste management andtoxics in the Great Lakes and
pesticides and all that kind offun stuff.
I hadn't yet graduated toworking on carbon or nature or
(12:19):
thinking about all the greatwork that we do in terms of
protecting areas at WildlandsLake.
But 34 years later, we stillvery, very much need an Earth
Day, because we needenvironmental groups and the
public, and one of the greatthings that I've seen happen in
my 34 years working onenvironmental issues is this
(12:41):
transition where the public iseven more engaged, where we have
a democratization.
That's happened because of theinternet, because of AI, because
of all of these ways in whichwe can now see into the world
and see what's going on, and soI'm more encouraged than ever
that the public and the peopleare paying attention and are
(13:01):
hungry for information, and ifyou're hungry for information,
you want to be listening to thepodcast and you want to be
supporting the podcast, soanything that you can do on this
Earth Day to help us keep thepodcast going would be greatly
appreciated.
Thanks so much for listeningand tell all your friends about
it.
Thank you, okay.
I was just going to ask aboutedge effect.
(13:23):
This is something that I had noidea about until I joined
Wildlands Lake and Dave taughtme a lesson on edge effect.
Go, dave, tell everybody aboutedge effect.
Dave Pearce (13:34):
Well, edge effect is where you have the edge of
the forest right and there couldbe a natural opening or it's
it's more it's it's moreproblematic if it's an
artificial opening ofdisturbance and um, so you can
(13:54):
imagine a forest was covered, anarea, and then you have a road
going through and now you havetwo edges of the forest where it
was complete forest coverbefore and, uh, that part of the
forest is opened up to manythings sunlight, wind, um, it's
more accessible to predators, um, and so it'll dry out the
(14:17):
forest more than a closed forestwould be.
Uh, there'll be differentspecies growing there because
the sunlight can penetrate, um,you know, well, beyond the exact
edge of the forest, cause the,you know, the morning sun shines
through on this side and theafternoon sun shines through on
the other side, and you get, youget light penetrating well
beyond the edge of the road intothe forest.
(14:39):
And the same with predators, um, that are.
It makes predator, it makes iteasier for predators to move
along the road, but also to makeforays into the, into the
forest, off the road.
So you can imagine a wolf or awolf pack traveling along a road
.
Uh, it's pretty easy goingrelative to going through the
bush and then they see or smella caribou you know, maybe you
(15:00):
know up to a kilometer off theroad, and then they can peel off
and and uh go after thatcaribou which you know, maybe
you know up to a kilometer offthe road and then they can peel
off and and uh go after thatcaribou which you know they
wouldn't.
It wouldn't be as easy for themto see.
So there, yeah, there'smultiple, I guess, impacts uh
from an edge effect point ofview, of roads and cutovers too,
but uh, as we've seen, I mean,the cutovers do grow back.
(15:21):
Uh, as we've seen, I mean, thecut cutovers do grow back uh to
one extent or another, but it'sthe roads and landings that are
really uh persisting.
Kaya Adleman (15:53):
Wow, the presumption of regeneration that
exists in the Canadian forestmanagement frame.
But what about from a climatestandpoint?
Or perhaps from a policystandpoint?
Dave Pearce (16:09):
You want me to go yeah go for it.
Okay.
So I mean, yeah, so you've gottrees that have been removed
that are not growing back at thesame rate as the rest of the
cutover area, so thoseconstitute additional carbon
debt because there's the trees.
There aren't trees theresucking up carbon that would
(16:33):
have been there Right.
And so and Trevor, you know,found out, there's 14% of the
clear cut on average isn'tcoming back.
Um, that's, you know, 14%, uh,less, less carbon being absorbed
by trees compared to what, uh,what would have been there, uh
and um, and so there's a real,real impact on uh, on the
(16:59):
environment.
There's more carbon as a resultof these areas.
There's more carbon in theatmosphere than there would have
been.
But there's also a glaring holein Canada's accounting and maybe
Janet can speak to this a bitmore but where they're not
considering this.
And so Canada is supposed to bereporting on the carbon, you
(17:21):
know, gains and losses caused byCanadian activities, and
they're not reporting on thisparticular one and many more.
There's others that kind of flyunder the radar too.
So we're doing worse, I guess,as a country, than we think we
(17:42):
are because of these types of ummiscalculations.
And then there's the actual,actual impact, and then uh,
additionally um, and this wehaven't quantified this.
In a sense you can kind ofquantify the CO2 equivalent
because you know how much, howmany trees should it should be
there and and you can kind ofand we've done the the
(18:03):
calculation how much uh, co2equivalent um is in the
atmosphere.
That shouldn't be.
But then there's the methane uhportion because of all this um
decomposing wood, that's um, the, the deeper stuff is
decomposing in the absence ofoxygen and the result of that is
a methane production.
(18:24):
You think of a stinky old, likea swamp or a bog.
If anybody's delved into themuck there or even pulled their
boot out of a deep hole in themud, it smells because there's
methane and associated sulfurstuff.
You can't actually smell themethane, but it's the associated
(18:45):
sulfur that goes along with itthat you smell, but anyways the
methane production.
And methane is even worse thanCO2 in terms of trapping heat in
the atmosphere.
Janet Sumner (19:01):
Yeah, just to add a little bit to what Dave was
saying.
The reason we don't account forit is because under the
international agreements, canadaadmits to almost no
deforestation and that's becausewhen we look at the forest and
(19:21):
it's being used for forestry, ifyou go in and you clear, cut
that forest, it is still goingto be used for forestry at some
point in the future.
So you haven't changed theactual land use on it, even
though you've maybe taken allthe trees off it, maybe even
you've regrown some of thosetrees, but you've got 14% of it
(19:43):
on average.
As this logging scar study andyou can go see all the math it
goes anywhere from as little as10%.
That's been what I would callsort of de facto deforestation,
because it's still barren orlargely barren.
That forest is not coming backanytime soon, as Dave has, you
(20:05):
know, explained.
Kaya Adleman (20:09):
And that's the assumption right under the
international agreements is thatthe forest grows back.
Therefore, you don't have tocount it against your carbon
emissions.
Therefore, you don't have tocount it against your carbon
emissions.
Janet Sumner (20:18):
Yeah, but it's also the assumption that you
would still have to count it if,for example, you turned it into
a shopping mall, maybe treesaround it, because it's not a
different land use.
And so, for example, in a placelike Brazil, they're often
cutting trees down to turn itinto agriculture, or maybe it's
a city or a shopping mall andthat's a different land use.
(20:44):
So they have to claim it.
Canada, we don't have to claimthose because it hasn't changed
land use and also because it wascut down as part of the logging
operations, it's assumed thatregeneration will be successful.
In fact, we model that.
We model it as if it's going tocome back.
I think Ontario admits to maybe3% to 7% that might be
(21:05):
attributable to landings androads and, as I said, our math
looked at it and said it's morelike 14%.
That's a big difference.
And I'll just speak tosomething that I worked on.
We had looked at one of theplaces of a forestry company
(21:26):
who's actually very progressive.
We can stay out of this areaand we wanted to understand a
little bit about how much wouldbe preserved if that didn't
happen, if you didn't have thatlogging scar there, if that 14
(21:47):
percent wasn't logged.
And I think the area they werewilling to stay out of was
something like 450 000 hectares.
And then then you know Trevor,when he and I talked about this,
the subject he said well, wewill have to discount the water,
of course, because that's notgoing to come back.
So we did a rough estimate ofthat being about 150,000 of the
(22:07):
hectares, and so that meant300,000 hectares that you
wouldn't be harvesting and itwas phenomenal when it came back
.
It was like 13 megatons CO2over a 20-year period.
You would avoid releasing intothe atmosphere by not logging
there, and that's just based onhaving a 14% barren footprint
(22:33):
from roads and landings.
So it's not insignificant andwe're not counting it.
It's not included in our math.
We don't admit to that asdeforestation, although Trevor
and I both agreed it's actuallyin the document.
We call it de factodeforestation because it's
essentially like most peoplewould think deforestation is
(22:55):
there's no trees.
So that's why we call it defacto deforestation, even though
the international definition isa land use change.
For us it's like well, it'sbarren, it had trees on it, now
it's barren.
So from our perspective that'sde facto deforestation.
And so that 14% really is amassive carbon loss, and one
that is going well under theradar carbon loss and one that
(23:19):
is going well under the radar.
And it's unfortunate because Iactually think if companies were
given the choices and theycould say well, you know, we're
going to change our practicesand we would realize this
because we met with severalcompanies after we did this
study and presented the findingsof this study and they, without
a doubt, looked at us and said,well, that's not happening in
my forest, because they believethat when they're cutting, that
(23:45):
the regeneration is going to besuccessful.
In fact, in fact, they go outand they test whether or not it
is at the stage of what I callit's called free to grow.
Right, dave, it's, it's, it'slike, basically, it's reached a
certain height, it can now grow.
And and we, we talked toauditors and auditors said well,
you know, we kind of wewondered about those roads and
landings, but we just sort ofassumed it was going to come
back.
So that's what's sogroundbreaking about the work
(24:05):
that Trevor did, that he justwouldn't let go of it because he
could see it and he just wantedto know what it was.
And, as I said, dave and I wereboth of the opinion like, well,
you know, it probably probablycomes back, but this is the
first time somebody looked at itand said, you know what, based
on almost 300 sites, this is notcoming back.
(24:26):
Now, some of them might besuccessful, but we've got, on
average, 14 percent.
It's not, it's essentiallybarren.
After 30 years.
That was a game changer for me,I know, for dave, for the
entire organization.
We just were like wow, that'ssomething that people are not
(24:48):
talking about.
Want to add anything there,dave?
Dave Pearce (24:54):
yeah, well, you talked about the sort of the
bureaucratic loophole.
I guess that prevents theseareas from being counted as
deforestation.
But then there's also theresolution of the imagery that
Canada uses right to assess fordeforestation.
(25:16):
So I kind of dug into Trevor'sreport a little bit and he talks
about the deforestationinterpretation guide that um, uh
, is used by uh, NRCan, naturalResources, canada to assess
deforestation and so there's aprovision in there, if it's, if
it's big enough and they can seeit and they can measure it,
(25:37):
they could count it asdeforestation.
But because they use landsatimagery that only the pixels are
uh, 30 meters across right andand uh, so that means, um, when
they look at that lens, theseindividual scars, the road and
(26:00):
the landing, they don't show upbecause they're too small, it's
just a blurry something, youknow.
It's a light colored blurry,whereas when Trevor was looking
at high resolution aerialfootage, I mean it's very
obvious aerial footage and itmeans very obvious um, and so
(26:22):
they're just not looking at it,um, you know, kind of using the
right lens and I think, uh, Iwas interviewed once about this
and it was, and I was, you know,it's similar to coming in out
of a cold weather and cominginto a hot uh, you know uh or a
warm and moist environment andyour glasses, my glasses, fog up
.
I wear glasses so I can't see.
Right, I can see that there's acouch over here or whatever,
(26:44):
but I can't see if there's a caton the couch, which I've sat on
the cat a couple of times.
Janet Sumner (26:52):
I said you're a good family man, Dave.
I didn't know you were going totalk about your cats that way.
Dave Pearce (26:59):
But Family man, Dave, I didn't know you were
going to talk about your catsthat way, but I mean yeah.
Kaya Adleman (27:06):
So the resolution issue, yeah, I mean if you, even
if you ever just look at apicture that has terrible
resolution and you zoom in onyour computer and then you start
seeing the pixels, like that'swhat it looks like.
If you see the governmentimagery, it looks like a bunch
of pixels that are just asingular color that you can't
decipher.
Or if you look at a higherresolution imagery, you're able
(27:27):
to see more specific things atthe same level of zoom.
I have this screen background,or my screensaver on my laptop
is a photo, is a screen grab, ofthe Sopranos which we were just
talking about, and it's TonySoprano looking at lawn
(27:53):
furniture at the famousFountains of Wayne Garden Store
garden store in New Jersey rip,it's out of business.
But also, um, the inspirationfor my favorite band name,
fountains of Wayne, shout out,but it's terribly pixelated.
Like it's horrible.
If you see, if you watch itlike on crave or on HBO, it
looks amazing, like the visualslook amazing, but because it's a
(28:14):
screen grab that someone took,probably just from watching it
on their computer or something,it looks terrible and I don't
know why.
I have it on my laptop but itmakes me happy.
So, even if it's terribleresolution.
So that's all to say.
The government of Canada looksat forestry like looking at this
(28:34):
terrible picture of TonySoprano shopping at a garden
furniture store.
Janet Sumner (28:39):
That's our Soprano moment we actually had this
conversation before we started.
And Kaya has another claim tofame, which is what's near your
family home.
Kaya, what were you telling usbefore?
Kaya Adleman (28:52):
The famous Holston's Restaurant.
It's not a diner.
I wouldn't define it as a diner, contrary to popular belief,
but it's the restaurant.
That's from where they shot thefinal scene of the Sopranos.
They have really good ice creamfloats, so I would recommend.
Yeah, that's what they'refamous for is their ice cream
(29:14):
and their chocolate and fudge,but Tony Soprano goes there for
some reason to eat onion ringsand then the series is over.
Won't spoil it for anyone.
Janet Sumner (29:24):
Yeah, and just to make note, I called that the
golden age of television, whichDave correctly said.
No, that was actually thehoneymooners.
So just to dive deep into thedifferences there, but yeah, so
we had a bit of a soprano'smoment before we started this.
No, I think that's a reallyimportant piece.
Is the?
Is the resolution?
(29:45):
Um, and just to be very uhprecise about that resolution,
uh, trevor's work in loggingscars looked at essentially a
resolution of 40 centimeters, soso under a meter, and the
federal government resolutionwhen looking at the state of
Canada's forests is 30 meters.
And these roads are how wide,dave?
(30:07):
What would you say?
Dave Pearce (30:09):
Well, they're less than 30 meters across.
Janet Sumner (30:15):
So you can't see them.
Dave Pearce (30:16):
Yeah, they can't see them.
You can see a bit of a smudge.
Do we have show notes?
Janet Sumner (30:21):
Yeah, we'll have show notes and we'll include
anything you want to in thoseshow notes.
Dave Pearce (30:25):
Well, you know the famous image, the aerial image
at 40 centimeters and then theLandsat sort of superimposed
over it.
Janet Sumner (30:36):
Yeah, it's great because it looks like those
old-fashioned coke bottles, likeif you were to look through
those it just kind of looks likethis fuzzy green.
You can't really tell what itis yeah so you might have
included in that.
Kaya Adleman (30:49):
Earth day is upon us by the influx of green
messaging likely flooding yoursocial media feeds, and some of
this messaging may be mentioningCanada's forests, which has, as
we know, become an increasinglypopular flashpoint in the
greater environmental discourse.
The language surroundingCanadian forests can be
confusing, though, like whatdoes sustainable mean in the
(31:12):
context of our forests?
What is the difference betweendeforestation and forest
degradation?
That's why, on the Clear Cut,we're committed to weeding
through the words and connectingwith experts to unpack the
issues facing Canada's forests.
As listeners, you've becomeinstrumental in bringing us
these important conversations.
(31:34):
Like what does a transition ofthe fiber economy look like, and
should we really be consideringbiomass fuels a climate
solution?
There's a lot more beyond thetree line, with warnings that an
even worse wildfire season iscoming this summer and Canada's
slow progress towards meetingits 2050 climate and nature
goals.
Your support keeps us bringingthese critical issues to life.
(31:58):
You can show your love for thepodcast by giving us a donation,
linked in the episodedescription below, leaving us a
review or sharing the podcastwith your friends From all of us
at Wildlands League.
Thank you.
Janet Sumner (32:14):
So where I wanted to go next with this or where I
wanted to ask your question wasoh, maybe I'm just going to
recount the day.
So I remember one of the bestthings about my job is I get to
work with some incredibly brightpeople and I get to ask
questions that just are buggingme or that I think, oh, I'd
really like to know the answerto this, like to know the answer
(32:40):
to this.
So one day I was in the officeand we used to have a great big
table in the middle of ourcentral office and a big screen
so that we could look at thingson the screen, and Dave and
Trevor were on Google, I thinkit was, and they were looking at
maps of the forest, et cetera,and I decided to ask this
question.
That was just.
I just had to know the answer.
(33:00):
I said so we can see thisfootprint, like you can see that
signature.
You can see lines in the forest.
You can clearly see these scarsthat go across it.
You can see it, and we hadlooked at almost 300 sites in
Ontario, and so one of thethings that I wanted to know
that day was can you see thisanywhere else in Canada?
Well, didn't Dave and Trevor'sfaces light up and they were
(33:24):
like, oh yeah, and they startedusing Google just to fly over
Canada and say, well see, youcan see it here, you can see it
there, you can see it here, youcan see it there, and you know,
then they gave me explanationsof why it looks slightly
different here but morepronounced there, et cetera.
And so, dave, can you maybebecause I found it fascinating
to basically be able to go anduse Google and basically go find
(33:47):
that footprint, dave, can youtell us a little bit about that
day, because I found itfascinating.
Dave Pearce (33:52):
Well, I, just as you're starting to tell the
story, I just thought I'd openup Google Earth and see and I
haven't.
I haven't quite landed on it,but it would literally pretty
much take that amount of timethat you told the intro to for
me to find a site, uh, anywherein Ontario or Quebec that has
that signature, uh footprint,because logging poultry logging
(34:17):
was so, was so ubiquitous.
I don't know what the stats arenow Like I said, I think and I
hope they're moving away from itto more cut to length, but it's
still.
It's still used a lot in Canadaand over the last 20 or 30
years was the predominant methodof clear cut harvesting in the
boreal forest.
So, um, yeah, and that, and theclear cut harvesting in the
(34:39):
boreal, you know, is all ofNorthern Ontario, all of
Northern Quebec, uh, theNorthern prairie, so-called
prairie provinces, which aremore than half forested, um and
uh, and the interior of BC theyuse the same, they um would use
full tree harvesting and allthose areas.
So the potential for thatfootprint and to be able to find
(35:02):
those sites, you know, again,it would take me five minutes to
find a site that had that Justrandomly kind of scrolling in an
area that I know has forestrygoing on in the boreal.
Janet Sumner (35:13):
Yeah, did you look at it?
Oh yeah, as well yeah, it's uh.
Kaya Adleman (35:22):
It's pretty crazy to look at um and I, I believe,
if I'm correct, I the thesatellite imagery um the time
scale or if you know how, likegoogle earth works, um, they,
it's a mosaic of differentsatellite images that are is
available.
So it would be harder to dojust using um, the google earth
(35:47):
satellite or the google earthsoftware to do a logging scars,
ask uh project, but it gives youa good uh baseline for for the
extent of the footprint, forsure.
Janet Sumner (36:03):
You can find the signature, but you can't
necessarily do the Because youdon't know where the cut block
ends and you can't sort of, youcan't get that denominator, as
Dave was saying, and you don'tnecessarily know when it was cut
, so you can't say that'sexisted for 20 years or 50 or
whatever it is right, like youcan't do that?
Dave Pearce (36:23):
yeah, because you don't know.
So I just found one, and it's anew one.
It looks like it was just.
I mean, you know the image is.
I don't know when the image wastaken, but whenever the image
was taken it was freshly cut andit looks like it was a winter
harvest up in you know, uh, kindof a wet area in northern
ontario where they do winterroads.
(36:45):
But you can see the line of theroad and then you can see like
masses of of.
They look like logs that havebeen run over by a machine
because they have mud on top ofthem.
This is how good the imagery is.
Um, and that is like that's ababy logging scar.
Now, how long it's going topersist, I don't know, because
(37:06):
maybe winter roads are a littlebit.
You know they've got a lightertouch on the foot, on the on the
landscape.
You know they've uh, that'swhat we've been told, but it
would be interesting.
But you definitely can findthem.
That's how long it took me.
Janet Sumner (37:29):
It took me less than five minutes to find one.
Yeah, so if you're out there andyou're listening to this and
you want to go see Logging Scars, you can definitely see.
We've actually got a map on theLogging Scars website and you
can actually see the ones thatwe looked at.
You can even find I think it'sgot the GIS points for most of
the ones that we have and youcan click on those and then see
the Google imagery.
But if you want to go for atour around Canada now you've
(37:52):
seen what they look like you canactually use Google to find
those Logging Scars acrossCanada and you have to get into
a certain resolution before youcan see them.
So, but I invite our listenersto to go and take a tour of
Canada looking for these loggingscars and maybe start out with
logging scarsca, just to to getyourself oriented, because that
(38:14):
will give you an approximationof how, what, what to look for
on the landscape and how you cansee them, et cetera.
You won't be able tonecessarily do the math because
you can't draw that line ofwhere the harvest block was or
things like that, but you cancertainly.
Well, you're saying you can Dave.
Dave Pearce (38:31):
Not for all of them , but for some of them, no, I
mean for some of them.
You can.
I mean it's not as precisebecause Trevor was again, he was
being very diligent and sayingyou know, this is where I think
the line would be, and let mesort of verify that and
calibrate it based on actuallybeing on the ground.
But you can kind of you can dothe rough math, especially with
Google earth.
You know it's got the tools.
(38:51):
You can.
You can throw a, um, uh, apolygon down around the
perimeter and it'll tell youwhat the area is of the whole
cutover.
And then you can kind of gowell, there's the road and the
landings.
I'll just take that, I'll putanother polygon and then that
gives you that area and you justdivide the uh, the scars, by
the total area and then thatgives you your, your proportion
(39:13):
right there, um, so again, youcould do in five minutes you
could have a.
It would be rough, I wouldn't,I wouldn't publish that, but
it's a rough estimate andhopefully with AI and better
technology, you know, we'll beable to, either through machine
learning or crowdsourcing, beable to replicate this and get a
(39:36):
bigger sample size.
Janet Sumner (39:38):
Yeah, to replicate this and get a bigger sample
size.
Yeah, it was interesting to me.
The criticism that has beenleveled by some of the industry
association has been oh well,they cherry-picked the sites.
And I always find that a funnycriticism because it didn't say
our calculations were off, itdidn't say our methodology was
how.
It said we cherry-picked, and Ifound that interesting because
(40:00):
we did almost 300 sites and thenground truth, a representative
sample yeah, and I don't knowanybody who's ever done more
than that or looked at even atleast that and yet, um, the
criticism is that we, we cherrypicked, um, and, as I say, you
can use Google Earth to go andsee all of these sites.
(40:20):
It feels like the defense ofthis is rather weak, or the
defense of those who would thinkdifferently is rather weak and,
as I said, canadians shouldknow this.
This is our forest.
We're handing out 10 years onour forest and this is how
things are being cut and this isthe de facto deforestation or
(40:41):
the legacy of logging and I'lljust make one more point that
you and trevor have presented tonatural resources uh, canada
and our can, right?
Dave Pearce (40:54):
yeah?
And to who else have youpresented to?
But you've been taken veryseriously, right oh?
Janet Sumner (41:02):
absolutely.
Dave Pearce (41:05):
Some of the industry folks have come back
with, like you said, rather lamecriticisms.
But within NRCan, what's beenthe response?
Janet Sumner (41:15):
No the response from NRCan was yeah, they
replicated the study, which wasgreat from our perspective.
We were confident that we'ddone a good job and I remember
the day we were in there and wepresented it was taken very
seriously and in fact theyreplicated and said we might
have been a bit moreconservative than we needed to
(41:35):
be.
So I thought that wasinteresting and I'm hoping it
gives Canada the impetus or thedesire to actually get.
And what I've been asking forfor some time is, you know,
based on this study, it would bereally helpful if Canada could
do a mapping of Canada's forestsat a higher resolution, ie,
(41:56):
instead of using 30 meters, I'vebeen asking for 4 to 10 meters,
and that would allow us, andthen it's not just based on our
opinion, then it's.
You know, the federalgovernment can do a 4 to 10
meter resolution map of Canada'sforests and all Canadians can
know what's the footprint in theforest, all Canadians can know
what that looks like, and evenforestry companies, because the
(42:16):
other thing about this is, ifthose trees are not there, when
and dave, you can speak to thiswhen you do the forest model,
like when you.
We talked about this in thebeginning.
Dave has experienced in runningthe swam model and he'll tell
you what that stands for,because I always get it wrong.
Um, but that is a black box ofbasically being able to run a
(42:38):
forestry model and figure outhow many trees you're going to
have to cut.
Well, if you're missing 14% ofyour trees so they're
essentially those areas arebarren that's going to reduce
the fiber when you get out thereto cut.
So it's even helpful for theforest industry to know exactly
what's not there.
And wouldn't it be great if wehad that four to 10 meter
(42:58):
resolution and then people couldactually see what was not there
?
And wouldn't it be great if wehad that four to 10 meter
resolution and then people couldactually see what was going on?
Dave, do you want to speak tothat?
Dave Pearce (43:08):
Well, yeah, my recollection of SWAM and just
force management.
They would assume a certainamount would be lost to the
roads and maybe to the landings,but it's way less than what, uh
, trevor, um, um discovered.
So around two, three percent,right.
(43:29):
So they, they would say, ohwell, we're gonna, we're gonna
lose two to three percentpercent of of the cut block to a
road, roads and landings, whenit's you know, it's an average
of 14.
So there's, there's going to beat least 10 less wood out there
than they, they think when,they, when, uh, the companies go
back yeah, so I'm hoping canadasteps up and does that.
Janet Sumner (43:52):
Uh, four to ten meter resolution.
That would be a benefit toeverybody.
It would allow us to look atthat.
And also something you saidbefore we started the podcast.
We were talking aboutdegradation.
Can you just speak?
Kaya Adleman (44:05):
to that I was going to ask about that yeah,
yeah.
Dave Pearce (44:13):
Where do you want me to start?
Janet Sumner (44:16):
Well, I think your comment to us was and this was
part of our discussion becauseyou know, we've got several
episodes that we're inproduction with and one of the
things that's come up is theEuropean Union is looking at
procurement policies that willtalk about where fiber comes
from and they don't want to takeit from places that have
(44:38):
deforestation or degradation.
Kaya Adleman (44:41):
And so Canada has to.
Janet Sumner (44:43):
Yeah, go ahead, Guy.
Kaya Adleman (44:45):
Just to define what a procurement policy is.
It's the EU saying they're notgoing to import fiber products
into the EU based on certaincriteria.
Janet Sumner (45:00):
Right.
So this degradation definitionis really important, and Dave's
remark to us before the micstarted recording was that
logging scars are probably oneof the clearest examples of
degradation.
Give us your take on that, dave.
Dave Pearce (45:17):
Yeah, I mean, it's undeniable.
And when we set this up wetalked about our sort of our
skepticism of of trevor'sconcerns.
We knew there were problemswith forestry.
I don't want to underplay that.
We kind of knew in general thatyou know, um, caribou were
disappearing, other species werehaving trouble, um, we thought
(45:38):
we were at the time in the early2000s.
Uh, that, uh, you know, um, wewere over harvesting and um, but
this actually um illustratesone of one of the mechanisms of
of the damage right and and is aclear example of damage of long
(45:59):
lasting.
Once you go into an area, um,you know, at least in the
examples, that we've seen thetrevor ground truth and and you
know, saw remotely, you've got14 of that land is not coming
back.
The roads are essentiallypermanent.
There's been a change not onlyin the carbon regime and the
carbon cycle, uh, the naturalcarbon cycle, but also in the
(46:23):
flora and fauna and species atrisk are are suffering like like
caribou, uh, because theseareas are degraded to the point
where they'll they will nolonger support caribou, and
justina talked, uh in previousepisodes.
Justina Ray talked veryeloquently about how that works,
(46:45):
but the logging scars are avery clear indication and
example of that degradation andthat damage.
Janet Sumner (46:54):
So that's a lot.
I think we might have exhaustedlogging scars.
Dave Pearce (47:03):
Yeah, think so I'm gonna sit down you're gonna say
oh, you're standing are youstanding up yeah, yeah, oh, my
goodness, just in two hours ofyou standing way to go, kaya,
I've been lying down.
This is a.
This is a.
This is actually my couch backhere.
I've just put it back.
You're not going to record thispart right.
Janet Sumner (47:30):
Okay, so we've finished two episodes now of
Logging Scars.
We've learned that when you goin to do full tree harvesting
into a forest or certainly inthe northwest of Ontario what
(47:52):
happened was we see a footprintthat essentially is the legacy
of the access of full treeharvesting into an intact oil
landscape.
And that is, you get the roadsthat you needed to drive the
heavy machinery in to get at thetrees, the heavy machinery in
to get at the trees, and then,as the harvesting occurs, you're
dragging those full trees tothe roadside, delimbing them,
taking the tops off, et cetera,and piling some of the
unmerchantable trees or thetrees that you can't sell and
(48:12):
you're putting them by theroadside and those are building
up what are called the landings.
That's where the trees land asyou're processing them and you
leave the forest and you domassive regeneration and a lot
of the regeneration works and itgets to that state of free to
grow.
And what we were assuming andwhat many people were assuming
not just foresters or industryor auditors, et cetera, but also
(48:37):
many environmental groups wewere assuming, okay, the
regeneration from the air lookspretty good, but what?
Trevor was just a dog with abone about and he couldn't let
it go was he wanted to figureout what was going on in this
forest and why.
From the air, you could seethese long lines with areas of
(48:57):
regrowth that were not occurring, sort of either brown that were
not occurring, sort of eitherbrownish or light green, because
they might have a lot of berrybushes on them, etc.
And then when he got down ontothe ground, he could really
start to see that these landingareas sometimes the debris pile
was 10 feet high and you hadthis rutting in the roads that
was not coming back and it wascompacted and compressed and the
(49:21):
landings were smothering theregrowth for trees, even if
regeneration had been successfulin all the adjacent areas and
it looked like a robust numberof trees coming back.
And so all of this leads to allkinds of challenges in the
forest, and for me, what it alsosays is what else don't we know
(49:41):
?
What else don't we know interms of the forest across
Canada and I think I talk aboutthis in one of the episodes is
just that if you do a Googleflyover and you know what to
look for, you can go to forestmanagement units.
You can actually see that theforest is not coming back.
(50:03):
It may not be the same quantumof area Like in this we found it
was 14% on average wasn'tcoming back, but it was anything
from like 10% to 27%, dependingon the forest management unit.
So as we look across Canada andwe look at whether it's full
tree harvesting or partial tree,we do see a footprint in the
(50:25):
forest that remains and you cansee that on Google Earth.
You can go take a look at it.
But it suggests that Canadaneeds to actually figure that
out If we really truly want tobe responsible about our
forestry and figure out what isthe footprint, what is the
carbon impact?
What is the impact to species?
How much disturbance have weactually increased?
(50:46):
How much is not coming back?
I mean even the caribou.
Science suggests that after 30or 40 years that once you've let
an area be regrown, that thoseareas will come back and be
caribou capable is theterminology I've heard.
But if you've still got thatdisturbance profile or you've
(51:06):
got that access for predators,that's going to keep caribou
away from those areas.
Even if you've been able toregrow trees and I keep talking
about it as regrowing treesbecause you're not regrowing a
complex ecosystem like a forestand check out our conversation
with Michelle Connolly, if youwant to hear any more about that
, in terms of the complexifyingagents of insect outbreaks and
(51:28):
fires, but that forestry isactually a simplifying of the
forest and it takes that complexsystem and simplifies it.
Anyway, I've gone on enough,but that is that is what I take
away from today's conversationand the previous conversation.
Kaya Adleman (51:44):
Yeah, I mean I guess just to add to that, in
addition to the many takeawaysfrom logging scars, from the
carbon impacts to the impacts tobiodiversity, caribou impacts
to forestry, like if these areasaren't growing back, are we
going to have to go into morenew intact areas to get our
fiber supply from.
(52:05):
And I think what's alsointeresting is this argument of
if logging scars exist, then isthere more of a need to go in to
do regeneration, and thepossible consequences of that,
as Dave was mentioning having todrag out heavy machinery back
into that area continue tosmother the soil.
(52:25):
For me it strengthens the needfor a precautionary approach
when it comes to forestry.
Also, logging scars drawsattention to the need for better
data and oversight of what'sgoing on in Canada's forests on
behalf of the government.
Logging Scars is a smallsnapshot into what's going on in
(52:47):
Canada's forests but, like wetalked about on the episode,
this pattern is seen on GoogleEarth satellite imagery across
Canada.
It's actually been mentioned bya few of our guests before on
previous episodes.
So Canada only maps at a 30meter resolution and logging
scars is definitely an argumentfor a greater resolution of
(53:11):
what's going on in the forest.
Of those takeaways, that was abig takeaway for me and I think
just generally like loggingscars is such a referential work
.
When you talk to environmentalorganizations who work on a
variety of different issuessomewhat related to forestry,
logging scars is always broughtup.
(53:31):
You mentioned Wildlands Leaguelogging scars.
Oh yeah, you guys did thatlogging scars work.
I always refer to that, and soI really encourage everyone
who's listening to this to go tologging scarsca and take a look
for yourself.
The images are really, reallygreat.
In addition to being verythorough in his scientific
(53:54):
methods, trevor is also a verygreat photographer.
The photo of his partner,victoria, like just standing
next to that huge pile ofslashes Pretty, pretty cool.
Yeah, yeah, all right, thanks,kaya, all right, thank you.
Janet Sumner (54:13):
If you like listening to the Clear Cut and
want to keep the content coming,support the show.
It would mean a lot to Kaya andI.
The link to do so will be inthe episode description below.
Kaya Adleman (54:24):
You can also become a supporter by going to
our website atwwwwildlandsleagueorg.
Slash the clear cut and alsomake sure to leave us a review
on your favorite podcaststreaming platform.
It would really help thepodcast and stay tuned for new
episodes by following us onsocial media.
Janet Sumner (54:45):
That's at Wildlands League on Instagram,
twitter and Facebook or LinkedIn, of course.
Kaya Adleman (54:51):
See you next time.
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