11.7 Topic for discussion.

Rainforests are the richest place on the Earth. Do you agree?

Part IV FORESTRY

Unit 1 Forest management

1.1 Read and translate the text 1 using a dictionary.

Text 1

Managing the forest

1. It is hard to imagine a resource that provides more benefits for humans than do forests. Food, shelter, tools, and fuels are all products of this natural treasury. The forest is also home to many animals and plants. Its trees help clear the air of pollution while enriching it with oxygen and slow down the sometimes destructive forces of wind and water. Forests are one of the major resources that can be renewed and improved. The science of managing forests is called forestry.

The forest types largely determine what plant and animal life will be found in the area. The amount and types of food, water, climate, and shelter will favor some life forms and discourage others. Within a given forest, human activity can also have a great influence on the plant and animal populations.

Many animals, especially the browsers like deer and elk use the forest for shelter. They spend much of their time along the forest edge, eating grasses and brush, but they retreat to the woods for safety. Other animals, such as bears, can find the nuts and smaller animals that they feed on deeper in the woods, though they also enjoy the berries and roots they find along the forest edge and in clearings.

Squirrels prefer hardwood forests with lots of acorns and nuts, though they eat pine seeds as well. Beavers eat the soft inner bark of trees and use the trees for their lodges and dams. Seed-eating birds are more likely to nest along the forest edge.

Insects also have very specialized habitat requirements. The southern pine beetle, for example, feeds on only pines and their relatives. Others, like the gypsy moth, feed on many kinds of hardwood trees.

Often the health of the entire community depends on the vigor of the forest. And, as a forest changes with age or as a result of fire, insects, diseases, or human activity, it is likely to become favorable to an entirely new set of plants and animals.

2. The most modern aspects of the science of forestry are collectively called forest management. These aspects of forestry involve much more than just using the trees nature provides. Forest management is concerned with the complete life cycle of the trees and the forest, from getting trees off to a better start to making sure trees are harvested in a way that protects the future of the forest.

Forest management usually involves doing the same sorts of things nature does, but in a more planned and organized fashion. Nature plants trees, thins forest stands, and kills trees, but nature’s efforts sometimes seem haphazard. Forest managers do these same things with a plan that benefits the forest stand and people, too. Nature lets trees burn or rot. Forest managers prefer to use the wood.

3. When a mature hardwood forest is harvested or killed by nature, it is not long before a new forest takes its place. There are seeds in the ground already, dropped there by the trees of the past. There are usually young trees on the ground unless the stand was killed by fire or some other general catastrophe.

When nature renews a forest, it is often quite different from the original forest. A mature stand in the Central Hardwood Forest, for example, is usually composed of oaks and hickories and other species referred to as climax types. They are species that grow well in bright sunlight or in partial shade. They have long life spans and compete well for the moisture and the space available.

When these trees are removed or destroyed, however, other trees have a chance to get started. Seeds from pines or other trees in the vicinity blow onto the ground. Sometimes seeds sprout after being in the ground for many years. The new forest is composed mostly of trees referred to as early succession species. Usually some seeds of the climax types also survive. And some trees resprout from the root systems of trees that have been killed. But it is only after many years that the climax types will dominate the forest once again. This same succession takes place when farms and pastures are allowed to lie idle, allowing forests to develop.

4. Foresters and landowners often plant seeds or seedlings of a particular kind of tree. The seedlings are usually grown in large nurseries, much as ornamental plants are grown for landscaping, and transplanted when they are older and better able to survive.

When companies first began to replant harvested forests, all of the planting was done by hand. Since the 1940s more and more trees have been planted by machine. The tree planter is pulled by a tractor. A plowlike blade opens a furrow, an opening in the ground, so a worker can plant a seedling. Packing wheels on the planter then close the furrow around the tiny tree. A crew with a tree planter can plant thousands of seedlings in one day.

In forests where the ground is too rough to allow the use of such machines, planting is still done by hand. Sometimes seeds are spread over the ground by airplane or helicopter.

5. History records many instances of harmful harvesting of the forests, often to provide food or fuel. The once mighty forests of cedar in Lebanon are no more. Vast forests in China were destroyed during and after World War II. Rain forests in the Amazon Basin are today being cleared for croplands.

Forests have been devastated whenever people needed open land for farming. Most of the east coast of North America was once covered with dense forests. The new settlers cut the trees, used what wood they needed, and burned the rest. Individuals and companies have learned to practice better harvesting techniques. The long-accepted practice of cutting only a few trees at a time from a particular stand is being challenged by foresters. They point out that the practice almost always resulted in taking the best trees and leaving inferior specimens to take over the forest. They prescribe following nature’s approach of harvesting all the trees in an area at one time and encouraging seeds from the best trees available to reforest the land.

1.2 Give Russian equivalents:, clearings, pine beetle, gypsy moth, the vigor of the forest, large nurseries, a furrow, inferior specimens.