- Students will demonstrate a familiarity with how trees common to western Canada establish, grow, and respond in relation to sites and other organisms (silvics) by stating the silvical characteristics for selected trees.
- Students will describe how silvical characteristics influence silvicultural decision making.
- Students will describe and identify different types of forest disturbances and explain how these disturbances influence stand development and forest management decision making.
- Students will describe patterns of stand development and discuss key attributes of stand structure for discrete stages of stand development for western Canadian forests.
- Students will describe and identify (classify) ecosystems using the biogeoclimatic classification system.
- Students will develop a sophisticated understanding of ecosystem interactions, productivity, function and maintenance and will begin to apply this understanding in discussion towards forest management issues in northeastern British Columbia.
- Students will improve interpretive and descriptive skills upon completion of this course.
- Students will have improved upon their general field skills upon completion of this course.
- Students will improve participatory discussion skills.
- Students will improve written communication skills.
Performance tasks:
- Discuss the native range, climatic associations, soils and topographical preferences, associated forest cover, silviculturally important life history traits (i.e. seed production and dissemination, seedling development, growth and yield, rooting habit, ecophysiology and damaging agents) and management techniques for selected trees and plants common to north-eastern British Columbia Canada.
- Apply silvical characteristics to forest management problems.
- Describe how primary site factors and competition between plants influence forest structure and demographics and how this would influence forest management.
- Describe the types of succession, how succession affects biodiversity, differences in successional outcomes due to time (chronosequence) and space (toposequence), important differences between early and late successional stages and important mechanisms that drive succession for boreal forests.
- State the importance of fire, insect, disease and other disturbances in terms of their role in stand development.
- State and discuss the characteristics of stand development phases for boreal forests.
- Understand the foundations for the classification of plant communities and be able to classify ecosystems in north-eastern British Columbia using the biogeoclimatic classification system.
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Supplementary Reading:
- Klinka, K., V.J. Krajina, A. Ceska, and A.M. Scagel. 1989. Indicator plants of coastal British Columbia. University of British Columbia Press, Vancouver, B.C. 288 pp.
- Burns, R.M. and B.H. Honkala. (co-ordinators) 1990. Silvics of North America. Vol. 1 Conifers, 675 pp., Vol. 2 Hardwoods, 877 pp., USDA For. Serv. Agri. Handbook 654, Washington, D.C.
- Oliver, C.D. and Larson B.C. 1996. Forest Stand Dynamics. John Wiley and Sons. Toronto.
- Barbour, M.G., J.H. Burk, W.D. Pitts, F.S. Gilliam, and M.W. Schwartz. 1999. Terrestrial Plant Ecology. Addison Wesley Longman, Inc. Don Mills.
- British Columbia Ministry of Environment Lands and Parks and British Columbia Ministry of Forests. 1998. Field Manual for Describing Terrestrial Ecosystems. Resources Inventory Branch British Columbia Ministry of Environment Lands and Parks and Research Branch British Columbia Ministry of Forests. Victoria B.C.
- Haeussler, S., D. Coates, and J. Mather. 1990. Autecology of Common Plants in British Columbia: A Literature Review. Forestry Canada and British Columbia Ministry of Natural Resources.
- Delong, S.C., A. MacKinnon, J. Lang. 1990. A field guide for identification and interpretation of ecosystems of the northeast portion of the Prince George Forest Region. BC Ministry of Forests, Victoria.
- DeLong, S.C., D. Tanner, and M.J. Jull. 1994. A field guide for identification and interpretation of ecosystems of the northern Rockies portion of the Prince George Forest Region. BC Ministry of Forests, Victoria.
- Kritcher, J.C., and G. Morrison. 1993. A field guide to the ecology of western forests. Houghton Mifflin Co, New York.
- Davis, L.S., and K.N. Johnson. 1987. Forest Management 3/e. McGraw-Hill, Toronto.
- Gadd, B. 1999. Handbook of the Canadian Rockies. Corax Press, Jasper.
- Halfpenny, J.C., R.D. Ozanne. 1989. Winter: an ecological handbook. Johnson Books. Bolder.
- Bolen, E.G. 1998. Ecology of North America. John Wiley and Sons, Toronto.
- Smith, D.M., B.C. Larsen, M.J. Kelty, and P Mark, S. Ashton. 1997. The practice of silviculture: applied forest ecology. John Wiley and Sons, Toronto.
- Stelfox, J.B. 1995. Relationships between stand age, stand structure and biodiversity in aspen mixedwood forests in Alberta. Jointly published by Alberta Envionmental Center Vegreville, Alberta and the Canadian Forest Service.
- Walker, L.C. 1999. The North American forests: geography, ecology and silviculture. CRC Press, New York.
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