After several years of market fluctuations, the Louisiana timber industry is finally starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel.
That is the optimism shared by forestry professionals during the 2023 Forestry Forum held as a part of AgExpo recently in West Monroe.
Read MoreOn Friday, Jan. 20, the first saplings of a new Kisatchie National Forest were nestled in the soil of Vernon Parish, an effort to reforest the area after Category 4 Hurricane Laura wiped out 256,000 acres of trees in 2020. Of that acreage, 90,000 were severely impacted, more than 20,000 catastrophically.
Read MoreForty-eight-year-old James Travis Johnson of Travis Johnson Logging was arrested by the Louisiana Department of Agriculture and Forestry’s (LDAF) Forestry Enforcement Agents for failing to pay for $24,000 of timber in Vernon Parish. Johnson was charged one count of Harvest of Forest Products/Failure to Remit Payment.
Read MoreMartco, LLC, the parent company of the third-generation, family-owned timber sourcing and manufacturing company RoyOMartin, announced it will invest $9.5 million to install technologically advanced production equipment at its Natchitoches Parish lumber mill.
The RoyOMartin plywood manufacturing facility in Chopin is one of the parish’s largest employers, and the expansion will allow the company to retain approximately 684 existing jobs through 2035.
Stress for trees can be a lot like stress in humans — too much is never a good thing.
Pines, the main tree species in Louisiana forests, are susceptible to several biotic and abiotic stresses, said Raj Singh, LSU AgCenter plant doctor.
Read MoreRegistration for the 2023 Forestry Forum in Northeast Louisiana has begun.
On-site registration begins at 8 a.m. Friday, Jan. 13, 2023, at the West Monroe Convention Center in the Trenton Room. The program begins at 8:30 a.m. Early registration fee is $15, which ends Friday, Jan. 6. Registration at the door is $20. Checks can be made payable to LSU AgCenter and include Forestry Forum in the memo portion of the check. You can download the registration form, fill it out and mail it with your check to LSU AgCenter, PO Box 160, Harrisonburg, LA 71340.
Read MoreMore than a century ago, forestry was a lot different. Many of the old-growth forests were overharvested, leaving open fields with few trees remaining. Then, in 1947, the Louisiana Forestry Association began its efforts to promote reforestation where forests had been clearcut and sustainability once those trees had grown large enough to harvest.
Read MoreLogging is the second largest division in Louisiana’s manufacturing industry, however natural disasters and the pandemic have brought logging in Louisiana to an all-time low.
Logging is Louisiana’s main source of timber, and the industry provides employment to just over 25,000 Louisiana residents, making it one of the largest in the state. However, in the aftermath of Hurricane Laura and the pandemic, rising fuel costs, a diminishing demand and reduced production have all made the industry take a massive hit.
Read MoreFishing spiders, Dolomedes tenebrosus, are venomous, carnivorous and enormous. However, these spiders are not our enemy, and they do not eat our plants. They eat the bugs that do, as well as insects that sting and spread dreaded diseases, like mosquito larvae.
Read MoreLouisiana State Treasurer John Schroder made a stop in Central Louisiana on Thursday, Oct. 27, to promote the Louisiana Loggers Relief Grant Program.
Read MoreLandowners go to forestry meetings and they keep hearing a term used ... “basal area” and they wonder, “What in the world is Basal Area?”
Basal Area, or BA, is a common term used to describe the average amount of an area, commonly an acre, which is occupied by tree stems. In other words, how much of the area of one acre is taken up in trees.
Read MoreThe 2nd Annual Long Leaf Steam Up and Fall Festival kicks off at 10 o’clock tomorrow morning and runs through 10 o’clock tomorrow night. Sunday’s activities get started at 10AM and run through 2 PM.
Read MoreTechnology has aided forestry for years, especially when performing prescribed burning to keep fuels on forest floors from building up to dangerous levels. Now, the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) is using technology of unmanned aircraft in hopes to save lives during those operations.
Read MoreThe U.S. Forest Service (Forest Service), an agency of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, awarded Strategic Biofuels a cooperative agreement under its Wood Innovations Program for the first phase of a multiphase project to develop a robust, auditable cloud-based system for demonstrating compliance of forestry feedstock with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulations under the federal Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS). Strategic Biofuels is the leader in developing negative carbon footprint renewable fuels production facilities.
Read MoreDid you know there’s wood cellulose in your ice cream? Or that those pretty purple berries are on a shrub called American beautyberry? And no, the berries are not edible.
These are just a few of the things over 700 fifth-graders from around Rapides Parish learned at Forest Awareness Week held at Indian Creek Recreation Area this week.
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