Inoculating Trees with Wood Decay Fungi with Rifle and Shotgun

Document Type

Article

Journal/Book Title

Western Journal of Applied Forestry

Publication Date

1996

Publisher

Society of American Foresters

Volume

11

Issue

1

First Page

13

Last Page

15

Abstract

Managing for cavity-dependent wildlife is a major issue for state and national forest resource managers. It is difficult to maintain dead standing trees, which are often harvested for fiber and firewood or felled for safety. Public lands managers are now required to retain habitat for snag-dependent wildlife •n timber sales or other intensive management activities. However, there are no effective methods that can be used to create suitable trees. Herbicides and girdling have been used to produce snags for cavity nesting birds (Conner et al 1981, McComb and Rumsey 1983, Bull and Partridge 1986), but these fall sooner than trees killed by natural causes and are rarely used by cavity nesters. Nesting woodpeckers frequently use trees that have been limbed and topped by an explosive charge, and these trees stand the longest (Bull and Partridge 1986). This technique is used throughout the West, but it is expensive, requires highly skilled personnel, and often does not produce suitably decayed wood.

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