Phantom forests: Ambitious tree planting projects are failing • Hacker News Board

Re: Phantom forests: Ambitious tree planting projects are failing

#21

Post by lazide » Tue, Oct 18, 2022, 4:24 PM UTC

clairity wrote: post #14

debacle wrote: post #5

Trees tend to fail spectacularly, even for seasoned growers. The site that I bulk purchase seedlings from estimates a failure rate as high as 70% for evergreen plugs if you do everything right . As you move up from seedlings to 3 year old plants, the failure rate drops to 10%, but my real failure rate is probably closer to 30%. The number one reason is too much/too little moisture, with some pests/disease thrown in.…

yes, LA has a program to give away trees for planting in yards and parkways, and my read of the program is that, while it's goal is laudable, the implementation is lacking. earlier this year, a partner non-profit planted 2 trees for us and i planted an additional 2 trees that another org gave us, and i learned that it's not a set-it-and-forget-it type of endeavor. walking around my neighborhood, many of these trees,…

Also, even native plants aren’t adapted to what many people consider ‘native soil’ - if there is no existing native vegetation, the soil itself is far different from what a typical seed would deal with from that same plant natively.

And when you think about it, it’s normal - you’d never end up with a giant 100% consistent group of plants in a native area anyway. You’d have variable concentrations all over the place, with some devoid of one species, others overpopulated with it, all based on suitability of the local env. and and variations in the soil, water, shade, and competing plants nearby.

As humans, we just think we can point to a spot and it should comply and grow amazingly I guess, and we get flustered if that isn’t what happens.

Re: Phantom forests: Ambitious tree planting projects are failing

#22

Post by debacle » Tue, Oct 18, 2022, 4:36 PM UTC

smesla wrote: post #12

debacle wrote: post #5

Trees tend to fail spectacularly, even for seasoned growers. The site that I bulk purchase seedlings from estimates a failure rate as high as 70% for evergreen plugs if you do everything right . As you move up from seedlings to 3 year old plants, the failure rate drops to 10%, but my real failure rate is probably closer to 30%. The number one reason is too much/too little moisture, with some pests/disease thrown in.…

What sort of evergreens are you planting? Are they native? I replanted a clearcut a year or so ago and even with an abnormally hot summer and a dry fall I'm looking at 30%, tops.

A variety. I'm working to restore a large tract of former farmland, and so we're trying to plant whatever sticks to increase biodiversity.

Re: Phantom forests: Ambitious tree planting projects are failing

#23

Post by splitstud » Tue, Oct 18, 2022, 4:39 PM UTC

lazide wrote: post #21

clairity wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

yes, LA has a program to give away trees for planting in yards and parkways, and my read of the program is that, while it's goal is laudable, the implementation is lacking. earlier this year, a partner non-profit planted 2 trees for us and i planted an additional 2 trees that another org gave us, and i learned that it's not a set-it-and-forget-it type of endeavor. walking around my neighborhood, many of these trees,…

Also, even native plants aren’t adapted to what many people consider ‘native soil’ - if there is no existing native vegetation, the soil itself is far different from what a typical seed would deal with from that same plant natively. And when you think about it, it’s normal - you’d never end up with a giant 100% consistent group of plants in a native area anyway. You’d have variable concentrations all over the place,…

No post body was provided.

Re: Phantom forests: Ambitious tree planting projects are failing

#24

Post by throwaway8582 » Tue, Oct 18, 2022, 4:41 PM UTC

Much of the Earth's surface is not suitable for growing trees, either because it's too dry, to wet, to cold, poor soil or lack of soil, etc. The article gives examples of planting in places where trees don't typically grow, on coastlines and in deserts, so it's not at all surprising that the trees planted there died. This is why I've always been skeptical of tree planting initiatives. In areas where they can survive, trees will just naturally appear on unused land, there's no need to plant them. If this isn't happening on it's own, it's probably because the conditions there aren't right for them.

Re: Phantom forests: Ambitious tree planting projects are failing

#25

Post by MichaelCollins » Tue, Oct 18, 2022, 4:51 PM UTC

The problem is with the incentives. We reward organizations for planting trees when we should be rewarding them for growing trees.

Anecdotally, paper mills don't seem to have a problem successfully growing monocrop forests on their own properties because they actually have a reason to care about the success of replanting their own land.

Re: Phantom forests: Ambitious tree planting projects are failing

#26

Post by mabbo » Tue, Oct 18, 2022, 4:53 PM UTC

ianbicking wrote: post #11

The Miyawaki method [1], which I'm sure has been on HN before, is a very different approach to these projects. When I first read about it, it seemed like a kind of too-good-to-be-true miracle approach, but reading further it's really just a lot of hard work. Site preparation is a huge part of it. This photo gallery [2] gives some sense. It starts with soil testing and soil amendment, I doubt they ever consider the so…

> I do wonder what tools could support this kind of higher-effort higher-impact forestation

What's neat is that the tools already exist. Much of modern farming is a data problem- knowing soil conditions and nutrient levels across a large area and which plants would work best where. They often make use of satellite data, watershed simulation, weather and climate models.

I wonder if anyone has documented using those tools for this purpose.

Re: Phantom forests: Ambitious tree planting projects are failing

#27

Post by 0000011111 » Tue, Oct 18, 2022, 4:56 PM UTC

throwaway8582 wrote: post #24

Much of the Earth's surface is not suitable for growing trees, either because it's too dry, to wet, to cold, poor soil or lack of soil, etc. The article gives examples of planting in places where trees don't typically grow, on coastlines and in deserts, so it's not at all surprising that the trees planted there died. This is why I've always been skeptical of tree planting initiatives. In areas where they can survive,…

I wonder what the success rate would be if trees were replanted in forest that burned.

And to what extent climate change would make the environment no longer suited for trees?

In the US forest fires burn about 7 million acres on average each year.

https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/IF10244.pdf

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_California_wildfires

The Dixie fire alone was about 1 million acres.

San Francisco is 30,000 acres for perspective.

https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/IF10244.pdf

Re: Phantom forests: Ambitious tree planting projects are failing

#28

Post by smesla » Tue, Oct 18, 2022, 4:57 PM UTC

debacle wrote: post #22

smesla wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What sort of evergreens are you planting? Are they native? I replanted a clearcut a year or so ago and even with an abnormally hot summer and a dry fall I'm looking at 30%, tops.

A variety. I'm working to restore a large tract of former farmland, and so we're trying to plant whatever sticks to increase biodiversity.

If you haven't yet, you may want to hire a professional forester. At 70% loss they'd likely pay for themselves many times over and save a lot of headache.

Re: Phantom forests: Ambitious tree planting projects are failing

#29

Post by nyanpasu64 » Tue, Oct 18, 2022, 5:01 PM UTC

See also https://placesjournal.org/article/informal-settlers-environm... (discussion at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32726036), describing how one local-run tree-planting operation has succeeded where government and NGO-run prestige projects failed.

Re: Phantom forests: Ambitious tree planting projects are failing

#30

Post by Lendal » Tue, Oct 18, 2022, 5:02 PM UTC

MichaelCollins wrote: post #25

The problem is with the incentives. We reward organizations for planting trees when we should be rewarding them for growing trees. Anecdotally, paper mills don't seem to have a problem successfully growing monocrop forests on their own properties because they actually have a reason to care about the success of replanting their own land.

I have plenty of incentive to keep the trees in my own yard from dying, yet I lack the expertise. So they die. I need an arborist. Unfortunately the arborists in my town are incentivized to get me to pay their company to cut my trees down and replace them with new ones every 10-15 years or so.

We really just need more foresters, with a broader mission that extends beyond simply government-owned park land, who can help individual landowners to plant the right kinds of trees in the right ways.