The Official Newspaper for Foster County
The Official Newspaper for Foster County
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Over the last 12 months, I've received more than 600 emails, text messages, phone calls and other forms of communication where people asked me a question related to trees and forests. Yes, I actually track those numbers. One of the more interesting questions came a few weeks ago and it was pretty simple. How much is a mature shelter belt worth? Oh, where to begin? The question was straightforward, but a simple response was impossible. There are too many unknowns. What resource is being...
My meteorologist friends tell me that the word "normal" has very little meaning, as no year is ever really normal. Does that mean that every year is "abnormal"? I fear that the answer would take a long time and involve a deep dive into statistics. Maybe we'll just say that the 2024 growing season was weird. Or perhaps we'll call it "notable." That sounds a little more scientific. The year started out with a lot of moisture, throughout much of the region. In some places, it was so wet that...
I moved to North Dakota in September of 2002. During my last week in East Lansing, Mich., I was having a drink with a colleague who's a forest entomologist. She had been on a conference call all afternoon, where they were discussing a new insect that they had just identified in the Detroit area. They called it emerald ash borer (EAB). My friend said, "It's going to be a bad one." Here we are, 22 years later, and the insect has finally been confirmed in North Dakota in rural LaMoure County. Last...
My friend Don is recovering from a dislocated shoulder. He was on a ladder, using a chainsaw to prune branches from a tree. The first three branches came down safely and as planned. The last one did not. The final branch remained partially attached to the tree as it fell. The branch swept back towards the ladder and knocked it out from beneath Don. You can figure out the rest. Even though he was injured, Don realizes how lucky he was. A dislocated shoulder is tough, but it could've been a lot...
I travel a lot throughout North Dakota. It’s part of my job. While it’s sometimes hard to be away from home so much, I do get to see a lot of the state, enjoying both its natural beauty and the variety of the many small towns. I’m always on the lookout for rare or unique tree species during my travels. Recently, I was in Hettinger, North Dakota, and saw a newly planted ‘MN Strain’ redbud tree. I was glad to see the folks in this town trying something new and different. I was also a little wo...
I took a walk in the woods last week with a colleague of mine, along with some graduate students. We were at Knife River Indian Villages National Historic Site. Have you ever been there? It’s a fascinating place. Of course, to me, any forest is fascinating. What is a forest, anyway? It’s a simple question, but the answer isn’t quite so easy. This is actually how I start out my introductory forestry class each time that it’s taught. What’s a forest? Is it just a bunch of trees? If yes, how many?...
Cucumbers are one of the most popular vegetables grown in the Dakotas. The fruits are wonderful in salads, sandwiches and snacks. I work with hundreds of gardeners in North Dakota every summer in the testing of promising vegetable varieties. When we started this project 15 years ago, the most popular cucumber variety was Straight Eight. Straight Eight is a good cucumber. This old variety from 1935 produces straight, 8-inch fruits with good flavor. Over the years, we have learned there are many...
I’ve been to a lot of parties over the last few weeks, getting together with neighbors and friends as we celebrated the holidays with one year ending and a new one just beginning. Some people made resolutions for self-improvement and others were already making plans for this year’s projects. And a lot of people had questions about trees. How are they responding to the warm December weather? What will the mild temperatures do to the insect pests that will attack trees next summer? Is Dutch elm...
If someone is “seeing red,” it means that they suddenly became very angry. It’s a description of a very strong negative emotion. On the other hand, people often would love to see red in their trees, at least during autumn. A typical discussion about fall tree color in North Dakota usually starts with, “Do we have red trees in North Dakota? I thought everything just turned yellow.” Admittedly, there’s definitely a lot of yellow in the fall landscape. Most of our native deciduous trees turn...
Did you ever watch ABC’s “Wide World of Sports” when you were younger? I remember those Saturday afternoons, seeing some pretty unique competitions – power lifting, cliff diving and even barrel jumping. My favorite was the lumberjack competitions. Most of the events involved chopping logs with axes, or cutting logs with hand-powered crosscut saws or chainsaws. Log rolling in a pond or pool was common, as was the speed climb. The current speed climbing events use either a 60-foot pole or a 90-fo...
This phrase baffled me when I was young. What did it really mean? My friend Kevin, who grew up on a farm and taught me about baling hay, told me that it has two meanings. The first, literally, was to cut and bale hay when it would be sunny for a few days in a row. He didn’t want the fresh-mown hay to get rained on, for fear it would get moldy. Also, sunlight was critical to drying out the grasses and other plants in the cut hay. The second meaning, though, was more symbolic. The expression m...
How do you find the love of your life? When I lived in Taiwan, a friend told me that finding a spouse is just like picking an ear of corn in a corn field. You enter the corn field and start walking down a row. There are lots of corn cobs to choose from, but you can select only one. You can look at the corn cobs, but you cannot open the husks of the cob and reveal its beauty. That must wait until after you select it. In most cases, the best ear in the field is not the first one you see. But...
I didn’t make any New Year’s resolutions this year. So, I haven’t broken any resolutions this year! We are three months into 2023, and I’m bringing up resolutions. Why? In January, a lot of my friends on Facebook were posting about the books they had read in the previous year. The lists were quite impressive. People were reading about leadership, self-improvement and philosophy. And they read quite a few books. I didn’t want to share my list of adventure stories and shoot-‘em-up books. I fe...
For the next couple of weeks, I’ll be working on my end-of-the-year reports. It’s a great time to reflect on what went well and what could have gone better. I thought that the reports would provide a good foundation for this month’s column. But let’s face it – reports are boring. Instead, how about some highlights! This was the 30th straight year that I planted at least one tree in the spring. In 2022, I helped plant nearly a dozen new trees at the Myra Arboretum near Larimore, in western G...
I ask the same questions to my farmer friends every fall – how were the crops this year? Were yields good? Was it an easy harvest? These questions are good conversation starters though they may sound trite. But they're asked sincerely. I hope my friends have a good harvest and that the land produces a bounty for them. Farmers – and gardeners – sow seeds in the spring and harvest in the fall. The production of the forest and its harvest are different. This ecosystem is dominated by long-...
As I sat down to write this column, I realized that it might be a bit confusing. As a scientist and a communicator, I try to be precise and specific in my word choice. That’s a great goal, but it’s not always attainable when working in natural systems. Scientifically, there’s always an exception. Nevertheless, I hope you find this useful. It was my first year at NDSU, and I received a phone call from a client. He said, “I have a fir tree. I think it’s a spruce and it’s loaded with pine cones....
The first ones I notice are the sumacs. It’s the same pattern each year. Sumacs turn a bright red, and they start changing color early. It’s a bright, fire-engine red, usually. Sometimes they’re a little muted, with a bit of purple mixed in. Robins are supposed to signal the arrival of spring. For me, sumacs are the first sign of autumn. They’re beautiful. For the next few weeks, I’ll watch the palette change. In North Dakota, it’s a lot of yellow. You have to search for the reds and oranges, an...
I’ve completed nearly 20 years at NDSU as the Extension forester and I’ve seen a lot of the state (and its trees and forests) in that time. I sometimes wonder how many miles I’ve driven through the years. Numbers fascinate me. They can offer a clear understanding of a situation. For example, we could say that trees had great growth in 2022. My question would be, “How great is great”? What one person considers great, another person might consider to be average. Putting a number to that claim of g...
Let’s face it. North Dakota does not have redwoods. There was, however, a type of Sequoia that grew here 65 million years ago. But that doesn’t count today. There are some pretty big trees here, though. The largest tree is a cottonwood that is 105 feet tall, with a whopping 30-foot circumference and a crown spread of 92 feet, located in Steele County. The tallest tree is a different cottonwood that was 115 feet in height, when it was last measured in 2017. I wonder how much taller it is now? The...
I’ve always found North Dakota’s place names to be confusing. The city of Hettinger is not in Hettinger County. Nor is Steele found in Steele County. But Grand Forks is in Grand Forks County and Pembina is in Pembina County. I can’t keep track of it. Places are sometimes named for nearby natural features. Though Mountain is a little bit higher than the nearby Red River Valley, it’s not nearly as high as the neighboring Pembina Hills. Where’s the nearest butte to Butte, in northeastern McLean Cou...
When I was in college, I enjoyed country music a lot. In the late 1980s, Tanya Tucker had a No. 1 single titled, “Strong Enough to Bend.” The song relates strength to flexibility, with the analogy of a strong tree and a strong relationship. Both the partners in the relationship and the tree need to be strong enough to bend during difficult times. I like the analogy, though I’m much more of an expert with trees than I am with relationships! Though trees are tough, resilient and long-lived, some...
I saw a curious sight on my drive to work the other day. A lone icicle was hanging from a branch on a maple tree. I smiled and chuckled briefly when I saw that large, solitary crystal of frozen water. Conditions have to be just right to produce an icicle on a tree. Sap must leak out of a wound in the branch, but the air temperature has to be cold enough to freeze that sap before it drips to the ground. The previous night, conditions were perfect. I've noticed icicles on birch trees in the past....
March is deceptive. The days are getting longer, and at spring equinox, daylength is increasing at its fastest. But it’s still winter. We’re going to get more snow and there will still be days that have below-zero temperatures. Yet I can’t help but be optimistic. By the end of April, and maybe even sooner, new life will burst forth from the trees, shrubs and other plant life. The world will become greener. For now, though, it’s still March and there’s a lot of snow on the ground. Trees are mostl...
It’s almost mid-February, so it’s time to check in. How are you? I hope you’re doing well. Winter is a tough time for a lot of people. Days are short and nights are long. It’s been awfully, awfully cold this year and that makes it tough to get outside. My neighbor and my wife both informed me last night that I haven’t been out ice fishing at all this year. I hadn’t even realized it. Human health sometimes suffers in the winter. How about tree health? At least in my own yard, it’s been a tough wi...
It’s January, and the memories of Christmas are already starting to fade. We had a houseful of people, with plenty of food and lots of fun. Two days later, though, things got quiet pretty fast. My wife and I quickly settled into our normal winter routine, with one twist. She bought us a 3,000-piece jigsaw puzzle. Yes, 3,000 pieces! Wow. It was amazing, fun and took us 11 days to complete. The puzzle is a colorful undersea scene with lots of tropical fish and corals. There’s also a section of...
