Dakota Gardener: North Dakota Forestry by the numbers

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 pers...