Upland Oak Sustainability

Extension faculty and staff in the Department of Forestry and Natural Resources (Department) will work collaboratively with stakeholders in the South and the American Forest Foundation and associated stakeholders in the North to develop an upland oak conservation plan. The Department also shall undertake activities to provide state and regional training and resources including a menu of options for incorporating the upland oak conservation plan and management tools/resource into a multi-state (KY, VA, TN, NC, AL, and AR) management and educational activities for both natural resource professionals and landowners including the following: The project will provide the first comprehensive region wide approach to upland oak dominated hardwood conservation and management recommendations across the landscape. The conservation and sustainability plan will encapsulate emerging methods, developed by USFS and university researchers in the region, for oak regeneration and maintenance. Regional activities will include the assessment of oak resources and identification of management barriers that will be used to develop the conservation and sustainability plan for upland oak forests with an emphasis on white oak as a keystone species. This activity will be coordinated through and leveraged with hardwood silviculturists and extension resource personnel with expertise in upland oak and white oak management at the University of Kentucky, Department of Forestry and Natural Resources in collaboration with the American Forest Foundation. The conservation and sustainability plan will be spearheaded by a project coordinator funded by the project at the University of Kentucky and will include both contracted landscape and social analysis to develop it. The conservation and sustainability plan will be developed as outlined above and made available in hardcopy and electronic form via the web. Silvicultural guidelines for white oak and related upland oak species, a series of technical publications will be developed as part of the Professional Hardwood Notes Series or similar Extension outlets. Landowners for Oaks, a series of one-page landowner friendly materials on oak biology and silvicultural practices to regenerate and manage high quality white oak. State landowner management publications and web materials will be developed from the silvicultural guides and Landowners for Oak series and modified to fit state specific landowner plan development and landowner materials and frameworks. Web resources for the project will be established and will include all materials developed by the UK Forestry Extension. Regional and sub-regional technical training workshops for foresters will include one or more regional or sub-regional workshops for foresters on upland oak stand management and silvicultural practices. A social media platform designed to foster landowner engagement and sociological based methods, informed by SWOT, to inform them on how to interest landowners in oak management are innovations not commonly used in forestry to improve the effectiveness of landowner programming. Direction will be provided to assist collaborators establish demonstration areas to showcase upland white oak regeneration, recruitment and management as informed by the project’s conservation and sustainability plan and silvicultural guidelines. Direction will be provided to assist collaborators help develop landowner organizations and forestry cooperatives, recognizing that landowners are often best motivated by peer relations.