1 00:00:08,250 --> 00:00:11,063 - All right, well, let's get going here. 2 00:00:12,610 --> 00:00:14,640 So, hey everybody. 3 00:00:14,640 --> 00:00:15,730 Thanks for joining 4 00:00:15,730 --> 00:00:17,670 and, I just wanna say a quick thanks 5 00:00:17,670 --> 00:00:21,682 to the organizers at FEMC for putting on the event, 6 00:00:21,682 --> 00:00:23,200 but I know we don't have a lot of time, 7 00:00:23,200 --> 00:00:25,530 so I'm gonna go ahead and just jump right in here. 8 00:00:25,530 --> 00:00:28,040 So, today I'm gonna be talking 9 00:00:28,040 --> 00:00:31,090 about Forest Farming in the Northeast, 10 00:00:31,090 --> 00:00:33,070 and we're gonna talk about a new initiative 11 00:00:33,070 --> 00:00:36,170 that promotes the development of forest farming operations 12 00:00:36,170 --> 00:00:39,773 on private forest land across the Northeast region. 13 00:00:40,610 --> 00:00:44,078 But I'm gonna start by providing an overview of the concepts 14 00:00:44,078 --> 00:00:45,545 of forest farming, 15 00:00:45,545 --> 00:00:48,720 non-timber forest products in agroforestry, 16 00:00:48,720 --> 00:00:51,000 and I'll talk a little bit 17 00:00:51,000 --> 00:00:54,070 about why the practice is a good fit for the region, 18 00:00:54,070 --> 00:00:54,990 how it dovetails 19 00:00:54,990 --> 00:00:58,670 with some larger forest conservation goals and frameworks, 20 00:00:58,670 --> 00:00:59,780 and then I'm gonna talk about 21 00:00:59,780 --> 00:01:01,640 how this new USDA funded initiative 22 00:01:01,640 --> 00:01:04,730 is gonna help forest landowners across the Northeast, 23 00:01:04,730 --> 00:01:07,520 get started with a forest farm of their own 24 00:01:07,520 --> 00:01:09,020 to address some of the major challenges 25 00:01:09,020 --> 00:01:12,430 facing forest conservation on private lands 26 00:01:12,430 --> 00:01:13,263 across the region. 27 00:01:13,263 --> 00:01:15,913 So let me get going here. 28 00:01:15,913 --> 00:01:18,940 I'm gonna start, let's see. 29 00:01:18,940 --> 00:01:19,930 Is it going? Okay, 30 00:01:19,930 --> 00:01:21,090 by introducing myself here. 31 00:01:21,090 --> 00:01:23,107 So, my name is Karam Sheban, 32 00:01:23,107 --> 00:01:26,050 and since I registered for this conference, 33 00:01:26,050 --> 00:01:27,780 I've had a change in employment. 34 00:01:27,780 --> 00:01:30,400 So I'm currently the Director of Sustainable Forestry 35 00:01:30,400 --> 00:01:31,770 at Rural Action. 36 00:01:31,770 --> 00:01:32,990 This is a community development 37 00:01:32,990 --> 00:01:35,290 and environmental non-profit organization based 38 00:01:35,290 --> 00:01:37,090 in Appalachian Ohio. 39 00:01:37,090 --> 00:01:39,860 So I'm from Ohio originally and worked 40 00:01:39,860 --> 00:01:40,870 with my current organization 41 00:01:40,870 --> 00:01:42,840 for a number of years after college 42 00:01:42,840 --> 00:01:46,058 before returning to school for a master's in forestry 43 00:01:46,058 --> 00:01:48,590 at the Yale School of Forestry, 44 00:01:48,590 --> 00:01:50,950 where I still have like a research affiliation. 45 00:01:50,950 --> 00:01:54,840 So there my studies focused on forestry, 46 00:01:54,840 --> 00:01:58,870 forest ecology and agroforestry with a particular emphasis 47 00:01:58,870 --> 00:02:02,313 on temperate forest farming systems in the Eastern US. 48 00:02:03,388 --> 00:02:07,080 So to get us going here, 49 00:02:07,080 --> 00:02:08,850 I wanna introduce some terms and I'm gonna start 50 00:02:08,850 --> 00:02:10,540 with this one, non-timber forest products, 51 00:02:10,540 --> 00:02:11,920 which maybe some of you, 52 00:02:11,920 --> 00:02:14,170 or all of you may have heard this term before. 53 00:02:14,170 --> 00:02:15,600 It's somewhat self-explanatory, 54 00:02:15,600 --> 00:02:19,451 but essentially, non-timber forest products or NTFP's, 55 00:02:19,451 --> 00:02:21,150 constitute a broad category of products. 56 00:02:21,150 --> 00:02:24,100 Anything other than wood coming out of a forest 57 00:02:24,100 --> 00:02:26,860 that has a commercial or a use value. 58 00:02:26,860 --> 00:02:29,540 And so, it might seem obvious to say 59 00:02:29,540 --> 00:02:31,900 that forest produce useful things other than wood, 60 00:02:31,900 --> 00:02:35,790 but for some people this idea of a non-timber forest product 61 00:02:35,790 --> 00:02:36,873 is a new concept. 62 00:02:38,270 --> 00:02:39,850 It's also very inclusive term, 63 00:02:39,850 --> 00:02:42,620 there's all kinds of non-timber forest products. 64 00:02:42,620 --> 00:02:45,380 These include medicinal plants over 50 species, 65 00:02:45,380 --> 00:02:49,070 like ginseng, elderberry and slippery elm from this region 66 00:02:49,070 --> 00:02:51,620 that are common to the market, 67 00:02:51,620 --> 00:02:53,530 edible plants like black walnuts, 68 00:02:53,530 --> 00:02:55,513 pawpaws, persimmons, 69 00:02:56,440 --> 00:02:58,690 tree syrups, not just maple syrup, 70 00:02:58,690 --> 00:03:00,220 there's increasingly market opportunities 71 00:03:00,220 --> 00:03:01,640 for alternative tree syrups, 72 00:03:01,640 --> 00:03:05,468 like beech walnut, birch, even sycamore. 73 00:03:05,468 --> 00:03:09,110 And so when you begin to talk about forest farming systems, 74 00:03:09,110 --> 00:03:12,376 these are the species that often are the focus crops 75 00:03:12,376 --> 00:03:14,700 of these types of operations. 76 00:03:14,700 --> 00:03:19,700 So, there's lots of ways to describe 77 00:03:20,200 --> 00:03:21,660 or define forest farming, 78 00:03:21,660 --> 00:03:23,300 but at its most basic, 79 00:03:23,300 --> 00:03:26,650 forest farming is the cultivation of crops 80 00:03:26,650 --> 00:03:28,777 under a forest canopy. 81 00:03:28,777 --> 00:03:31,400 And so you're actually utilizing the natural shade 82 00:03:31,400 --> 00:03:32,900 of that forest canopy 83 00:03:32,900 --> 00:03:35,560 to create a conducive growing environment 84 00:03:35,560 --> 00:03:37,123 for your target species. 85 00:03:38,210 --> 00:03:42,090 And in contrast to farming field crops, 86 00:03:42,090 --> 00:03:44,366 where you're dramatically modifying the environment 87 00:03:44,366 --> 00:03:46,460 through clearing and tilling 88 00:03:46,460 --> 00:03:49,130 and adding inputs like water and fertilizer, 89 00:03:49,130 --> 00:03:52,760 forest farming systems are generally based around native, 90 00:03:52,760 --> 00:03:54,780 mostly perennial species. 91 00:03:54,780 --> 00:03:57,630 And this means working with plants that do well 92 00:03:57,630 --> 00:03:59,520 in your native forest environment. 93 00:03:59,520 --> 00:04:01,340 And so forest farming systems, 94 00:04:01,340 --> 00:04:02,550 they exist around the world, 95 00:04:02,550 --> 00:04:05,040 but across the Eastern United States, 96 00:04:05,040 --> 00:04:07,020 that means working primarily with plants 97 00:04:07,020 --> 00:04:09,560 that are native to Eastern Deciduous Forests, 98 00:04:09,560 --> 00:04:10,950 and in particular, 99 00:04:10,950 --> 00:04:13,860 this region that follows the topography and soils, 100 00:04:13,860 --> 00:04:17,870 the Appalachian mountains and for us 101 00:04:17,870 --> 00:04:19,370 and for folks in that region, 102 00:04:19,370 --> 00:04:20,203 the good news is that 103 00:04:20,203 --> 00:04:22,990 it's a highly bio-diverse tempered forest region. 104 00:04:22,990 --> 00:04:25,593 So there's lots of plants to choose from. 105 00:04:26,508 --> 00:04:28,300 And so when we're talking about eligible plants 106 00:04:28,300 --> 00:04:29,969 for forest farming systems, 107 00:04:29,969 --> 00:04:31,560 just to go through a few, 108 00:04:31,560 --> 00:04:34,220 some of the more commonly cultivated understory species are 109 00:04:34,220 --> 00:04:36,130 things like American ginseng, 110 00:04:36,130 --> 00:04:38,853 maybe many of you have heard of that one, 111 00:04:39,940 --> 00:04:43,500 but there are other plants like goldenseal pictured here, 112 00:04:43,500 --> 00:04:44,950 sometimes called yellow root. 113 00:04:46,540 --> 00:04:49,713 You've got black cohosh and other understory medicinal, 114 00:04:50,720 --> 00:04:52,940 as well as a bloodroot. 115 00:04:52,940 --> 00:04:54,330 Another one sometimes you'll see this 116 00:04:54,330 --> 00:04:56,000 as a popular horticultural plant. 117 00:04:56,000 --> 00:05:00,900 It's got this beautiful flower and then ramps or wild leaks, 118 00:05:00,900 --> 00:05:02,513 which is an understory edible. 119 00:05:03,660 --> 00:05:06,130 And then lots more, 120 00:05:06,130 --> 00:05:08,870 we've got black walnuts, the top left, 121 00:05:08,870 --> 00:05:11,460 and then in the center there is a hauling machine 122 00:05:12,450 --> 00:05:14,790 that our organization runs. 123 00:05:14,790 --> 00:05:16,840 You've got inoculated mushroom logs, 124 00:05:16,840 --> 00:05:20,230 tap maple trees for syrup, pawpaw fruits 125 00:05:20,230 --> 00:05:21,350 and talking mushrooms. 126 00:05:21,350 --> 00:05:23,970 So one of the really cool aspects 127 00:05:23,970 --> 00:05:25,190 of forest farming is it allows 128 00:05:25,190 --> 00:05:28,490 for these integrated cropping systems where, 129 00:05:28,490 --> 00:05:30,380 potentially all of these things could be produced 130 00:05:30,380 --> 00:05:32,230 on the same piece of forest land. 131 00:05:32,230 --> 00:05:34,260 You could have crops in your understory. 132 00:05:34,260 --> 00:05:36,860 You could have stacks of inoculated logs, 133 00:05:36,860 --> 00:05:39,390 tubing systems running between trees, 134 00:05:39,390 --> 00:05:42,490 with your fruit crops in the mid story, 135 00:05:42,490 --> 00:05:44,750 like pawpaws or the canopy, your black walnuts. 136 00:05:44,750 --> 00:05:46,980 So you'll sometimes hear this referred 137 00:05:46,980 --> 00:05:51,185 to as a vertically stratified or multi-story 138 00:05:51,185 --> 00:05:53,513 forest cropping system. 139 00:05:55,450 --> 00:05:58,470 And so forest farming is of five practices 140 00:05:58,470 --> 00:06:03,170 that together constitute the discipline of agroforestry, 141 00:06:03,170 --> 00:06:06,120 which is the integration of tree and field crops 142 00:06:06,120 --> 00:06:08,240 into the same system. 143 00:06:08,240 --> 00:06:09,970 And this brings all kinds of benefits, 144 00:06:09,970 --> 00:06:13,713 including climate benefits, biodiversity benefits. 145 00:06:14,940 --> 00:06:15,930 And this idea, 146 00:06:15,930 --> 00:06:18,762 agroforestry is something that the USDA 147 00:06:18,762 --> 00:06:20,523 is really promoting right now. 148 00:06:22,040 --> 00:06:24,630 In order for practice to qualify as agroforestry, 149 00:06:24,630 --> 00:06:27,613 it has to hit what USDA calls, the four Is, 150 00:06:29,180 --> 00:06:33,020 intentional, integrated, intensive, and interactive. 151 00:06:33,020 --> 00:06:37,490 And so, based on that vision of multi-story cropping 152 00:06:37,490 --> 00:06:39,620 that I just gave you, 153 00:06:39,620 --> 00:06:41,280 you can see forest farming systems definitely 154 00:06:41,280 --> 00:06:43,960 have the potential to hit all of these four categories, 155 00:06:43,960 --> 00:06:47,280 but it's important to note that there are all sorts of ways 156 00:06:47,280 --> 00:06:49,700 to produce forest crops, 157 00:06:49,700 --> 00:06:51,120 other like that I mentioned earlier. 158 00:06:51,120 --> 00:06:52,870 And so the intensity of production 159 00:06:52,870 --> 00:06:54,410 can actually vary quite a bit. 160 00:06:54,410 --> 00:06:56,310 And I'm just gonna run through this real quick here. 161 00:06:56,310 --> 00:06:58,590 On the one end of the spectrum, 162 00:06:58,590 --> 00:07:00,150 you have just the stewarding 163 00:07:00,150 --> 00:07:02,480 or tending of bio-plant populations. 164 00:07:02,480 --> 00:07:03,883 So, this just looks like, 165 00:07:03,883 --> 00:07:05,310 you probably can't see there, 166 00:07:05,310 --> 00:07:08,730 but there's some ginseng there by my foot in that picture. 167 00:07:08,730 --> 00:07:11,720 It's just harvesting from an existing wild plant population, 168 00:07:11,720 --> 00:07:13,290 maybe tending to that population 169 00:07:13,290 --> 00:07:16,140 by doing things like deliberately planting seeds 170 00:07:16,140 --> 00:07:17,810 or berries from plants 171 00:07:17,810 --> 00:07:21,050 before you harvest roots or taking care to only harvest 172 00:07:21,050 --> 00:07:23,903 the sustainable portion of that population each season. 173 00:07:26,040 --> 00:07:28,810 Then you get what gets called wild simulated production, 174 00:07:28,810 --> 00:07:31,240 where you're introducing a species 175 00:07:31,240 --> 00:07:33,720 into a natural forest environment, 176 00:07:33,720 --> 00:07:36,430 planting some ginseng seed or whatever it might be. 177 00:07:36,430 --> 00:07:40,310 But beyond planting that seed or transplanting rootlets, 178 00:07:40,310 --> 00:07:42,730 you let those plants grow as if they were wild. 179 00:07:42,730 --> 00:07:45,360 And so then those plants are competing with other plants 180 00:07:45,360 --> 00:07:48,855 in the understory, they are being browsed by deer, 181 00:07:48,855 --> 00:07:51,260 but there's essentially no labor costs 182 00:07:51,260 --> 00:07:53,533 beyond the initial planting. 183 00:07:55,290 --> 00:07:59,020 You've got what you hear called woods-grown production, 184 00:07:59,020 --> 00:08:00,210 which is a bit more intensive, 185 00:08:00,210 --> 00:08:03,110 you're still utilizing that natural shade provided 186 00:08:03,110 --> 00:08:04,930 by the forest canopy, 187 00:08:04,930 --> 00:08:06,520 which you're making major modifications 188 00:08:06,520 --> 00:08:07,970 to the growing environment, 189 00:08:07,970 --> 00:08:10,710 including potentially removing competing plants, 190 00:08:10,710 --> 00:08:13,300 tilling the soil or creating raised beds. 191 00:08:13,300 --> 00:08:17,580 You'll sometimes see applying fertilizers and fungicides 192 00:08:17,580 --> 00:08:19,460 to the soil to combat disease 193 00:08:19,460 --> 00:08:21,170 and to allow you to plant at a higher density, 194 00:08:21,170 --> 00:08:24,170 this is an under planting of American ginseng here, 195 00:08:24,170 --> 00:08:26,730 and you can see it's not competing with anything 196 00:08:26,730 --> 00:08:28,200 and you would never find a plant growing 197 00:08:28,200 --> 00:08:30,500 at that density naturally. 198 00:08:30,500 --> 00:08:32,640 So that's gonna require some fungicide probably 199 00:08:32,640 --> 00:08:34,783 to sustain that type of a population. 200 00:08:36,660 --> 00:08:38,870 Then there's also field-cultivation 201 00:08:38,870 --> 00:08:41,130 under artificial shade or partial sun. 202 00:08:41,130 --> 00:08:44,510 Although these systems tend to be commercial, 203 00:08:44,510 --> 00:08:45,610 as you can see here, 204 00:08:45,610 --> 00:08:47,726 there's no intact forest canopy. 205 00:08:47,726 --> 00:08:50,430 So you can see the production 206 00:08:50,430 --> 00:08:52,600 of forest plants can happen at different scales 207 00:08:52,600 --> 00:08:54,412 and it can happen at different intensities. 208 00:08:54,412 --> 00:08:58,080 Looking at this sort of production spectrum here, 209 00:08:58,080 --> 00:08:59,300 according to the USDA, 210 00:08:59,300 --> 00:09:01,540 only two of these systems would even qualify 211 00:09:01,540 --> 00:09:02,643 as forest farming. 212 00:09:03,590 --> 00:09:05,850 These two in the middle here, wild-simulated, woods-grown, 213 00:09:05,850 --> 00:09:08,050 like I said, the last that commercial production, 214 00:09:08,050 --> 00:09:10,393 there's no forest to speak of. 215 00:09:11,750 --> 00:09:15,400 And so honing in on these forest farming systems, 216 00:09:15,400 --> 00:09:17,380 you know, they generate a number of benefits. 217 00:09:17,380 --> 00:09:21,000 They're utilizing practices of plant stewardship to achieve 218 00:09:21,000 --> 00:09:22,560 what this professor here, 219 00:09:22,560 --> 00:09:25,650 Eric Burkhart at Penn State University likes 220 00:09:25,650 --> 00:09:29,540 to call "Conservation Through Cultivation" 221 00:09:29,540 --> 00:09:30,990 where you're actually transitioning 222 00:09:30,990 --> 00:09:33,390 the forest herbs supply chain, 223 00:09:33,390 --> 00:09:36,120 the botanical supply chain from wild harvested 224 00:09:36,120 --> 00:09:39,670 to sustainably cultivated understory plants 225 00:09:39,670 --> 00:09:41,810 and forest landowners are able to participate 226 00:09:41,810 --> 00:09:42,880 in the economies around 227 00:09:42,880 --> 00:09:45,650 these species without drawing exclusively 228 00:09:45,650 --> 00:09:47,683 on wild plant populations. 229 00:09:49,090 --> 00:09:50,790 In fact the re-introduction 230 00:09:50,790 --> 00:09:52,023 of native understory species 231 00:09:52,023 --> 00:09:55,210 on your property increases biodiversity, 232 00:09:55,210 --> 00:09:57,430 well, actually turning your forest understory 233 00:09:57,430 --> 00:09:58,930 into a working landscape. 234 00:09:58,930 --> 00:10:01,070 So, like I mentioned, 235 00:10:01,070 --> 00:10:02,830 there's real economic benefits potentially 236 00:10:02,830 --> 00:10:06,060 on a very small track of forest land activities 237 00:10:06,060 --> 00:10:07,870 like tapping maple trees 238 00:10:07,870 --> 00:10:09,450 and growing ginseng can yield 239 00:10:09,450 --> 00:10:11,410 a pretty nice supplemental income, 240 00:10:11,410 --> 00:10:13,160 the prices you can see down there. 241 00:10:13,160 --> 00:10:18,160 So to put forest farming into that economic context, 242 00:10:19,630 --> 00:10:23,440 ginseng and other forest farm understory species, 243 00:10:23,440 --> 00:10:25,210 and NTFP is actually represents 244 00:10:25,210 --> 00:10:28,210 some pretty significant forest based economies. 245 00:10:28,210 --> 00:10:29,980 You can see that maple syrup tops the list here, 246 00:10:29,980 --> 00:10:33,280 but ginseng and other native understory species 247 00:10:33,280 --> 00:10:35,830 like golden seal and black cohosh represent economies 248 00:10:35,830 --> 00:10:39,123 in the millions and tens of millions of dollars annually. 249 00:10:40,900 --> 00:10:43,320 So, some pretty significant economies. 250 00:10:43,320 --> 00:10:47,120 And there's lots of other reasons, not purely just economic, 251 00:10:47,120 --> 00:10:49,270 where by forest farming is a good fit 252 00:10:49,270 --> 00:10:51,780 for Northeast forests and beyond. 253 00:10:51,780 --> 00:10:53,320 And I'm gonna go through these somewhat quickly here, 254 00:10:53,320 --> 00:10:55,600 but I think they're important to note, 255 00:10:55,600 --> 00:10:58,780 from a forest land ownership perspective, 256 00:10:58,780 --> 00:11:01,450 you can see that so much of the forest land, 257 00:11:01,450 --> 00:11:03,370 as I'm sure most folks here know, 258 00:11:03,370 --> 00:11:05,420 in the Northeast it's privately owned. 259 00:11:05,420 --> 00:11:09,550 And the majority of that is held in smaller parcels. 260 00:11:09,550 --> 00:11:11,420 So that brings a lot of challenges 261 00:11:11,420 --> 00:11:12,890 from a management perspective, 262 00:11:12,890 --> 00:11:17,530 including maintaining native biodiversity on private lands. 263 00:11:17,530 --> 00:11:20,330 And so forest farming presents an opportunity 264 00:11:20,330 --> 00:11:24,710 to reintroduce dispersal limited native understory species 265 00:11:24,710 --> 00:11:28,490 into the largely second growth forest of our region 266 00:11:28,490 --> 00:11:31,460 while generating forest based income from landowners, 267 00:11:31,460 --> 00:11:33,440 which is a strategy that fits well 268 00:11:33,440 --> 00:11:36,363 with the ownership patterns that we see in this region. 269 00:11:37,810 --> 00:11:42,000 We also know that it is increasingly difficult 270 00:11:42,000 --> 00:11:44,670 for small family farms to survive 271 00:11:44,670 --> 00:11:46,110 in an era of farm consolidation, 272 00:11:46,110 --> 00:11:49,110 economies of scale and industrial farming practices. 273 00:11:49,110 --> 00:11:51,440 And so forest farming is a way for farmers 274 00:11:51,440 --> 00:11:54,800 to create new income streams from their properties. 275 00:11:54,800 --> 00:11:58,430 And here's an important statistic to keep in mind, 276 00:11:58,430 --> 00:12:01,870 20% of the forests in the Northeast are associated 277 00:12:01,870 --> 00:12:03,070 with a farm property. 278 00:12:03,070 --> 00:12:06,690 And so we're talking a lot about working lands here, 279 00:12:06,690 --> 00:12:08,500 when we're talking about forests. 280 00:12:08,500 --> 00:12:12,590 And so, there's a real potential for farmers 281 00:12:12,590 --> 00:12:15,110 to integrate forest crops into their operations 282 00:12:15,110 --> 00:12:18,490 and here are just a few examples of local foods being made 283 00:12:18,490 --> 00:12:20,330 from forest farm crops. 284 00:12:20,330 --> 00:12:24,790 A lot of these are from the Ohio area, 285 00:12:24,790 --> 00:12:25,940 kind of where I'm from. 286 00:12:27,010 --> 00:12:28,960 So, there's lots of opportunities here. 287 00:12:31,710 --> 00:12:32,950 And forest farming is, 288 00:12:32,950 --> 00:12:36,860 it's not mutually exclusive with other property uses. 289 00:12:36,860 --> 00:12:39,850 It's low cost, it's relatively low impact, 290 00:12:39,850 --> 00:12:41,280 it fits with many of the reasons 291 00:12:41,280 --> 00:12:43,420 that forest land owners identify 292 00:12:43,420 --> 00:12:45,350 as why they own forest land, 293 00:12:45,350 --> 00:12:47,220 things like aesthetics, 294 00:12:47,220 --> 00:12:50,030 beauty, recreation, wildlife, 295 00:12:50,030 --> 00:12:53,100 and legacy or maintaining family land. 296 00:12:53,100 --> 00:12:56,450 And it's also important to note that forest farming 297 00:12:56,450 --> 00:13:01,450 is not mutually exclusive with active timber management 298 00:13:01,940 --> 00:13:02,773 and harvesting. 299 00:13:02,773 --> 00:13:06,323 So it's a complimentary of land use practice. 300 00:13:08,370 --> 00:13:10,650 There's also a really important biodiversity reason to care 301 00:13:10,650 --> 00:13:11,483 about forest farming. 302 00:13:11,483 --> 00:13:15,140 And this is a 2020 paper by Michelle Spicer 303 00:13:15,140 --> 00:13:19,410 that highlights the fact that over 80% of the biodiversity 304 00:13:19,410 --> 00:13:21,710 in Eastern deciduous forest is located 305 00:13:21,710 --> 00:13:23,340 in the forest understory, 306 00:13:23,340 --> 00:13:26,920 and most of these plants are slow growing, 307 00:13:26,920 --> 00:13:28,590 they're dispersal limited, 308 00:13:28,590 --> 00:13:31,052 and populations don't really cover 309 00:13:31,052 --> 00:13:32,780 after a major disturbance, 310 00:13:32,780 --> 00:13:35,123 such as a heavy cutting or development. 311 00:13:36,560 --> 00:13:37,760 And so there's a real need 312 00:13:37,760 --> 00:13:39,070 to think about strategies 313 00:13:39,070 --> 00:13:42,160 for restoring the native biodiversity of a region's forest. 314 00:13:42,160 --> 00:13:44,480 And I think the forest farming has a role to play there. 315 00:13:44,480 --> 00:13:47,730 And then you can think of the practice under the paradigm 316 00:13:47,730 --> 00:13:51,100 of something like assisted species migration. 317 00:13:51,100 --> 00:13:53,500 So it fits with these kind of larger frameworks, 318 00:13:55,290 --> 00:13:58,960 but our region, what's missing in the Northeast 319 00:13:58,960 --> 00:14:01,400 is the education and outreach around forest farming 320 00:14:01,400 --> 00:14:03,530 to help landowners adopt the practice. 321 00:14:03,530 --> 00:14:04,363 So to that end, 322 00:14:04,363 --> 00:14:05,330 I want to see a few quick words 323 00:14:05,330 --> 00:14:08,330 about my current organization, Rural Action, 324 00:14:08,330 --> 00:14:11,700 we're a non-profit organization based in Southeast Ohio, 325 00:14:11,700 --> 00:14:13,160 our work is considered, 326 00:14:13,160 --> 00:14:15,580 we consider it asset-based community development, 327 00:14:15,580 --> 00:14:18,180 which is a model where you're working with the strengths 328 00:14:18,180 --> 00:14:20,160 that exist within the communities where you serve 329 00:14:20,160 --> 00:14:22,200 and you're building from those strengths. 330 00:14:22,200 --> 00:14:24,330 And we're doing this work in the context of region 331 00:14:24,330 --> 00:14:27,000 that historically has seen a lot of resource extraction, 332 00:14:27,000 --> 00:14:29,810 timber, coal, natural gas, 333 00:14:29,810 --> 00:14:31,870 and that's suffered many of the consequences 334 00:14:31,870 --> 00:14:32,880 of this kind of development, 335 00:14:32,880 --> 00:14:33,740 a lot of the challenges, 336 00:14:33,740 --> 00:14:34,810 this conference aims 337 00:14:34,810 --> 00:14:38,895 to tackle things like forest degradation and fragmentation. 338 00:14:38,895 --> 00:14:42,480 And so in response, Rural Action has been working 339 00:14:42,480 --> 00:14:44,600 for over 30 years with forest land owners 340 00:14:44,600 --> 00:14:46,785 to develop non-timber forest products 341 00:14:46,785 --> 00:14:50,010 as an economically and ecologically sustainable source 342 00:14:50,010 --> 00:14:53,130 of supplemental land based income. 343 00:14:53,130 --> 00:14:55,560 And so land owner education outreach represents 344 00:14:55,560 --> 00:14:57,280 the foundation of this work, 345 00:14:57,280 --> 00:15:00,740 pictured here, outdoors in the field, 346 00:15:00,740 --> 00:15:03,290 as well as services like in-person site visits 347 00:15:03,290 --> 00:15:04,360 and the development 348 00:15:04,360 --> 00:15:06,740 of non-timber forest product management plans 349 00:15:06,740 --> 00:15:07,763 for land owners. 350 00:15:09,150 --> 00:15:12,050 Building this body of work over the past few decades, 351 00:15:12,050 --> 00:15:14,430 Rural Action has reached thousands of forest landowners 352 00:15:14,430 --> 00:15:16,769 across the central Appalachian region 353 00:15:16,769 --> 00:15:19,160 and through partnerships with groups 354 00:15:19,160 --> 00:15:22,280 like the Appalachian Beginning Forest Farmers Coalition, 355 00:15:22,280 --> 00:15:25,490 group here, led by Virginia Tech University. 356 00:15:25,490 --> 00:15:27,950 And in partnership with the National Agroforestry Center, 357 00:15:27,950 --> 00:15:30,693 that footprint has continued to grow, 358 00:15:32,101 --> 00:15:35,070 the Appalachian Beginning Forest Farmers Coalition here has 359 00:15:35,070 --> 00:15:38,280 over 2000 members and their forest farming, 360 00:15:38,280 --> 00:15:42,040 YouTube channel has like 200 educational videos posted 361 00:15:42,040 --> 00:15:44,400 with 22,000 subscribers to the channel. 362 00:15:44,400 --> 00:15:47,033 So by partnering with them, 363 00:15:48,390 --> 00:15:50,960 our reach has really grown a lot recently. 364 00:15:50,960 --> 00:15:55,960 And so what we're hoping to do in my capacity 365 00:15:56,590 --> 00:15:59,080 and my affiliation with Yale on this new project 366 00:15:59,080 --> 00:16:01,630 is to replicate this model and to bring 367 00:16:01,630 --> 00:16:04,610 some of the resources in momentum around forest farming 368 00:16:04,610 --> 00:16:07,777 from the Appalachian region into the Northeast. 369 00:16:07,777 --> 00:16:09,130 Funded through the USDA, 370 00:16:09,130 --> 00:16:11,530 Sustainable Agriculture Research 371 00:16:11,530 --> 00:16:14,640 and Education Program, SARE, 372 00:16:14,640 --> 00:16:15,820 our goal is to establish 373 00:16:15,820 --> 00:16:17,930 the Northeast Forest Farmers Coalition. 374 00:16:17,930 --> 00:16:20,200 A community forest landowners, 375 00:16:20,200 --> 00:16:23,630 technical service providers, herb growers, and buyers, 376 00:16:23,630 --> 00:16:26,830 and others along the value chain 377 00:16:26,830 --> 00:16:28,620 across the Northeast region. 378 00:16:28,620 --> 00:16:32,490 And at the same time create the opportunity to quantify many 379 00:16:32,490 --> 00:16:34,510 of the ecological and economic benefits 380 00:16:34,510 --> 00:16:36,870 that this agroforestry practice brings 381 00:16:36,870 --> 00:16:38,180 to private forest land. 382 00:16:38,180 --> 00:16:41,180 So, in surveys of forest farmers, 383 00:16:41,180 --> 00:16:44,380 in-person education in the field is consistently 384 00:16:44,380 --> 00:16:46,760 a top requested service. 385 00:16:46,760 --> 00:16:49,012 So in response to that, 386 00:16:49,012 --> 00:16:50,170 with this project, 387 00:16:50,170 --> 00:16:51,370 we've established a network 388 00:16:51,370 --> 00:16:53,520 of research and demonstration sites 389 00:16:53,520 --> 00:16:56,347 at strategic locations across the Northeast. 390 00:16:56,347 --> 00:16:58,990 Now, these are located on university 391 00:16:58,990 --> 00:17:01,310 and non-profit owned forest land. 392 00:17:01,310 --> 00:17:04,500 In these plantings, pictured here on this map, 393 00:17:04,500 --> 00:17:06,310 are gonna serve as the infrastructure 394 00:17:06,310 --> 00:17:08,270 for in-person educational events 395 00:17:08,270 --> 00:17:10,380 that target forest landowners across the Northeast. 396 00:17:10,380 --> 00:17:12,420 So the sites are distributed 397 00:17:12,420 --> 00:17:14,940 across a pretty wide geographic range 398 00:17:14,940 --> 00:17:17,310 to increase educational reach, 399 00:17:17,310 --> 00:17:20,180 but also for research and to capture variability 400 00:17:20,180 --> 00:17:23,120 across a range of habitat types. 401 00:17:23,120 --> 00:17:25,040 And so on the research end, 402 00:17:25,040 --> 00:17:26,250 these plantings are addressing 403 00:17:26,250 --> 00:17:28,490 some key ecological, financial 404 00:17:28,490 --> 00:17:32,050 and production questions related to five understory species 405 00:17:32,050 --> 00:17:33,800 that all have commercial markets, 406 00:17:33,800 --> 00:17:37,180 American ginseng, goldenseal, ramps, 407 00:17:37,180 --> 00:17:38,440 blood root, and black cohosh. 408 00:17:38,440 --> 00:17:40,880 Some of the species I showed earlier, 409 00:17:40,880 --> 00:17:43,640 and here's just a schematic for planting design. 410 00:17:43,640 --> 00:17:46,790 We're essentially conducting forest based growth 411 00:17:46,790 --> 00:17:50,880 and yield trials for these target under different planting 412 00:17:50,880 --> 00:17:51,747 and management conditions. 413 00:17:51,747 --> 00:17:55,770 And so we spent the fall establishing these sites, 414 00:17:55,770 --> 00:17:59,140 and here's a few pictures of these research sites going 415 00:17:59,140 --> 00:18:00,123 into the ground, 416 00:18:02,167 --> 00:18:03,650 had a great group of volunteers 417 00:18:03,650 --> 00:18:06,280 and different people doing this work. 418 00:18:06,280 --> 00:18:09,910 And so we're tracking every individual species 419 00:18:09,910 --> 00:18:11,930 and we're gonna be able to produce a lot of great data 420 00:18:11,930 --> 00:18:13,560 over the lifetime of this project. 421 00:18:13,560 --> 00:18:17,760 So we spent, like I said, this past fall, 422 00:18:17,760 --> 00:18:19,170 putting these research plots in, 423 00:18:19,170 --> 00:18:21,460 we had a lot of students, community, forest farmers, 424 00:18:21,460 --> 00:18:25,440 and volunteers that helped out in the process pictured here. 425 00:18:25,440 --> 00:18:26,480 We're currently in the process 426 00:18:26,480 --> 00:18:28,910 of building out online content, 427 00:18:28,910 --> 00:18:31,728 beginning to plan educational events for the spring, 428 00:18:31,728 --> 00:18:34,230 and those events are gonna cover topics 429 00:18:34,230 --> 00:18:37,300 like site selection and preparation, 430 00:18:37,300 --> 00:18:42,300 forest management, for NTFP's, species biology and ecology, 431 00:18:43,100 --> 00:18:44,120 things like processing, 432 00:18:44,120 --> 00:18:48,023 selling and marketing forest botanicals and more. 433 00:18:49,720 --> 00:18:52,970 And through these in-person trainings and workshops, 434 00:18:52,970 --> 00:18:54,150 the model for this project is 435 00:18:54,150 --> 00:18:56,220 to generate new forest farming operations 436 00:18:56,220 --> 00:18:58,970 on privately owned forest land across the region 437 00:18:58,970 --> 00:19:00,810 through education and outreach, 438 00:19:00,810 --> 00:19:04,430 in the process, preserve healthy intact forest land 439 00:19:04,430 --> 00:19:05,263 in the Northeast. 440 00:19:05,263 --> 00:19:09,330 So, at the same time we'll be working with undergraduate 441 00:19:09,330 --> 00:19:11,870 and master's students, Ideals Forestry School, 442 00:19:11,870 --> 00:19:15,180 as well as community partners to collect data 443 00:19:15,180 --> 00:19:20,180 and use these sites to produce scholarship with the goal of, 444 00:19:21,420 --> 00:19:22,693 let's see if that work, 445 00:19:24,210 --> 00:19:28,960 there we go, providing some useful scholarship 446 00:19:28,960 --> 00:19:33,130 in data for forest farmers that are hoping to replicate 447 00:19:33,130 --> 00:19:35,810 these plantings on their private lands across the region. 448 00:19:35,810 --> 00:19:37,620 So this' just a paper I published recently 449 00:19:37,620 --> 00:19:39,660 with some colleagues on forest farming. 450 00:19:39,660 --> 00:19:42,530 Ginseng, that also was supported by the USDA, SARE program. 451 00:19:42,530 --> 00:19:45,480 So, hope I'm still on time. 452 00:19:45,480 --> 00:19:48,160 I'm just gonna say, thanks for listening. 453 00:19:48,160 --> 00:19:49,440 My email address is here. 454 00:19:49,440 --> 00:19:50,960 My current email address for anyone 455 00:19:50,960 --> 00:19:53,250 that's interested in following up. 456 00:19:53,250 --> 00:19:54,540 I know I was talking fast there, 457 00:19:54,540 --> 00:19:57,370 trying to get it all in or staying updated 458 00:19:57,370 --> 00:19:59,220 on project, events and activities. 459 00:19:59,220 --> 00:20:01,220 Like I said, we're looking to the spring 460 00:20:01,220 --> 00:20:04,650 to start hosting in-person events, hopefully. 461 00:20:04,650 --> 00:20:07,590 And hopefully, we have little bit of time for questions. 462 00:20:07,590 --> 00:20:11,233 So I'll go ahead and just open things up. 463 00:20:12,480 --> 00:20:15,130 - I just wanted to say thank you from the FEMC 464 00:20:15,130 --> 00:20:16,170 for talking today. 465 00:20:16,170 --> 00:20:17,040 I have to head out, 466 00:20:17,040 --> 00:20:19,820 but you are welcome to stick around and answer, 467 00:20:19,820 --> 00:20:21,760 there's one question that is already in the chat, 468 00:20:21,760 --> 00:20:26,643 and you can unmute as well and ask direct questions. 469 00:20:28,060 --> 00:20:30,263 Thank you. - Yeah, thank you. 470 00:20:33,390 --> 00:20:34,950 Alright, so yeah. 471 00:20:34,950 --> 00:20:38,440 What impact was grown cultivation have on soil structure, 472 00:20:38,440 --> 00:20:41,520 native biota and the microrisal network? 473 00:20:41,520 --> 00:20:42,770 This' a good question. 474 00:20:42,770 --> 00:20:47,490 And, I think that's something that specifically 475 00:20:47,490 --> 00:20:49,410 there hasn't been a ton of research on, 476 00:20:49,410 --> 00:20:54,410 and I think that's partly why we designed this project 477 00:20:55,220 --> 00:20:56,590 to have it for research component. 478 00:20:56,590 --> 00:20:58,520 So part of what we are comparing, 479 00:20:58,520 --> 00:21:03,340 maybe I'll just go back if I can 480 00:21:03,340 --> 00:21:05,340 to our research design, 481 00:21:05,340 --> 00:21:08,500 which I kind of glossed over quickly, 482 00:21:08,500 --> 00:21:10,510 but one of the things we're actually comparing 483 00:21:10,510 --> 00:21:15,510 on our research sites is a wild simulated planting approach 484 00:21:16,590 --> 00:21:19,360 with a more like woods cultivated planting approach. 485 00:21:19,360 --> 00:21:20,653 So you can see these two, 486 00:21:22,580 --> 00:21:24,360 the two kind of color-coded rows, 487 00:21:24,360 --> 00:21:27,160 We essentially varied our management 488 00:21:27,160 --> 00:21:30,900 and for the woods grown cultivation, 489 00:21:30,900 --> 00:21:35,513 we're actually tilling the soil down to about six inches. 490 00:21:37,180 --> 00:21:39,450 I mean, I think that it's really reasonable 491 00:21:39,450 --> 00:21:44,450 to think that there are gonna be major changes as a result 492 00:21:44,530 --> 00:21:48,280 to soil structure, to microrisal networks. 493 00:21:48,280 --> 00:21:50,460 And we don't have a ton of great information right now 494 00:21:50,460 --> 00:21:54,810 on the importance of those networks for the functioning 495 00:21:54,810 --> 00:21:59,810 and productivity of plants in these forest farming systems. 496 00:22:03,190 --> 00:22:06,580 But I think there's a lot of good reason to assume that 497 00:22:06,580 --> 00:22:08,130 there's definitely gonna be impacts 498 00:22:08,130 --> 00:22:12,120 and that the impacts might sort of go beyond just 499 00:22:12,120 --> 00:22:14,670 the lifetime of the crop that you're planting. 500 00:22:14,670 --> 00:22:16,360 I will say that in those, 501 00:22:16,360 --> 00:22:18,990 like the picture I had of a woods grown cultivation 502 00:22:18,990 --> 00:22:22,960 with that blanketing of ginseng in the understory, 503 00:22:22,960 --> 00:22:25,010 that particular operation I know is using 504 00:22:25,930 --> 00:22:28,050 fungicide and stuff. 505 00:22:28,050 --> 00:22:33,050 And they basically, 506 00:22:33,430 --> 00:22:35,340 with that intensive over planting, 507 00:22:35,340 --> 00:22:39,840 you really can't plant ginseng twice 508 00:22:39,840 --> 00:22:43,733 in the same location because of fungal load. 509 00:22:44,930 --> 00:22:49,080 So in that type of artificial population density 510 00:22:49,080 --> 00:22:49,913 and planting like that, 511 00:22:49,913 --> 00:22:53,363 you'd definitely see changes in terms of the soil biota. 512 00:22:54,430 --> 00:22:57,610 And so, we're approaching this 513 00:22:57,610 --> 00:22:58,910 from just a research perspective, 514 00:22:58,910 --> 00:23:02,720 but I think that there's a good chance that we may find 515 00:23:02,720 --> 00:23:05,215 that a wild simulated planting approach 516 00:23:05,215 --> 00:23:09,010 ends up producing plants that grow just as fast, 517 00:23:09,010 --> 00:23:13,000 just as well in many cases on many sites. 518 00:23:13,000 --> 00:23:16,322 And so it may turn out that there's really no need 519 00:23:16,322 --> 00:23:20,451 to undertake the sort of more intensive production methods. 520 00:23:20,451 --> 00:23:23,460 We'll see, I think some people are definitely concerned 521 00:23:23,460 --> 00:23:26,880 about that in a forest environment understandably. 522 00:23:26,880 --> 00:23:31,500 So let's see here. 523 00:23:31,500 --> 00:23:33,120 So how would wild simulated fit in 524 00:23:33,120 --> 00:23:35,020 with traditional silver culture group selection 525 00:23:35,020 --> 00:23:38,720 that allows a tree regeneration along with NTFP's? 526 00:23:38,720 --> 00:23:39,930 So I think it fits pretty well. 527 00:23:39,930 --> 00:23:40,890 And that's actually something 528 00:23:40,890 --> 00:23:43,903 that in my own master's research, 529 00:23:45,560 --> 00:23:49,270 which looked at plantings of wild simulated ginseng across, 530 00:23:49,270 --> 00:23:53,850 it was a large area planted in the Catskill region. 531 00:23:53,850 --> 00:23:55,630 They're doing it on a wild simulated approach, 532 00:23:55,630 --> 00:23:58,570 essentially just raking back the leaf litter, 533 00:23:58,570 --> 00:24:01,210 broadcasting ginseng seed across, 534 00:24:01,210 --> 00:24:04,620 they were cultivating almost a thousand acres, 535 00:24:04,620 --> 00:24:08,030 it's really interesting operation in the Catskills. 536 00:24:08,030 --> 00:24:11,560 And what I ended up basically, 537 00:24:11,560 --> 00:24:14,490 from my research looking at the relationship 538 00:24:14,490 --> 00:24:16,720 between environmental factors 539 00:24:16,720 --> 00:24:19,530 and the relative success of these plantings. 540 00:24:19,530 --> 00:24:21,430 So like how fast were they growing? 541 00:24:21,430 --> 00:24:23,451 How big were the plants getting? 542 00:24:23,451 --> 00:24:25,403 How many plants were surviving? 543 00:24:26,280 --> 00:24:27,730 And we found that the main relationship 544 00:24:27,730 --> 00:24:31,270 that was happening there is that on the sites 545 00:24:31,270 --> 00:24:33,340 that they were cultivating that were sunnier, 546 00:24:33,340 --> 00:24:34,770 their plants were doing way better, 547 00:24:34,770 --> 00:24:36,280 and the shade levels were 548 00:24:37,230 --> 00:24:42,230 over 90% in most canopy coverage in most cases. 549 00:24:43,170 --> 00:24:44,720 And so our conclusion in that paper 550 00:24:44,720 --> 00:24:47,350 was that traditional silver culture, 551 00:24:47,350 --> 00:24:51,170 whether it's group selection or individual tree selection, 552 00:24:51,170 --> 00:24:56,170 could work really well to actually increase the success 553 00:24:57,500 --> 00:24:59,030 of those understory plantings. 554 00:24:59,030 --> 00:25:03,190 And I think as long as you are able to sort of go in 555 00:25:03,190 --> 00:25:05,500 and do harvesting with minimal disturbance, 556 00:25:05,500 --> 00:25:07,620 so you weren't really disturbing plantings 557 00:25:07,620 --> 00:25:08,840 in the understory, 558 00:25:08,840 --> 00:25:10,940 that active silver culture that opened up 559 00:25:10,940 --> 00:25:13,340 the canopy a bit, let a little more sunlight in, 560 00:25:14,220 --> 00:25:17,900 could really be complimentary, 561 00:25:17,900 --> 00:25:18,905 and obviously then, 562 00:25:18,905 --> 00:25:21,450 if you're deriving some income 563 00:25:21,450 --> 00:25:25,020 from that active forest management, just to supplemental, 564 00:25:25,020 --> 00:25:28,673 synergistic relationship between those two activities. 565 00:25:30,850 --> 00:25:31,810 Okay, so let's see. 566 00:25:31,810 --> 00:25:35,010 How has the Northeast Forest Farmers Association 567 00:25:35,010 --> 00:25:36,450 approach in herb seed sourcing 568 00:25:36,450 --> 00:25:39,043 and genetics regarding wild simulated methods? 569 00:25:39,990 --> 00:25:40,910 So that's a good question. 570 00:25:40,910 --> 00:25:42,830 It's one of the biggest challenges 571 00:25:42,830 --> 00:25:44,730 with forest farming right now, 572 00:25:44,730 --> 00:25:46,780 where we're at is there's increasing interest 573 00:25:46,780 --> 00:25:47,613 from landowners. 574 00:25:47,613 --> 00:25:48,480 People are really interested in, 575 00:25:48,480 --> 00:25:49,630 they wanna get started. 576 00:25:50,690 --> 00:25:53,010 The challenge is sourcing planting stock. 577 00:25:53,010 --> 00:25:55,480 That is definitely a challenge and it's different, 578 00:25:55,480 --> 00:25:57,180 it totally differs by species. 579 00:25:57,180 --> 00:26:00,930 So American ginseng is probably the most well known 580 00:26:00,930 --> 00:26:03,980 or commonly planted as often sort of the centerpiece 581 00:26:03,980 --> 00:26:04,990 or like focal crop, 582 00:26:04,990 --> 00:26:07,240 just because prices for American ginseng 583 00:26:07,240 --> 00:26:08,330 are particularly high 584 00:26:08,330 --> 00:26:12,600 and can support planting other species. 585 00:26:12,600 --> 00:26:15,890 And basically, all of the seed stock that's produced 586 00:26:15,890 --> 00:26:17,980 for ginseng commercially is coming out 587 00:26:17,980 --> 00:26:20,250 of large commercial operations, 588 00:26:20,250 --> 00:26:23,370 like I pictured under that artificial shade cloth, 589 00:26:23,370 --> 00:26:26,500 mostly located in Wisconsin. 590 00:26:26,500 --> 00:26:29,980 There's also a lot of production coming out of Quebec. 591 00:26:29,980 --> 00:26:32,370 And so right now, if you wanted to buy ginseng seed, 592 00:26:32,370 --> 00:26:34,310 that's probably where you're gonna find it from, 593 00:26:34,310 --> 00:26:37,090 unless you happen to have a local connection, 594 00:26:37,090 --> 00:26:39,050 but there's some concern 595 00:26:39,050 --> 00:26:43,020 for sure regarding genetics when it comes to planting out 596 00:26:43,020 --> 00:26:48,020 across habitat ranging all the way down from Alabama, 597 00:26:50,720 --> 00:26:52,020 all the way up through Quebec, 598 00:26:52,020 --> 00:26:54,740 you're planting the same seed stock produced 599 00:26:54,740 --> 00:26:59,490 under these kind of intense conditions, there's concern. 600 00:26:59,490 --> 00:27:02,240 So there's a major need as far as the other, 601 00:27:02,240 --> 00:27:03,790 what we're gonna hope to do through our project 602 00:27:03,790 --> 00:27:07,260 is to build out resources in terms of just, 603 00:27:07,260 --> 00:27:09,800 where allow like to help people figure out 604 00:27:09,800 --> 00:27:11,790 where they can source these products. 605 00:27:11,790 --> 00:27:16,480 We work with a number of growers to source planting stock 606 00:27:16,480 --> 00:27:20,000 for our plantings across our research sites, 607 00:27:20,000 --> 00:27:21,550 which is quite a lot of plants. 608 00:27:23,020 --> 00:27:25,390 And so we made some good connections through that process, 609 00:27:25,390 --> 00:27:27,280 we'll probably recommend to people that they could reach out 610 00:27:27,280 --> 00:27:30,290 to those same growers that have planting stock, 611 00:27:30,290 --> 00:27:32,581 but we're also hoping to really 612 00:27:32,581 --> 00:27:35,430 as part of this project and through another couple 613 00:27:35,430 --> 00:27:38,720 other initiatives that I'm working on with different groups 614 00:27:38,720 --> 00:27:43,600 to build out the local planting stock sources 615 00:27:43,600 --> 00:27:45,650 through the creation of nurseries 616 00:27:45,650 --> 00:27:47,820 that are growing as planting stock and doing it 617 00:27:47,820 --> 00:27:50,660 in a sustainable way so that ultimately, 618 00:27:50,660 --> 00:27:55,660 ideally, people could go to their regional nursery 619 00:27:56,040 --> 00:28:00,930 to buy planting stock that's sourced from genetics 620 00:28:00,930 --> 00:28:04,150 from the region and is adapted to local conditions. 621 00:28:04,150 --> 00:28:06,563 So that's definitely what we're working toward. 622 00:28:07,440 --> 00:28:11,870 So, our plan will be to just help land owners navigate this 623 00:28:11,870 --> 00:28:12,720 in the early years, 624 00:28:12,720 --> 00:28:15,520 and to work with the growers that we have a network with 625 00:28:16,530 --> 00:28:17,850 to get plants in the ground. 626 00:28:17,850 --> 00:28:22,093 So, all right. 627 00:28:23,170 --> 00:28:24,580 If there's any other questions, you can throw them 628 00:28:24,580 --> 00:28:28,853 in the chat, that's otherwise. 629 00:28:30,020 --> 00:28:33,890 Let's see, I think it's just me in here. 630 00:28:33,890 --> 00:28:38,010 So I'll give it just maybe another few seconds 631 00:28:38,010 --> 00:28:39,600 if anyone wants to throw anything else in there, 632 00:28:39,600 --> 00:28:40,870 and if not, 633 00:28:40,870 --> 00:28:43,300 then, thanks again for coming. 634 00:28:43,300 --> 00:28:46,380 And hopefully everyone enjoys the rest of the conference 635 00:28:46,380 --> 00:28:48,560 and feel free, like I said, 636 00:28:48,560 --> 00:28:53,560 just put my email back up there to reach out.