Tri-County Forestry Association is founded

Prescribed Fire is an important part of healthy forestland

The Inaugural membership meeting of the new Tri-County Forestry Association was held on Thursday September 8 in Dorchester County. The new landowner's advocacy group will represent Charleston, Dorchester and Berkley Counties as it pertains to forestry issues. More than 100 landowners were present when John Thermos with MeadWestvaco called the meeting to order. "This is an opportunity to establish a new forestry association in the Lowcountry, so you're here at the beginning and we look forward to raising forestry awareness in these counties," said Thermos. Some facts garnered during the meeting include that S.C. has 13.1-million acres of forestland with 88% under private ownership and only 12% in the public domain. A full two-thirds of S.C. is forested and the breakdown is 54% in hardwood bottomlands and 46% in pine trees. The downturn in the economy, and in particular the housing market, affects forestry in that prices are low for mature trees due to lack of demand. Therefore, many landowners are not harvesting mature trees right now, hoping for a better price down the road, with a side effect that tree seedling plantings are at historically low levels. Local forestry associations like the Tri-County will coordinate with the South Carolina Forestry Association (SCFA) and affiliate with the Forest Landowners Association (FLA). Veterinarian Walt McPhail of S.C. was present at the Tri-County meeting, and was recently recognized as the national landowner of the year by the FLA, and he chairs the board of SCFA.

Pine trees are a renewable resource

Walt McPhail on cover of FLA magazine

Walt McPhail at the Tri-County meeting on 9/8/11

To view a past blog entry about the S.C. Tree Farm program click here.