Kennebec Land Trust

Kennebec Woodland Partnership

April, 2010

The Kennebec Woodland Partnership, a forestland conservation initiative launched by the Maine Forest Service and Kennebec Land Trust in 2009, announced this month that it has welcomed five new partners:

 The Partnership will work to encourage woodland stewardship and conservation in Kennebec County, and to sustain the many values, both public and private, of our woods. Please save the date and join us at our kick-off event, a three-day conference to be held October 21-23, 2010, in Winthrop.

Kennebec County’s wooded landscapes are vital to our quality of life. Our local economy, wood products markets, recreational opportunities, water quality, and wildlife habitat all depend largely on our forests. KWP will provide a wide range of tools and strategies to help landowners make decisions about their woodlands. Information will be shared through a broad network of woodland owners, towns, cities, professional timber harvesters, foresters, and biologists, with support from local conservation groups, state agencies, and non-profit organizations.

Kennebec County in southern-central Maine is an area of ecological and socio-economic transition between the most densely populated and the most heavily forested areas of the state. According to a 2008 USDA Forest Service estimate there are approximately 388,000 acres of woodland in Kennebec County.

Initial funding for KWP is provided by the Maine Outdoor Heritage Fund. A grant is pending from USDA Forest Service, Northeastern Area State and Private Forestry.

For more information, contact:

Morten Moesswilde, District Forester, Maine Forest Service. 2870 North Belfast Avenue, Augusta, Maine 04330 (207)441-2895, morten.moesswilde@maine.gov,     

Theresa Kerchner, Executive Director, Kennebec Land Trust, 134 Main Street #2B, Winthrop, Maine 04364 (207)377-2848, kennebeclandtrust@gmail.com, or

Amanda Mahaffey, Project Consultant, Kennebec Woodland Partnership, ammahaffey@gmail.com, (207)449-3070.

Overview 

February, 2010    

The Maine Forest Service and Kennebec Land Trust have recently launched a regional forestland conservation initiative, the Kennebec Woodland Partnership.This innovative, landscape-level project will establish a sustained dialogue on  maintaining forest cover with the goal of enhancing forest stewardship and conservation in Kennebec County for the long term. The Kennebec Woodland Partnership will facilitate information exchange through a broad regional network of woodland owners, municipalities, non-profit organizations and forest managers, culminating in a three-day workshop October 21-23, 2010.   

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Theresa Kerchner

Executive Director

Kennebec Land Trust

PO Box 261

Winthrop, ME 04364

(207)377-2848

www.tklt.org

Located in central Maine, Kennebec County embodies the ecological and socio-economic transitions between the most densely populated and heavily forested areas of the state. The new program will draw on a diverse pool of foresters, small woodlot owners, loggers, biologists, economists, municipal planners, and community members to craft a collaborative vision for keeping forest as forest in Kennebec County. The project will also support individual owners to sustain the many public and private benefits of forests.

A framework of principles for long-term collaboration between all participants will be developed through this dialogue and presented at the October, 2010 conference.

For more information, contact

Morten Moesswilde, District Forester, Maine Forest Service 2870 North Belfast Avenue, Augusta, Maine 04330 (207)441-2895, morten.moesswilde@maine.gov, or     

Theresa Kerchner, Executive Director, Kennebec Land Trust, 134 Main Street #2B, Winthrop, Maine 04364 (207)377-2848, kennebeclandtrust@gmail.com, or

Amanda Mahaffey, Project Consultant,, ammahaffey@gmail.com,        (207)449-3070.

Kennebec Woodland Partnership Summary

Monmouth Third Grade Visits Kennebec Land Trust Property:

Governor Ken Curtis’s Childhood Home 

Josh Lake, KLT intern November, 2009

“Look, M-A-I-N-E!” exclaimed a Monmouth third grader to Ken Canfield, Maine Forest Service District Forester.  The student had just found eastern white pine needles on the ground and identified them using Ken’s acronym of “M-A-I-N-E” to correspond to the tree’s five needles in a fascicle.  The eastern white pine is of course Maine’s state tree, and its cone, with tassel, is the state flower, making for a convenient and memorable acronym. 

This learning opportunity came on a beautiful fall afternoon in late October at Governor Kenneth Curtis’s childhood home in Leeds, the 360-acre Curtis Homestead Conservation Area of the Kennebec Land Trust (KLT). 

All the pieces came together in a project long in the making when logger Nat Bell, forester Ken Canfield, sawmill operator Bruce Bell, and KLT Stewardship intern Josh Lake presented an afternoon of learning and fun for local school children.  The program took place on land that had been farmed by the Curtis  family since the early 1800’s, with students observing a selective timber harvest similar to work that Archie Curtis, Ken’s father, would have done seventy years ago.   

Nat Bell and Ken Canfield brought one group of students to the edge of the field where the harvest was taking place and spoke about how and why trees are selected for harvesting.  They also told students about the site’s ecology, including which species of trees grew alongside the eastern white pines and which animals roamed the woods.   

The most exciting moment of the day came when the students witnessed the felling of a large pine.  Observing from a safe distance, they watched as Nat inspected, notched, and began cutting into the tree.  As the tree began to slowly shake and tilt toward its desired felling spot, the students let out a “Timberrrr!” that would have made any lumberjack proud.  The tree came crashing down right where Nat wanted it to, and the children were amazed at the sight and sounds of the felling of this large tree. 

Nearby at the log yard, the location to which the logs are skidded after cutting so that they can be loaded onto a truck, Bruce and Josh taught the other group how pine logs are used.  Bruce explained that pulp logs are spindly and crooked, perfect for grinding into pulp for paper making, while saw logs are straight and suitable for lumber. 

Bruce then turned to his Wood Mizer portable saw mill and demonstrated how a pine log is turned into a perfect board.  As he first de-barked the log, then sawed it into five boards, the captivated audience enjoyed the flying sawdust and the immense power of the large band saw as it cut the 12-foot log with ease.  After the boards were cut and the inside of the tree was visible, Bruce and Josh taught students about knots and how they form, and the growing process of the tree.  Especially fun for the students was the chance to inspect the pile of fine sawdust that formed next to the machine. 

The two groups then switched presentations, and after two hours outdoors, the third graders said their goodbyes to the presenters and packed onto the school bus for the short trip back to Monmouth.