Cut-Tree/Leave-Tree Selection Guide

by Ron Gosnell

If you adopt the approach offered in the Forestry Forum answer about choosing the trees to keep and then cutting and removing all the rest, there still will be some individual tree selection decisions to make.

Here are some selection guidelines for individual tree "cut or leave" decisions:

  1. Leave some dead and downed trees for insects and wildlife. Not too many however for fire danger consideration. Remove dead standing in lightening prone locations, along ridge tops for example.
  2. Leave an age-variety of trees but avoid understory trees directly under overstory branches as this will carry a surface fire into the tree crowns. Make occasional treeless openings when they are missing. Disrupt both vertical and horizontal fuel continuity.
  3. Leave trees with wildlife nests and cavities. Learn about different kinds of wildlife “snags” and try to protect a variety of snag types. Learn about the habitat requirements of animals that you wish to benefit, and remove or leave trees to encourage those conditions.
  4. Leave some old trees even though they may be subject to insect attack. Age is an important component of a forest and a genetic link to the past. Old trees have thick bark accumulations which protects a tree from surface-fire heat.
  5. Remove green-infested bark beetle trees promptly before brood matures, especially so during these current epidemic conditions. This will reduce the severity of impacts to the community and slow the rate of epidemic expansion.
  6. Remove diseased trees. Mistletoe and fungus diseases for example spread steadily to disease-free trees when infected trees are not removed or isolated.
  7. Remove trees from problem locations and get utility company help for near power lines.
  8. Leave trees which tend to have the natural general form of a species, which is often an indicator of vigor and dominance. Remove trees growing on sites for which the trees are poorly suited. Learn to recognize the natural form and site requirements for all tree species that grow on your land.
  9. Leave particular unusual trees for their aesthetic.
  10. Remove trees that do not especially contribute a. to your management goal or b. to a sustainable forest condition.

Cut-tree/leave-tree selection decisions are influenced by a landowner’s preferences.

Cut-tree/leave-tree decisions for a home’s immediate vicinity require special considerations for defensible space, terrain, tree species-flammability, tree spacing, limb pruning, utilities and safe access.