The second day of the just-completed ForestTECH 2021/22 event focussed on advancements in automated silviculture with a particular focus on mechanised planting operations – new technology, developing technologies and an insight into results from local forest trials and commercial planting operations. In short, like Europe and South America in particular, the cost and availability of labour for planting have both …
Early EOI to present at ForestTECH 2022
Despite continued Covid related disruptions to the running of the annual ForestTECH event, ForestTECH 2021-22 ran, albeit virtually as an on-line event on 23-24 February this year. Over 300 delegates from 15 different countries were registered for the event. Feedback has now been collated and the response from those involved, excellent. Feedback from delegates also very clearly told us that; …
Telstra starts carbon farming to offset emissions
Telecommunications giant Telstra is starting its own carbon farm, growing trees to reduce its emissions. Big polluters that want to move towards net zero emissions need to buy carbon credits to offset what they put into the atmosphere. But not enough carbon credits exist in Australia, so Telstra boss Andy Penn is becoming a farmer. “A carbon farmer,” he laughed. …
Autonomous drones fly through forests
Expert human drone pilots have proven incredibly adept at piloting UAV through complex courses at high speeds which are still unmatched by autonomous systems. But researchers at the University of Zurich and Intel Labs are collaborating to change that, and their work, recently presented in the journal Science Robotics, could have far-reaching implications for the future of commercial drones. “Autonomous …
A prototype forest monitoring framework
From a forest biosecurity perspective, there is growing interest in forest surveillance processes capable of providing information on foliar disease present within the planted estate. Monitoring strategies often rely on aerial surveys to provide this information; they are, however, infrequent and only cover a small proportion of the forest estate. In this article, we present the results of a collaborative …
Celebrating tree planting – with a film festival
“Tree planting transforms us. These are our stories.” On 19 March The 2022 virtual Tree Planting Film Festival entitled We Are the Landscape, provided an inside look into what it takes to be a tree planter in Canada, sharing stories of passion, purpose, and perseverance. It featured 26 short films and documentaries, each under 10 minutes in length, as well …
Shopify purchases carbon offsets from DroneSeed
Reforestation company DroneSeed has announced its largest sale of offsets to date to Shopify, a leading provider of essential internet infrastructure for commerce, which is on a mission to reverse climate change. As part of the post-fire reforestation, native trees of multiple species will remove 50,000 tonnes as they grow over the next century on a legally protected site. A …
The Digital Forester: thoughts from a Canadian forester
Adam Dick is a Science Advisor at the Canadian Wood Fibre Centre, Canadian Forest Service and joins us from Fredericton. Adam was one of the champions that brought lidar enhanced forest inventory (EFI) to New Brunswick, which has resulted in the province having wall-to-wall lidar coverage and EFI predictions. From academia, to industry, to provincial and federal government roles, Adam …
Treeswift using drones to monitor forests
Over the past decade, drones have become an increasingly important tool for forest monitoring. They’re a fast and effective way to collect a lot of data in one go, without upsetting the natural balance too much. Formed as a spinoff of the University of Pennsylvania’s GRASP Laboratory in 2020, Treeswift has been working to build out that promise. Founders Steven …
Covid – the tipping point for automation?
Critical labour shortages are the catalyst for companies to finally automate and boost our decades-long productivity stagnation On December 19, 2013 a 20-year-old Levin man, Lincoln Kidd, was crushed to death by a falling tree – the 10th forestry worker in New Zealand to die in a single year; the 27th in four years. Forestry was setting the wrong sort …