Originally published at Women Not Dabbling by Gina
Sorry for this poor photo, we have lots of snow!
In what could tentatively be called our front yard, about dead center, are two curious tree stumps. At some point in time, one of the former occupants of the land cut down the box elders for reasons unknown. In the years following the felling, the trees have sent up what biologist term “epicormic shoots”. The curious part is that someone very carefully tied all the shoots upward with twine.
Now I suppose the person could have just been tired of being smacked in the face by one of those branches as they mowed. Maybe they had plans to take the chainsaw to the shoots and thought tying them up would make the job easier. However, I personally like to imagine that these tangles of stems were purposely tied up as a woodland management technique known as coppicing.
Coppicing is an ancient forestry technique (still in practice) whereby a hardwood tree is cut down near the base during a dormant period (i.e. winter). Consequently, the following spring, the tree regenerates itself by throwing up shoots. In forestry terms these shoots are called the underwood of the tree and the stump is called the stool. Granted enough time to grow, this method allows a tree to be “divided” into many trees to harvest in succession over the following years. With good management practices, the underwood trees could live longer than the original tree would have without cutting. If the shoots are then cut in the dormant period, another round of shoots will be regenerated to take their place. Closely related, pollarding involves harvesting trees in a grazing area 6-7 feet above the ground in order to keep the shoots out of the animals’ reach. Eventually the trees grow new tops.
There are several benefits to coppicing a tree or creating a rotational forest of coppiced trees (known as a copse). The most obvious gain, from a sustainability point of view, is that by employing this technique to a felled tree, one can create a way to harvest a woodlot rotationally for firewood or poles for years to come. Some species are rather quick growers (e.g. willow) and can be harvested every 3-4 years. Ash, one of the best species to grow for firewood, can be harvested every 10 years. Others, such as oak, would not be as efficient in this area as it would require 50 years for the next harvest round, but it would be great for insuring future generational harvests.
Today coppicing is considered inefficient for large logging practices (too laborious they claim) and is now mainly used for creating pockets of biodiversity in a forest or for conservation of both flora and fauna. However, I believe that with the resurgence of wood burners as a resource for heating and cooking, coppicing could be a great sustainable way for small woodlot owners to use their habitat’s trees. Even if you live on a small urban/suburban lot, consider coppicing if you find you need to remove a tree (e.g. need for more light in the garden). Depending on the species, you may be able to harvest poles for fencing or a trellis in just a few years. It is simply a way to stretch that one tree into more firewood or building materials down the road.
This winter I plan to cut a few of the stems out of that box elder underwood . The ropes have created nice, straight poles. I hope to build a wattle fence around my garden and the shoots are now the perfect size or I can let them grow larger. Eventually, I want to remove some of the damaged trees from the woodlot on my property and encourage epicormic growth. My ultimate goal is to create a sustainable method of harvesting wood from my small property.
The size of the wood harvested from a coppiced tree seems to fit well with the requirements of a rocket stove.
Thanks for explaining this. It’s a topic I knew very little about. Good stuff to know.
Another great permaculture idea-great way to grow your own building materials and fuel. Alot of foresight and patience required.
Great article!
Great post! We use this a lot for fencing materials from our chestnut and filbert trees. No box elders here, just their namesakes. 🙂
It is a wonderful idea although I should don my master gardener’s gloves and tell you that depending on the area of the country you live in Ash trees may not be a good idea for planting due to the rapid advance of the ash borer’s disease. Some people think that the scare is overrated but the ISU professor who taught our entomology class is from Michigan and the picture he showed us were something else.
This is totally off the topic of coppicing but you can also plant bamboo to use for fencing and trellising. It grows much faster and sometimes straighter than trees and really works very well. I had a nice stand of it at my old place. It is really invasive and hard to kill though so you have to be able to contain it.
this is excellent information! trying to keep a sustainable woodlot can be a challenge when you don’t have a lot of land to support it (such as us).
i wonder, can all trees be coppiced? i know maples can be…how about cherries? we have lots of cherry growing out here and they burn so nice and hot! it would be excellent if we could do this with them.
I thought about going into the EAB thing, but ash is a native throughout the US, and is quite prolific through the midwest (I live in IN). I was going to go into detail about invasive insect damage and tree removal. The main reason I brought up ash is not so much planting it, but for existing ash damaged by EAB. One of the first signs of an EAB infestation is epicormic sprouts which may not be affected as quickly as the larger trees (it’s still research).
The Potawotamies of Northern MI and Northern IN use black ash for basketry. I’ve been thinking that coppicing may be a way to extend the life of EAB damaged trees (I first thought of this based on someone in MI’s idea of allowing her EAB damaged trees to coppice as an self-guided experiment-I’ll look for her blog link because I can’t remember it right now).
I live in an EAB infested area too and my woods has a lot of ash that has yet to show any definitive signs of the insect, but if I should have to remove them I hope to grow the epicormic sprouts for more firewood. Ash burns green and hot, so it makes a great firewood.
It’s a great point about not purposely planting ash for coppicing, although in some areas local sources seedlings should be ok. I’ll stress do not remove firewood/seedlings/or unmitigated ash material from infested areas into non-infested areas. MI, IN, IL, OH, parts of WI, WV, VA, MD and PA all have known infestations of Emerald ash borer!
In fact, I don’t encourage any wood removal into new areas as it is-this information is mainly for landowners to use on their same property. We talk a lot about eating local, but keeping your nature local is important too.
Thanks, Stephany!
Tansy, almost any hardwood tree will coppice. Some are just faster than others. I’m not sure what the growth rate for cherry is (probably similar to ash’s 10 years or so, maybe a little longer). Oak, beech, hard maple would take many years. Soft maples (such as silver) would be pretty quick. Birch and willow are extremely fast (3-4 years).
In England, copse usually consist of chestnut, hazelnut and hornbeam. Just like MoH!
Coniferous trees (e.g. pines) are different.
Oh, Missouri also has a small population of EAB (forgot that one). I actually did my thesis in college on EAB and other invasive insects and urban forestry, so it is a topic near and dear to my heart. I should also mention that I don’t follow the eradication of all infested trees approach which MI has followed until recent times. They now believe resistance or natural and introduced predators may slow the spread (the concentration is now on regulation vs. control).
Ignore my typos please, typing too fast today, I guess! 🙂
Eric: Great point!!!
I live in Iowa and had two giant ash trees in my front yard until a drunk driver took one out last summer. When we looked into replacing it the local tree nursery wouldn’t even sell us an ash.
The upside is that I have a ridiculous amount of ash wood curing in my driveway and under the back deck. We are looking forward to using that next year.
That is so sad about the mature ash tree! They make such lovely yard trees (which is why EAB is also so sad).
I think nurseries can’t get the ash stock as easily now (much of it came out of MI), some think “what’s the point of planting it if EAB will get it in sooner than later’, and some just can’t make money off of it anymore. I still think it is a beautiful tree and I hope we are able to save it as a native. If not, it will probably be hybridized like the chestnut and American elm.
It’s great you are aware of the issue with invasives over in IA!
The ash wood will be great and requires a lot less curing time than other good fire woods.
Great post, it’s very cool to know this! We have been planning on planting something around the perimeter of our 2 acres to use as a shelter belt and sustainable firewood source. This sounds like the way to harvest without having to plant again, just let nature take it’s course.
Do you know if there are any trees that don’t send up the shoots when they are felled like this? Should most trees do this? We were thinking of using the New Zealand native Manuka trees.
Hi Donna, Im in New Zealand and we have 36 acres of Manuka on our land, Manuka makes great firewood, it burns very hot, and the living trees are great for honey 🙂
Manuka are a very hardy tree and they dont regrow, they are not a coppicing tree (least thats what our garden shops tell us) and from experience Ive never seen it take off again once cut down.
They grow easily from seed, heat-pad to start and then lots of light once they germinate, they need a lot of light when planted out also or they will die back. Im not sure how cold it is there but often sites on the net state that Manuka dont like frosts, but we do have frosts as low as -7 in winter here and they dont mind that one bit…
Good luck 🙂
Hey Mel, thanks so much for that! I have been collecting manuka seeds but wasn’t sure how to germinate them. So heating pads eh? I’ll try that. Mostly where we will be planting it will have lots of sun, but there were some places we were also considering that don’t. They are a bit sheltered, they have light, but not direct sun.
We want to keep bees, using top bar hives and the manuka will be for them as well. And ultimately for us, with manuka honey, yay!
Hi Donna, Yep just sprinkle them on the top of the dirt and dont cover them when sowing, and spray with water twice daily, & on heat pad till they germinate and presto… they also germinate very quickly, some of our natives can take months…. keep them at 20 deg C…
They dont do well with root disturbance, so Id suggest you put them in RT or PB 3/4 bags, just sprinkle a few on top and the strongest will survive when you plant it out.
And the area that you were planning on putting them without direct sunlight may work, but they might just die off, worth a try though…
Manukas the start for our native bush regenerating, so they grow and produce a great place for our larger natives then they die off when they larger ones grow through. But sill worth a try if it has enough light.
Good luck :)_
This is great! I definately will use this technique when I fell trees on my property. Thank you for such an informative post.