The Mixture of Species and Sustainability of the Curtis Forest
RTT uses mixed-species models of forests for reasons of sustainability. Significant mitigation of climate change using farm forests will require hundreds of thousands of acres of plantings. If we planted the traditional monocultures of a single species, they would possibly eventually be susceptible to insects and diseases. If we use a mixture of species, mimicking the mixtures of natural forests, we might lose one species, but the stand would regenerate maintaining its role of long-term CO2e sequestration. There are 7 species of trees in the Curtis forest. The percentages are 41% Klinkii, 18% gallinazo, 10.1% pilon, 10% deglupta hybrid, 9.8% chancho, 5.6% mahogany, and 4.8% cedar.
The Klinkii is for long-term CO2 storage. The gallinazo, deglupta and chancho are for early thinnings for farmer income because they grow much faster. The mahogany and cedar produce high value wood for future farmer income as we strive towards a 100+ year model. Replanting shade-tolerant species under the original forest will be necessary to maintain stand density, generate farmer income, and reach our goal of 2,000 tCO2/ha by 50 years and 100+ years of storage.
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