Today in Pictures

[shtferbrains]

Chuck you be so happy , we went full electric in shack now ..

Nice size fillets.

[blueversi]

Very well said , Chuck should practice Lorne Culvert’s preaching ways and plant trees instead of crops . Great idea from that wizard
zero income for about 30-40 years

Possibly not even any income after the 30-40 years either, the market could be non existent by then, mill closed down, who knows.

[AlbertaFarmer5]

This is not a wetland and no drainage is required.
If you are really concerned about the removal of trees you could just stop farming your fields and in a few years Mother Nature will reclaim them.

This is the correct way to asses this issue.
This is no different than the established farmer chastising the young farmer for buying land that is too expensive. Claiming land prices are too high, will never pay, and about to crash. To which I ask, when will you be selling yours, since the opportunity cost is there regardless if you pay for it today, or don't sell it at todays values.

Someone who inherited land which was cleared by his/her ancestors and doesn't return it to it's natural state, is no more or less virtuous than someone who takes the initiative to clear land in the modern era.

In fact, I would argue that clearing virgin land today, and managing it with today's farming practices will be far better for the environment than continuing to farm land cleared a century ago.
When I break new land, I incorporate as much of the deadfall, sticks, roots, litter, as possible. Breaking discs allow this to be possible. In the good old days much of this would have to be removed and burnt since the light equipment couldn't handle it. Or it would be buried deep with a breaking plow, never to be seen again.
My new breaking sees tillage once in the first year, then remains as no till from then on.
My new breaking gets all straw put back on, back in the days, all the straw was hauled off to the threshing machine and never made it back to where it came from.
On our grey wooded low OM soils, the OM and productivity drop off drastically within decades of breaking due to the high tillage methods of the past. I plan to maintain that high productivity with modern methods. The difference in soil is drastic.

According to the CBC, new forests sequester more CO2 than mature forests:

Young vigorous stands grow and sequester carbon at maximum speed. As stands get older, the tree canopy closes and individual trees begin to die off from self-thinning and other causes.

Very old forest stands can reach a sort of carbon neutral equilibrium state where trees are dying and decaying at approximately the same rate as they are growing back.
New growth forest may take up carbon at a greater rate than old growth forests (CBC / Radio-Canada)
So, taking into account both growth and mortality, 100 hectares of young forest will generally speaking have a higher net carbon capture rate than older but otherwise identical stands.

Paradis said that research has shown that the optimal landscape-level carbon sequestration policy may be to harvest and replant stands when they reach their peak growth rate. This is typically between 80 and 120 years old for most Canadian forest ecosystems, much younger than what is typically called old growth.

The most responsible thing Chuck could do for the environment, for CO2, and for soil health would be to let his land regress to its natural state for a few centuries while the soil rejuvenates, and let other farmers clear the mature forests instead.

[AlbertaFarmer5]

Possibly not even any income after the 30-40 years either, the market could be non existent by then, mill closed down, who knows.

About 2000, my brother came home with his college education in something conservation (ish), and informed me that the best use for the quarter of land I had just bought was to seed it down to poplar trees to harvest in a few decades.
Ignoring the economic necessity of having no income to make the payments in the intervening decades, the next issue is that a few years later, the nearest pulp mill closed down.
The next closest is so far away that if they take any wood from this area it has to be free, and even then they rarely will take it, since trucking costs more than the wood is worth. There are piles of rotting poplars still left over from that era.

[blackpowder]

I kinda like Blaithins' idea of farming pics.
We can prove Chuck's faults any time. He makes it too easy, but it's time consuming lol.

[Blaithin]

I kinda like Blaithins' idea of farming pics.
We can prove Chuck's faults any time. He makes it too easy, but it's time consuming lol.

That’s a full loop!

[AlbertaFarmer5]

Since I'm the guilty party who got distracted with ridiculing Chuck on the pictures thread, I will attempt to redeem myself by posting some recent pictures.

[Guest]

Bring your skates, the ice is ready

[shtferbrains]

D8K with a ripper.

You could do some serious damage with that.

Drain the swamp?

[AlbertaFarmer5]

D8K with a ripper.

You could do some serious damage with that.

Drain the swamp?

Shh, don't tell Chuck.

The ripper also works really well for ripping tree roots along fencelines. Eliminates losing 50 feet of crop along trees on a dry year like this.