Introduction
This toolkit comprises three easy-to-use calculators on planning and establishment costs, expected productivity, carbon sequestration and economics for those interested in planting and managing native forests to meet multiple objectives. The calculators have been developed based on the experience and resources of the Tane’s Tree Trust with default values based on average costs of most commonly planting scenarios and growth rates based on average performance of planted natives nationwide. Users can elect to enter their own planting prescriptions and growth data in the calculators based on their own site and species specific details or requirements.
Tāne’s Tree Trust indigenous plantation database
The data that underpins the growth and carbon models used in the calculators is from the Tāne’s Tree Trust Indigenous Plantation Database. This is New Zealand’s largest national database of planted natives comprising measurements of 15,000 trees and shrubs 5-110 years old.
The toolkit is part of Tāne’s Tree Trust vision to see this database developed into a freely available web-based interactive resource for anyone interested in the planting of native forests.
We are expecting to add further data to the TTT Indigenous Plantation Database with a further nationwide survey of planted stands of native trees and shrubs. Since the last survey in 2010 there have been a number of established plantings of natives located where we will be establishing Permanent Sample Plots (PSPs) as well as the many new plantings of natives that have occurred over the last couple of decades.
The aim is to eventually provide sufficient growth data on the major tree and shrub species from planted stands to run species-specific growth and carbon models. This includes developing a site index for key species, and where sufficient data allows regional estimates of growth and yield.
If you have or know of a planted stand of native trees with a known management history, particularly the year of planting, and the stand is sufficiently large to accommodate a minimum 10 m diameter measurement plot avoiding edge trees, then please [Enable JavaScript to view protected content]. We are keen to add new growth data to our database and improve our growth models for planted native forest.
Updates and improvements
We are keen to update and improve this toolkit so feel free to send any suggestions, or please contact us if you have any issues with using the calculators.
As we add more growth data to the Tane’s Tree Trust Indigenous Plantation Database, we will upgrade the models accordingly with the aim of providing species-specific growth and yield models on a regional basis to allow users to estimate growth and carbon predictions for a wider range of species and sites as this allows.
We are also working to include regeneration in the growth and yield models, and carbon models as further work is completed on evaluating and quantifying the role of reversion of marginal hill country.
Free online resources on establishment options
Check out our free Tāne’s Tree Trust resources to work out what you need to do to successfully to plant and manage a native forest on your land to meet whatever objectives you have in mind.
Practical methods with case studies and links to best-practice guidelines will assist landowners with choice of planting layout and density, species selection, planting plans, and monitoring options.
Acknowledgements
This toolkit project was partially funded by the Ministry for Primary Industries’ Sustainable Farming Fund as part of the Tāne’s Tree Trust planting native forestry toolkit – from planning to implementation project. Co-funding was provided by The Tindall Foundation as part of the Our Forests Our Future programme, and the Tāne’s Tree Trust Research Fund, and support from Project Crimson Trust’s Trees That Count. Robin Sallis has designed and developed the online calculators with input from Mark Kimberley of EnviroStats, Dr Jacqui Aimers of Aimers Consulting, Gerard Horgon forestry economist, and Michael and Dr David Bergin of Environmental Restoration Ltd. We also acknowledge the technical support from the Tāne’s Tree Trust Trustees and a number of forestry practitioners in the development and testing of these calculators.