BRANCHING OUT 2012, Issue 1 A newsletter of the School of Natural Resource Management & Ecology at Paul Smith’s College knockout
In this issue:
NSF grant Silvopasture experiment
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Forestry Day at the VIC 4
Letter From the Dean M any of you have received this newsletter before. For many others, this will be a first. There’s a good reason for that: Paul Smith’s College recently switched from three to two divisions. Academically, our programs remain the same; administratively, though, we’re bringing several disciplines under one umbrella. The school of Natural Resource Management and Ecology now offers programs in fisheries and wildlife sciences, arboriculture and landscape management, forestry, biology and many other science-related degrees. Ultimately, the shift will benefit students by offering them the same
education with less fragmentation. And thanks to a generous grant from the National Science Foundation – you can read more on page 2 – even more worthy students will have the opportunity to enroll in some of these science-related programs. No matter which degree they choose, Paul Smith’s offers students plenty of rich opportunities, on and off campus. Interested in hunting or trapping? Now there’s a three-credit course for that. Like to travel? Take a trip to the Dominican Republic or Hawaii. Do you like timber sports? Our woodsmen’s school is thriving like never before. And that’s just a
taste of what’s going on these days. I really hope you enjoy reading about the rest of it. And, as ever, I would love to hear how you’re doing, as well. Sincerely,
Jeff Walton jwalton@paulsmiths.edu
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NSF grant to aid science students
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aul Smith’s College has won a $530,000 grant from the National Science Foundation that will help students pursue careers in science. Students majoring in fisheries and wildlife science or environmental science will be eligible for scholarships that will be covered by the grant. The grant is part of an NSF initiative to increase the nation’s strength in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields. More than 400 colleges and universities applied for the grant; Paul Smith’s was among approximately 90 chosen to receive an award. As many as 14 students at a time will benefit from Paul Smith’s new Enhancing Ecological Education Scholarship Program, or E3SP. The grant will cover scholarships for five years, beginning in fall 2012 and running through the 2016-2017 academic year. “The Adirondacks are one of the best classrooms imaginable to give students the foundation they need to pursue work in ecology and the environment,” says Prof. Jorie Favreau, director of E3SP. “Students in E3SP will work directly with faculty members on original research and experience firsthand the thrill of discovery, building the basis for lifelong careers in science.”
Student scholarship
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ach year at the New York State Arborists Conference, a scholarship is given to a different arboricultural student to help pay for college. This year, Paul Smith’s student Mark Bouquin received the $1,700 gift. Bouquin was recognized in front of more than 200 arborists in January while attending the conference with Prof. Randall Swanson.
Draft Horse Club
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he Draft Horse Club received $8,466 in campus sustainability fund grants, partially because it decided to start producing its own food for horses by plowing and harvesting the hay they eat in a nearby field. The grant money also paid for new horse-drawn farming equipment, which will be used to prepare Gould’s Garden for plowing this year.
Dominican trip
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aul Smith’s College launched its ecotourism collaboration with a college in the Dominican Republic in January, when Profs. Joe Dadey and Brett McLeod and 13 students traveled to the Caribbean. Students worked on four different projects with colleagues at the National School of the Environment, located in the mountain town of Jarabacoa. Together, they constructed three tenting platforms and designed a resources inventory guide, an interpretive trail and brochure, and designed a plan to improve community participation in local projects. They relied on guides to teach them about the area’s existing ecotourism venues and sampled a variety of accommodations, travel companies and adventure activities. They also spent time at a high-mountain organic coffee plantation to learn the ins and outs of direct trade in the coffee industry and tourism development in the Dominican Republic. In their down time, they played pickup baseball games with the Dominican students, saw rare iguanas, visited caves that revealed ancient indigenous pictographs and went rafting, canyoning, deep-sea fishing and snorkeling.
Sportsman Education
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unting and trapping are essential tools for wildlife management and form the backbone of the North American model of wildlife conservation. It’s natural, then, that Paul Smith’s College offers a course on the subject. Students enrolled in our for-credit Sportsman Education class, offered for the first time this spring, received New York State certification in hunter education (firearms), bowhunter education, trapper education, and waterfowl identification, each a requirement to hold specific hunting and trapping licenses in North America. The course is taught by Ben Tabor, a wildlife technician with the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, who trains New York sportsman education instructors. The course covers the history and importance of hunting and prepares wildlife professionals to understand its role in wildlife management.
Read us online Would you rather receive Branching Out by email? Email bbennett@paulsmiths.edu
Sugaring season Woodsmen’s School thriving
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he Adirondack Woodsmen’s School will be featured in the Adirondack Life Annual Guide. Now in its the third year, enrollment is expected to reach nearly 50 students. Several major manufacturers sponsor the program, including Carhartt work wear, Stihl power equipment and Red Wing Shoes. To see a video of Prof. Bob Brhel and the draft horse team being used for horse logging as part of the Woodsmen’s School, visit http:// youtu.be/Jg5QFLOot1A.
Prof leads trip, pens book review
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rof. Jorie Favreau brought students to Hawaii in November 2011 for the national meeting of The Wildlife Society. Students went bird watching in a cloud forest, saw endangered species that may go extinct in our lifetimes, visited Volcanoes National Park, hiked through a crater, saw the red glow of the lava at night, competed in a quiz bowl, participated in a professional-student mixer and attended talks. Favreau also reviewed “Biology and Management of White-Tailed Deer” in the Dec. 2011 issue of Choice: Current Reviews for Academic Libraries. Favreau called the book, edited by David G. Hewitt, essential for wildlife library collections serving students of all levels as well as researchers, faculty, biologists and managers.
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ecord-high temperatures this spring took their toll on maple syrup producers across the Northeast, and the Paul Smith’s Sugar Bush fared no better. Sap runs best when days are cool and nights dip below freezing – but with the thermometer approaching 80 degrees some days in March, the sugar bush’s season ended after just 31/2 weeks. Hans Michielen, the Sugar Bush manager, says he would normally produce about 600 gallons in an average year. This year, he got 375.
Students publish
Silvopastures
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rof. David Patrick and several students published a paper in the Herpetological Review. The paper, on ecology of mink frogs in the Adirondacks, will appear in the journal later this year; Zac Bozic ’11, Alex Byrne, Jenna Daub, Alex LeChaminant and Josh Pierce were co-authors. “The five undergraduate students who worked on this paper were fully involved in the research, design and implementation of the field and laboratory methods,” Patrick said.“Four of the five are current students. It’s pretty rare for undergraduates to be co-authors on peer-reviewed papers and even rarer to get the papers accepted in a time when they are applying for their first jobs following graduation.”
rof. Joe Orefice was awarded a $14,570 Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education grant to conduct a silvopasture experiment at his farm in Riverview. Silvopasture combines forests, cattle and grazing fields in one location. The systems have proven to be productive and profitable in other parts of the country and world, but little is known about the benefits and tradeoffs of using them on farms in the northeastern United States. Orefice’s research will test the environmental and economic impacts of converting a northern hardwoods stand into a silvopasture.
Quiz bowl
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he quiz team fielded by the Paul Smith’s College Student Chapter of the Society of American Foresters (SAF) bested the competition in the annual Quiz Bowl challenge, held at the New England chapter’s winter meeting in April. It was the first time a team from Paul Smith’s won the forestry-trivia challenge since 2008. The team was led by Profs. Joe Orefice and Matt Olson ’99 and faced off against competitors from the University of New Hampshire, Green Mountain College and UMass-Amherst, which hosted the event. – Rand Snyder
. L-R: Steve Handfield, Kris Friers, Ben Haigh and Hannah Wahlstrom.
First-growth forest in the Adirondacks
Forestry Day
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Forestry Day at the Paul Smith’s College VIC in October featured competitions in axe throwing, log chopping and bow saw cutting. There was also a six-person relay featuring wood block cutting with a bow saw, wood splitting by hand and sorting and stacking firewood.
ver wonder what the Adirondacks looked like hundreds of years ago? Long-time Paul Smith’s College professor Michael Kudish returned to campus in April to discuss the subject with a talk titled “Adirondack First Growth Forests: How to Recognize and Map Them.” “Many people are curious to see what Adirondack forests looked like several hundred years ago before the effects of Europeans on the landscape,” Kudish told the crowd in the auditorium of the Freer Science building. While there are still many original forests, Kudish said no one person knows where it all is and how much we have. His lecture offered techniques for recognizing and mapping first-growth forests, and estimates on how much is out there. To view the lecture, visit http://youtu.be/ 5MCk-sWgdbU.
Pat Hendrick | Press-Republican
Tree doctors
> Student Clinton Williams scales a tree near the Phelps Smith Administration Building.
When students in the arboriculture course performed tree surgery tasks in class this spring, they had some new tools at their disposal thanks to a gift from the Husqvarna/ArborMaster Collegiate Training Program. Last year, Husqvarna presented two 346 XP Pro chainsaws to Daniel Groves, a technical instructor at the college, during a two-day educator workshop in North Carolina. The saws are valued at $550 apiece.