This grizzly at the St Louis Zoo
is displayed in an exhibit that mimics its
natural habitat. A whole industry has emerged to
manufacture these exhibits.
At your local zoo – if you can suspend disbelief for a moment – you might find yourself in the middle of a tropical rainforest. Or a dusty African plain, watching the animals in their natural habitat. Of course, those wild settings are merely a façade. Clever construction techniques covering up concrete cages. In the second of a two-part series, the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports… the thought and planning behind the displays can be nearly as intricate as nature itself:
The Gypsy Moth caterpillar cut a wide-swath of destruction through some midwestern states this year. The caterpillar has been called one of the most destructive hardwood forest insect pests in the U.S. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Natalie Walston reports:
Transcript
The gypsy moth caterpillar cut a wide-swath of destruction through some Great Lakes states this year. The caterpillar has been called one of the most destructive hardwood forest insect pests in the United States. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Natalie Walston reports.
Agriculture officials in Great Lakes states have tried a variety of chemical methods to stop the spread of the gypsy moth. Still, it’s estimated the gypsy moth caterpillar destroyed a record forty-two thousand acres of trees in Ohio alone this year. The Ohio Department of Agriculture says that number has doubled from last year. Agriculture officials in New York State say the gypsy moth caterpillar feasted on fifty thousand trees this year. That’s compared to twenty-seven thousand last year. But, the state of Michigan got a break. Michigan Department of Natural Resources entomologist, Frank Sapio says the insects died from a virus before they could destroy trees, and he says the DNR released a natural fungus that worked with the virus to kill the caterpillars. Last year, though, the caterpillars were blamed for eating ninety-seven thousand acres of tree leaves in Michigan.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Natalie Walston.
Landscape Manager Jeff Culbertson sprays a Scots pine with thief repellant containing fox urine. The smell isn't too noticeable outdoors... but when a thief drags a conifer indoors, the repellant heats up and makes for a memorable Christmas. Photo by Nanci Ann McIntosh, University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
Evergreen trees grace forests, campuses, and lawns around the region. Much to the dismay of landscapers and gardeners, some of those trees disappear this time of year, stolen by someone who may not quite get the idea of Christmas cheer. But some universities have found a way to fight tree rustlers. It involves a foul-smelling concoction that makes thieves regret taking a tree. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Rebecca Williams has the recipe for this nasty, yet effective repellant:
Transcript
Evergreen trees grace forests, campuses, and lawns around the region. And much to the dismay of landscapers and gardeners, some of those trees disappear this time of year, stolen by someone who may not quite get the idea of Christmas cheer. But some universities have found a way to fight tree-rustlers. It involves a foul-smelling concoction that makes thieves regret taking a tree. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Rebecca Williams has the recipe for this nasty, yet effective repellant:
About fifteen years ago, landscape managers at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln had a big problem. Tree thieves were cutting down the best conifers on campus. And the landscapers were getting calls from local residents, whose trees were also disappearing. Dennis Adams is a forester at the University of Nebraska.
“It’d be, you know, trees that have good Christmas tree form, so blue spruce, concolor fir, some of the pines – white pine, scotch pine.”
Some thieves were easy to track. Jeff Culbertson is a landscape manager at the university. He says students were stealing trees during Thanksgiving break… and they weren’t always perfect criminals…
“We’ve had instances where the students, I guess didn’t do a good job or didn’t think anybody cared, but you could find the dragged marks of the tree through the snow to their fraternity or dormitory or something like that so in those cases I think it was pretty easy for them to figure out where the tree went.”
Campus trees are worth hundreds of dollars, so the university was eager to find a solution. Dennis Adams discovered a solution… literally. He found the recipe in an old magazine… 1 part glycerine, 10 parts water, and 2 parts… fox urine.
Jeff Culbertson says the fox urine makes Christmas tree thieves think twice…
“It doesn’t really smell like skunk. Maybe like an extremely strong cat urine sort of smell. Or dog, something that’s very concentrated. But you know normally you’re not going to smell that. So it’s pretty pungent.”
Culbertson says since the University of Nebraska began spraying conifers in the 80s, they haven’t lost many trees. He sprays 50 to 100 Christmas-tree size evergreens each year. He used to wear a plastic spray suit, but now he just keeps the wind at his back.
“When I do the fox urine, I don’t have many volunteers that want to help me with that. So I take on upon myself to do it. They mostly stand away from me, and they probably don’t talk to me too much that day either.”
Culbertson says there is one problem with this technique… when it’s cold out, you don’t notice the smell. So he started adding a dye… he sprays blue or red stripes on the trees where he sprays the fox urine. He says it makes the trees that much less attractive, and serves as a warning. And each year, the university lets the local papers know they’re spraying fox urine again.
But if a thief still chops down a tree and drags it into his house … Culbertson says he won’t likely do it again.
“It would be a smell that you’d have a hard time getting rid of.”
Culbertson recommends the method to anyone with a lot of trees to protect. He says the repellant is pretty affordable, and normally wears off after the Christmas season. Most of the supplies, sometimes even fox urine, can be bought at a garden store.
“I use a small, 3 gallon bottle sprayer, typical sort of garden sprayer people would purchase at the hardware store, garden center… And I try to use hot water. The glycerin is very syrupy kind of like corn syrup. So it helps to loosen it up, heat it up and make it less thick. I mix it up, take it out, and just spray the trees by hand.”
Both Jeff Culbertson and Dennis Adams think thieves are just looking for a cheap tree. But Adams still finds the thefts a little unbelievable.
“I think people have to be pretty desperate to steal a tree for Christmas. That seems like it’s kind of in the anti-Christmas spirit to steal.” (Laughs)
Other campus managers, meanwhile…have cooked up their own people repellant. The University of Idaho adds a few ounces of skunk scent. It makes their mix even more memorable.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Rebecca Williams.
The Sierra Club is suing the U.S. Forest Service to block logging of aspen in national forests in three Great Lakes states. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Stephanie Hemphill reports:
Transcript
The Sierra Club is suing the U.S. Forest Service to block logging of aspen on national forests in three Great Lakes states. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Stephanie Hemphill reports.
The lawsuit asks a federal court to force the Forest Service to stop cutting aspen on its land in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota. The Sierra Club’s Anne Woiwode says the Forest Service favors aspen production at the expense of a healthy forest, and a healthy economy.
“When they choose to keep aspen at very high levels, they choose not to bring back forests that may be of greater economic value, may actually produce many more jobs than aspen does for the amount of wood produced.”
Woiwode says clear cutting aspen prevents white pine and hardwood forests from growing back.
The Forest Service says it manages forests for a variety of types and ages of trees, and doesn’t try to encourage aspen where it would not grow naturally.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Stephanie Hemphill in Duluth.
A disease that’s destroying trees is spreading through parts of the Great Lakes region. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:
Transcript
A disease that’s destroying trees is spreading through parts of the Great Lakes Region. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports.
Beech bark disease has been damaging beech trees in eastern Canada and New England for a century. The disease has been creeping westward across the upper sections of U.S. since then. Last year Beech bark disease was discovered in the upper peninsula of Michigan. The disease is caused by two pests. First an insect called the wooly beech scale attacks the tree and open wounds. Then a fungus enters the bark, killing the trees. Often the beech trees are knocked over by high winds because of the damage done to them. Not all beech trees succumb to the disease. Scientists are now studying trees that appear resistant to beech bark disease, and they’re also looking for natural predators of the scale insect or the fungus that damages beeches. In the meantime, forest officials are cutting down beeches damaged by the disease. Before the trees fall down on someone unexpectedly.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Lester Graham.
The recent announcement by the National Forest Service canceling a
cutting plan in New Hampshire’s White Mountains has Great Lakes Radio
Consortium commentator Don Ogden thinking about forestry issues we often
don’t hear about:
Americans spend millions each year on corporate landscaping. But as Great
Lakes Radio Consortium commentator Tom Springer explains, what grows on
company property is usually forbidden fruit:
The timber industry specially breeds trees to increase their value.
Trees are worth more when they grow straight, tall and fast. Inbreeding
trees within the same family can increase the frequency of these traits,
but now a new study shows it can also be fatal. The Great Lakes Radio
Consortium’s Todd Witter has more:
Researchers are finding ways to use plants to clean up contaminated
sites. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports on a
project to use genetically altered trees to pull certain kinds of
pollution from the ground:
In an article in the journal "Nature Biotechnology" researchers saythey’re developing plants that clean up mercury contamination. TheGreat Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:
This grizzly at the St Louis Zoo is displayed in an exhibit that mimics its natural habitat. A whole industry has emerged to manufacture these exhibits.