Managing the Competition by Harlan Palm

I got started with the idea while releasing volunteer walnut (age 20 – 60 years) along 4 creeks.  I saw many walnut trees with 30 - 40 feet of clear trunks and straight as an arrow.   I recall one walnut that was clear and straight for 20 feet and then it bent away from a taller sycamore.  I expect the walnut was actually older but then it got overtaken by the faster growing sycamore.  

The intriguing challenge is to learn how to enhance or increase the number of high quality trees that are generating veneer quality logs that are potentially 20 – 40 feet in length.   The bark ridges are relatively straight with no evidence of catface scars.   It makes me wonder if there is a reduction in the frequency of pin knots!!!   If the level of competition was managed perfectly, the width of growth rings should be fairly uniform.

Regarding your question about redbud as a trainer.  Redbud is a little slower and tolerates juglone.   Even though it is a legume, it does not have nitrogen-fixing rhizobium associated with it like legume crops.  I have a prolific population of red bud on my farm that is so thick in places that you cannot walk through it….but at least it is not poisonous nor does it have any thorns!!!

On one of the farms that I have been managing uneven aged volunteer walnut growing on Landes and Haymond Silt Loam along a creek.   The trainer competition consists mostly of fast growing sycamore and soft maple along with some ash and elm.   I am “Managing the Competition” in a way that reduces the amount of necessary pruning on the walnut.   The adjacent competition shades out the lower small branches that shed without leaving a catface scar.  

I coppice the adjacent competition so that the walnut have about 15% height advantage over the competition.  I do not apply any herbicide to the cut stump that may be several feet tall.  Several sprouts emerge from the coppiced junk tree which shades the lower portion of the walnut stem.  

During subsequent years I coppice the fast growing shoots that are starting to catch up again with the walnut.   Eventually I start to cut the junk trees and treat the stumps.

I plan to get to the farm where I have been trying to Manage the Competition fairly soon.   If I can get any meaningful photos, I will forward to you.  As you know it is tough to get good photos when standing in such thick stands of tree trunks.