Beech trees: The villains of the forest?

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Originally Posted by MaximusFunk24 (Post 284603) I might add that Beech trees appear to be the villain of the forest, they will intentionally grow through the crown of competing trees and dont appear to value the "community" of the forest. If their aggressive nature wasnt enough, Beech trees (with a diameter of approx. 6'' or greater) are falling victim to some invasive species that leaves those pock marks all over their bark and eventually kills them. As a result the dying trees are spreading panic growth everywhere within their reach. At the same time many of the Maples that dominate the canopy in the Adirondacks are reaching the end of their lifespan (300ish yrs). It would be tragic if in several hundred years as the climate becomes less harsh, the Adirondacks became one dense Beech thicket. I would not shed a tear if some Beeches were cleared both for new skiing opportunities and to preserve the diversity of mixed hardwood forests.

I've come to understand what the issue is with the beech, and will try to outline it quickly for those who are interested. This affects nearly every forest in NY, and probably most of the northeast. It will probably be less of an issue in the Adirondacks due to less deer density, because they are one of the main issues.

It seems a rather interlinked and complicated problem but I think it can be boiled down into two main issues as well as some characteristics of the beech.

Beech has been affected by a bark disease which will kill most large trees. A few healthy beech remain, and you can tell a healthy one by its characteristic smooth, grey bark. If it has cankers, bumps and scale, it's dead or dying.

When beech die, they send out what are commonly known as "suckers", or root sprouts, in an attempt to save itself. Basically self cloning. A lot of trees can do this in various ways but beech is rather aggressive when dying. The sad part that the beech doesn't know is that its poor genes it is cloning are destined for the same fate as the dying main stem. But before that happens you end up with a dominating understory of beech saplings.

Here's the interaction though. Deer don't browse beech, or at least not enough to deter their growth. Maples OTOH are top tasty treats. So despite Maples trying to repopulate the understory, the deer take them out and the beech go on their "path of the lemming" using up resources on their way to their death.

In a nutshell, that's the issue - lots more detail, lots of presentations and reading out there if you look into this kind of stuff.

So in terms of forestry and land that is working forest, this is an even bigger issue because we, as humans, don't really value beech for much except firewood. And if it never makes it to maturity it's not even good for that. So lots of focus on how to manage logged land to keep deer from browsing the preferred species, mainly maple, but also oak, ash, basswood, etc...

There have been some experiments conducted in the western Adirondacks that clearly show a fenced off area heavily repopulated with yellow birch (which most of the large specimens are now at the end of their life) and non-fenced area remaining clear of trees... just ferns. Beech could probably also dominate but it seems in the Adirondacks even the deer are forced to eat the disgusting beech. And this an are where deer density is very, very low, as is the case with most of the Adirondacks compared to the rest of NY.