Nothing so serious as described in the Jim Speer email though. In use it was wonderfully reliable, as long as we kept it clean. Then again, we devised an alternate (improved?) method of extraction from the borer that possibly puts less strain on the borer. Don’t know; still investigating so we keep that for another day.

Hello All,
I have been buying Haglof increment borers every year for the
North American Dendroecological Fieldweek. We have had the same
problems as other have mentioned including the chuck that attached the
bit to the handle breaking off as Maria mentioned, increment borers
breaking off at the cutting tip-shaft junction, handle’s of spoons
rattling off on their first use making them useless, and the poor tooth
design. I have sent many borers back to Haglof and usually get them
replaced. I have also spoken with them quite a bit and sent them our
complaints the last time we had a discussion on poor borer design. I
will send along these comments to Haglof as well so that they can know
our dissatisfaction with their changes. I think Paul Krusic stated in a
previous conversation that the companies are good about replacing broken
equipment – just make sure that you carry a lot of extra borers into the
field.

Jim Speer

I have previously written that it may be instructive to think of BCPs more as a Pinus species that had adopted more of a cactus form …. ones in California are especially prone to that.

That’s an interesting turn of phrase. The White Mountain BCPs compete with big sagebrush. Whereas spacing in many forests is determined by canopy, that isn’t an issue with BSPs. I get the impression that spacing is probably determined by space occupied by root systems – is that what happens with cactus as well?

Steve: We didn’t tag the trees, but documented the locations in exact detail. I’m not even sure whether the Forest Service would allow you to tag trees any more. The usefulness of the Graybill tagging is diminished somewhat by the fact that the archive ID numbers do not reconcile to the tag numbers. We’ll try to see if a concordance is available at Tucson, but am not optimistic.

First, thanks so much for your comments and kind words! I love the fact that having a comprehensive visual record allows for such commentary and discussion.

A few responses on your specific tree comments:

* 006-4 and 006-5 are quite odd. That root was so large, we simply became curious! The fact that this sample is from a root is properly recorded. We just were interested to see what would be found.

* Tree 30 (Graybill 84-55) is most definitely in poor shape. It’s good to have your informed confirmation of the cautions that so many others have expressed in the last couple of years. As you are probably aware, this is a “strip bark” BCP. Many in the field have been cautious about use of such trees as proxies. And that’s why we avoided coring strip bark BCP’s, except when necessary to re-sample the trees sampled by Graybill in 1983.

* Photo 26-6 reflects an interesting conundrum. Look carefully and you’ll see the opposite side of the tree is over a steep fall-off. What is the meaning of “uniform height” when the soil line on one side of a tree is significantly higher than the other? I sure don’t know! Some of the trees were located at steep enough angles that it was almost impossible to core on the downhill side and reach above the uphill soil line.

* Photo 23-5 is another case of curiosity. It is a very healthy tree, yes with close-in foliage. What will it show? We will soon find out!

Your mention of overgrowth is interesting. Brings up topics such as long term forest succession growth. Over a period of hundreds (or sometimes thousands) of years, it seems reasonable that the tree ring record might show multiple cycles of slowed growth followed by “release” after a forest fire, an infestation-induced die-off, or other non-climactic events.

006-4, 006-5 look quite odd. Trees do not put the same layer of wood on the roots, stump, trunk top. You may want to be careful using those.

Vigor of a tree influences growthrings a lot. A treee in a poor shape, compared to when it was vigorous, will put on less wood (see your screenshot of the treee 30a, and if it comes from your 030-1 treee, it is quite obvious that the tree has slowed down due to its poor shape)

Normally, a standard height and orientation of the sample shoud be used. While BCP are quite unique and the uniform height of sampling is difficult, some samples look low ( 26-6)Cannot say anything about orientation.

Trees will put on less wood if they have competition for light (branches) or water (roots). A situation like 23-5 may be tricky – lot of vigorous growth around and partly above your tree. If it has been freestanding earlier, you may see some slowdown now.

I am impressed by your work – very useful especially in these ‘results justify the means’ hysteria times.