Welcome to Heartwood
On this podcast, you will hear stories from landowners, forestry professionals, and wood product producers, on a range of topics, including their relationship to the land. Join us as we get to the heart of why Vermont's forests matter.
Heartwood Vermont is now live on seven listening platforms, including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Podcasts!
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Episode 1: Woods Connection!
In this episode, you will hear many different voices from landowners, resource professionals, and wood product producers, as well as members of our podcasting team as we dive into the heart of our connections to Vermont's woods.
Photo courtesy of Kate Forrer, UVM Extension
Episode 2: Landowner Journey
In this episode, we talk to landowners about the journey they take turning their interest in their woods into action on the ground.
Photo courtesy of Lisa Sausville, VT Coverts
Episode 3: Talking to Professionals
Vermont has many technical service providers, or people who will come out to your land (either for free, or for a charge) to walk your land with you, and answer your questions about your woods to support you as a forest landowner. In this episode we are talking with some of these people and learning about what they do for landowners.
Photo courtesy of VT Department of Forests, Parks and Recreation.
Episode 4: Our Relationship with Wood
In this episode, we continue on our woods journey, we’ll revisit the roles of forestry professionals and meet other practitioners who harvest, process and market wood products.
Brian Lafoe and Stan Parker, owners of Lafoe Logging. Photo courtesy of VT Sustainable Jobs Fund.
Episode 5: Our Identity, Our Forests
This episode brings us back to our connection to the woods and why Vermont’s forests, the ecosystem services it provides and the products we create from our forests, matters.
Ken Gagnon, owner of Gagnon Lumber in Pittsford, VT. Photo courtesy of VT Sustainable Jobs Fund. Photo credit: Erica Houskeeper
Episode 6: Losing Our Ash
In this episode, we dive into the cultural and ecological impacts of losing black ash to emerald ash borer, an invasive beetle that threatens our region's ash trees. We talk with an Abenaki basketmaker, a research forester, a county forester, an ecologist, and a landowner to learn what’s at stake, and what Vermonters can do to help keep ash, specifically black ash as part of our region's culture and our ecology.
Black ash basket. Photo credit: Kerry Wood.
Episode 7: Cultivating Urban Tree Diversity
Most of us are familiar with the idea that having a diversity of species can lend resiliency to an ecosystem, but how often do we stop to consider the pros and cons of having a diversity of tree species in urban settings? What does an “urban” forest even mean in largely rural Vermont? In this episode, we talk with city arborists and watershed conservationists about these questions and what they mean in terms of resilience to invasive forest pests in the forest where we live.
Interplanting other species between mature ash in Burlington, pre-EAB. Photo credit: Elise Schadler