Yesterday we stopped on a very nice place in the middle of the forested area somewhere in the south part of Finland. It is very peaceful and quite here. When I woke up in the morning, I could not resist but to go for a walk through the forested surrounding.
Forests are full of blueberries and other wild berries which are just ripe enough to eat. I was even lucky enough to find penny bun, which tasted delicious with scrambled eggs.
On my walk I saw many different sorts of trees and was also faced with consequences of industrial foresting. This was quite shocking for me. As it looks owner was cutting trees with big machine, which left a lot of traces, destroyed forest floor, undergrowth and moved many traces on the tracks where it was driving. As a forest owner and also someone who is cutting trees and preparing burning wood by myself, I was surprised how much of not so small pieces of wood were left on the laying on the floor, how many small trees were just trampled just because they were staying on a way which machinery was going in order to come to big and industrial interesting wood. I admit, that also when I am working in forest, there is a bit of “collateral damage”, but I never trample small trees and let them just laying arround. I try to find the way for accessing fallen trees in a way that causes as little damage as possible and then I also clean after myself, that remaining trees can continue growing. I also know how it looks when you are just crashing trees and after you take out the biggest logs, but here the extend of it all was just overwhelming for me. On all sides, on several kilometers long walk I saw many such sites and it did not really look as if somebody will clean this mess.
I am sure, that nature will recover in time, and forest will reclaim its space in natural habitat, but with a bit of care and love for the nature could speed up recovery process tremendously. So… when you are foresting, please think about the nature. How will it recover? Take care for trimming the forest instead of crashing and walking through it like a dinosaur. Thank you!
