Sustainable and natural reforestation with the Moritz mini felling tractor

The area to be reforested has increased significantly in recent years. This is due to drought, bark beetles, storms and forest fires. Pfanzelt will demonstrate how to naturally reforest without large equipment in a large-scale project that will be carried out over several years.

When the excursion comes to the conference grounds

The site was located directly on the KWF Conference 2024 trade fair grounds, so everyone was able to get an idea of reforestation directly on site, 2.5 years after the start of the project. The project is being carried out by Pfanzelt and other partners, such as the KWF and the federal forests.

The KWF Conference 2024 in Hindsight | Taking stock of the afforestation project 2.5 years after its launch

We are thrilled and delighted! It was encouraging to see how many interested visitors explored the Future Forest project area or studied the theme path during the four days of the trade fair. The many constructive and intensive discussions on the processes and machines deployed were certainly the highlight of the event. Looking back at the first 2.5 years, we, as well as the district forester Werner Rocke, who is our counterpart, can confirm that the afforestation project is on the up and up and overall on a very positive track. This applies to the procedures implemented and adapted to the structure of the area as well as to the current status of the seeds or planting.

To facilitate machine maintenance, the planting and sowing strips were laid out at a distance of two metres. The MAX forestry mulcher with its working width of 1.2 metres can therefore easily remove unwanted growth between rows. Removal of the individual plants in the row is not necessary for this method.

In spring 2023, another check was carried out on the project area. In particular, the drought damage from last year was examined. If you look at the 2022 forest status report for Hesse, you can read the following there:

• 8 out of 12 months were in some cases significantly too dry and, with the exception of September, all months were too warm.
• In parts of the state of Hesse, the pronounced dryness of the soil has now been ongoing for five years.

Failures of planting due to drought are also visible in the project area. The failures of the Douglas fir were very low. This is probably due, among other things, to the fact that the areas planted with Douglas firs were mostly partially shaded during the day. There were major failures in the sessile oaks. Almost 600 dried-up plants were registered here. However, there are also pleasing results from Douglas fir sowing.

At the beginning of July 2023, we carried out the first culture maintenance of the year. Due to the rainy months, the accompanying vegetation was very lush and the Moritz was strongly called upon with the MAX forestry tiller. In some cases, the marker poles, which were just over a metre high, were already difficult to see. In 2023, additional maintenance with the brushcutter was dispensed with in consultation with district forester Werner Rocke. This was a direct consequence of last year’s results. On the one hand, there was some filling due to human error, and on the other hand, the plan was to use the narrow accompanying vegetation, which of course must not be so thick that it dams, to obtain shade for the plant rows. The maintenance of the area took around six working hours in this process.