Crow Wing County Land Services has completed its annual tree planting program for 2022. Pine seedlings were planted on 60 acres located in Wolford and Fairfield townships.

Since 1983, approximately 4.1 million pine tree seedlings have been planted on county managed forest lands across 5,000 acres. Approximately 1,400 acres of timber are harvested, compared to about 72,000 acres the county has.

Most of the county’s acres with aspen, birch, and oak grow new sprouts from the roots and regenerate naturally. After the county’s timber harvest, they have a regeneration survey. If the seedlings do not come back by themselves or through sprouts, they will survey those areas and plant the trees.

Planting is in an important element of sound forest management and ensures the resources will continue to provide recreational opportunities, and forest products for other walks of life.

As the county plans these timber harvests, it helps create a lot of hedge of an average size of 30 acres. This makes this a good diverse forest to plant trees and give benefits to wildlife and property owners.

If you have an acre or less, there is no minimum amount of trees you can plant in your yard. The county will plant trees over 50-plus acres with tens of thousands of trees.

Through this year’s annual tree planting, 46,800 of the pine seedlings were planted in 60-plus acres of land to sustain a healthy forest and wildlife habitat. All counties, including Crow Wing, are very committed to planting to trees.

Crow Wing County Land Services manages 105,000 acres of forest land for timber production. The sale of timber at public auctions during the year funds the county’s management, while providing revenues to local communities.

Forest lands are managed to strict environmental standards established by both the Sustainable Forestry Initiative and the Minnesota Forest Resources Council.

By — Hanky Hazelton