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Home → Publications → Tree Planters' Notes → Tree Planters' Notes Volume 24, Number 3 (1973) → Heavy vs. medium choppers for preparing sandhill sites for pine

Heavy vs. medium choppers for preparing sandhill sites for pine

In the sandhills of West Florida, sites dominated by scrub hardwoods and wiregrass can be converted to pine after intensive site preparation. The recommended treatment is a prescribed burn in the spring, at the time of full leaf development, followed 6 weeks later by two successive choppings spaced at least 6 weeks apart with an 11-ton brush cutter or "chopper" (2). Chopping eliminates wiregrass and effectively reduces competition from hardwoods (fig. 1), but heavy equipment is expensive and costly to operate. A recent study indicated that the costs of site preparation could be reduced by substituting an 8-ton or 4 1/4-ton chopper or a 1-ton disk harrow for the 11-ton chopper in the second treatment (1). This followup study was designed to compare the effectiveness of using an 8-ton chopper for both treatments with that of the conventional method of using an 11-ton chopper for both. Each method was compared in a stand of large hardwoods and in another of small hardwoods. The criteria in the evaluation were: 1) Time required for the two choppings, 2) reduction of hardwood sprouts, and 3) survival and height of slash pins 4 years after planting.


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Author(s): Russell M. Burns, Robert D. McReynolds

Publication: Tree Planters' Notes - Volume 24, Number 3 (1973)

Volume: 24

Number: 3