Sugaring and Wildlife

I am currently wrapping up a project with the Vermont Forests, Parks and Recreation Forest Legacy Program in partnership with the UVM Field Naturalist Program where I explored the relationship between sugaring and wildlife.

This included a statewide geospatial assessment identifying properties that sugar as indicated by Use Value Appraisal data, overlapping forests within these properties with the Vermont Conservation Design components and Omniscape wildlife movement models. I also explored the topology, geology, soils, and vegetation layers across these forests to determine which natural community types might be available for wildlife within sugarbushes.

Additionally, I developed and conducted a field assessment where I measured vegetation diversity and structure at the center and along the edge of 20 sugarbushes across Vermont, setting up audio devices and trail cameras to see which bird and mammal species were most common at these sites.

At each site, I measured vegetation, taps, and tubes at the core and edge of the sugarbush. If wildlife detections were fewer at the core, perhaps tubing is deterring animals from using habitat within sugarbushes that would otherwise be suitable.

Tree diversity of sugaring operations from 20 sugarbushes across Vermont relative to US Forest Service Forest Inventory and Assessment Program (FIA) composition of maple-beech-birch forests.

Wildlife may benefit from forest management within sugarbushes that incorporates early- or late-successional forest, as well as large slash piles and large standing dead trees.