Eastern Red Cedar Tree Control

University of Nebraska – Lincoln Author

09/01/2020 Added

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Kat Caswell looks at eastern red cedar tree control options in the Loess Canyons in SW Nebraska and their impact on forage production.
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[00:00:09.330]Hi, I'm Kat Castle.
[00:00:10.830]I am a cropping systems extension educator
[00:00:12.940]with the University of Nebraska.
[00:00:14.870]I am based out of the Southwest corner of the state.
[00:00:17.530]Thank you so much for attending
[00:00:18.730]our West Central Water and Crops Field Day for 2020.
[00:00:21.530]This looks a little different
[00:00:22.610]and through out this video
[00:00:23.680]you probably won't see me too much
[00:00:25.010]but you will hear my voice.
[00:00:26.660]So today I'm gonna be discussing
[00:00:28.400]control of Eastern red cedar trees.
[00:00:30.300]So Eastern red cedar trees are becoming a growing problem
[00:00:33.790]on much of the high plains,
[00:00:35.600]especially in Western Nebraska.
[00:00:38.140]So Eastern red cedar trees are a native tree
[00:00:40.440]and they're extremely effective as windbreaks
[00:00:43.160]and wind control.
[00:00:44.350]But they're also very well adapted to our native Prairie's
[00:00:48.810]and our grasslands,
[00:00:49.920]making them very quick and susceptible to encroaching
[00:00:53.770]and growing taking over these grasslands.
[00:00:56.540]So today, I'm gonna discuss some ways
[00:00:59.100]to control your Eastern red cedar trees
[00:01:01.270]and the impacting cost
[00:01:02.780]if you don't control your Eastern red cedar trees.
[00:01:05.090]So, feel free to contact me at the end of this presentation
[00:01:08.230]with any questions or concerns you might have.
[00:01:11.520]Let's begin with talking
[00:01:12.630]about how Eastern red cedar trees grow.
[00:01:15.000]Eastern red cedar trees are dioecious,
[00:01:16.940]meaning they have both a male and female plant.
[00:01:20.730]The females produce small blueberries,
[00:01:22.950]which are actually compact cones
[00:01:25.060]that contain three to four seeds per cone.
[00:01:28.670]In addition to the large seed production,
[00:01:31.410]Eastern red cedar trees generally grow very well
[00:01:34.640]under conditions of the great plains.
[00:01:37.260]These trees were selected as windbreaks
[00:01:38.960]because they outperformed an establishment
[00:01:40.990]compared to any other coniferous tree tested.
[00:01:44.120]Same stage trees performed so well as windbreaks.
[00:01:46.800]Tens of thousands of them were planted
[00:01:48.640]across the great plains,
[00:01:50.060]to assist with cattle production and homesteads.
[00:01:53.380]Would have previously stopped these trees
[00:01:55.420]from moving onto the range lands
[00:01:57.640]was the presence of fire in the landscape,
[00:02:00.440]both caused by humans
[00:02:02.250]and natural wildfires.
[00:02:04.670]Eastern red cedars are extremely susceptible to fire
[00:02:07.380]as a control method.
[00:02:09.470]It kills the plant in all stages of its life,
[00:02:11.920]from a full mature tree,
[00:02:13.470]down to a seedling.
[00:02:16.390]Let's take a look at some current trees.
[00:02:18.950]This is some drone footage
[00:02:20.080]from earlier in August 2020,
[00:02:22.620]taken in Frontier County,
[00:02:24.960]somewhere towards the Southern end of the Les Canyons.
[00:02:27.930]So just look at the difference
[00:02:29.720]between the ground cover
[00:02:31.890]that's caused by the living green Eastern red cedar trees,
[00:02:36.030]versus those hayfields.
[00:02:38.360]Those eastern side cedar trees are very dense
[00:02:41.140]and aren't allowing very much sunlight
[00:02:42.840]to get in between them.
[00:02:44.820]The more we're learning about Eastern red cedar trees,
[00:02:46.870]the more we're showing that these trees do reduce
[00:02:49.700]forage production
[00:02:50.870]and decrease the number of cattle
[00:02:52.610]that can be run on these acreage.
[00:02:54.810]Additionally, it's forcing out
[00:02:56.530]some of our native grass species
[00:02:58.620]and some those plants we enjoy seeing as forages.
[00:03:02.780]Our drone pilot got a little bit too close
[00:03:04.500]to those trees for comfort.
[00:03:07.800]You can see how these canyons get completely filled up
[00:03:10.810]with the Eastern red cedar trees,
[00:03:12.360]making them extremely difficult to control at this size
[00:03:15.610]and this density.
[00:03:17.930]When trees get to this points,
[00:03:19.650]most of the control methods are going to be reactive,
[00:03:22.700]rather than proactive.
[00:03:24.740]The primary form of control for these trees
[00:03:26.760]is going to be fire.
[00:03:28.510]Using prescribed burns is the most effective
[00:03:31.720]and efficient way of reducing tree numbers in this area
[00:03:35.160]and keeping this as usable range land.
[00:03:47.220]If you look off into the distance
[00:03:49.110]and even the surrounding area,
[00:03:50.410]you can see that the tree problem
[00:03:51.970]is not an isolated incident.
[00:03:53.980]Large swaths of Western Nebraska
[00:03:56.290]are being completely covered
[00:03:57.670]with the Eastern red cedar trees.
[00:04:00.040]While these trees do provide habitat for some wildlife,
[00:04:02.650]including game birds,
[00:04:04.230]the game birds will also occupy dead trees
[00:04:06.770]and some skeletons.
[00:04:08.780]So you won't be reducing your hunting completely,
[00:04:11.030]by eliminating your trees.
[00:04:17.578]One of the biggest challenges many people are facing
[00:04:20.180]in control of the trees,
[00:04:23.040]is the difficulty to get equipment
[00:04:25.760]and machinery into these canyons
[00:04:28.090]or to get to chainsaw down them
[00:04:29.510]and just the whole scope of it.
[00:04:31.230]When you're trying to control
[00:04:32.240]several thousand acres at a time,
[00:04:33.760]it can become very daunting.
[00:04:36.420]I was curious how much the tree population
[00:04:38.630]would've actually changed over the last 20 years.
[00:04:41.250]I did a quick pan around on Google Earth
[00:04:43.720]and found an area that looked like it hadn't been affected
[00:04:46.870]by management yet.
[00:04:48.340]I then outlined the areas of dense stands of trees
[00:04:51.010]in this 100 acre block.
[00:04:53.550]The area of the trees was about 27 acres,
[00:04:56.860]so roughly 27% of this area.
[00:05:00.140]I tried to grab an area that had a lot of canyons
[00:05:02.610]and a fair amount of trees.
[00:05:05.930]Then I brought that same map forward to 2014.
[00:05:08.960]Those yellow areas represent
[00:05:11.340]the tree stands that were present in 1993
[00:05:14.760]and as you can see quite a number of trees
[00:05:16.980]have filled in the area since then.
[00:05:19.680]In 2014 there was definitely more than one third of the area
[00:05:23.680]in this 100 acre square,
[00:05:25.600]covered by Eastern red cedar trees,
[00:05:27.730]dramatically affecting the productivity of these canyons.
[00:05:33.180]The expansion of the trees isn't surprising,
[00:05:35.330]especially when we take a look at some graphs
[00:05:37.130]we have by The University of Nebraska.
[00:05:39.290]We can see that while the juniper cover increases,
[00:05:42.800]especially at that turning point of 20 years,
[00:05:45.200]the herbacious cover will decrease.
[00:05:50.170]We see the same thing occur with earning potential,
[00:05:53.070]in relation to time without cedar management.
[00:05:55.630]Right around 20 years,
[00:05:56.770]we start seeing a very large drop-off
[00:05:59.110]and the potential that ground has to earn return.
[00:06:02.330]We see the same trend continue,
[00:06:04.500]in the dollar return per hundred weight of cattle,
[00:06:07.020]compared to the time without cedar management.
[00:06:09.300]Again right around this 20 year mark,
[00:06:11.090]we see a drastic drop-off in the productivity of that land.
[00:06:15.340]Oftentimes, we do not notice
[00:06:17.510]that we have an Eastern red cedar tree problem,
[00:06:19.430]until we're too far past that 20 years
[00:06:22.470]and past any proactive management
[00:06:24.510]and have to go with reactive management to the trees.
[00:06:30.780]All right so how do we actually control
[00:06:32.540]our Eastern red cedar trees?
[00:06:33.960]Well much like other weed control,
[00:06:35.810]there's multiple options
[00:06:37.150]and the best approach
[00:06:38.160]is to take an integrated management approach.
[00:06:40.900]So the simplest one we can think of is mechanical.
[00:06:43.110]So this includes cutting down trees with clippers,
[00:06:47.170]skid-steers, chainsaws,
[00:06:49.010]whatever mechanical method you would like to use.
[00:06:52.130]We can also integrate this with our burning,
[00:06:54.170]by stuffing cut trees into thicker stands of trees
[00:06:57.440]or canyons, before we burn them
[00:06:59.670]to use some of that as some additional burn fuel.
[00:07:03.260]We can also use chemical control.
[00:07:04.960]So there's several herbicide options
[00:07:06.860]include both sprays and injectables that we can use
[00:07:10.030]and we also have prescribed burn,
[00:07:11.960]which is a lot of what we're gonna focus on today.
[00:07:16.220]All right so here's a picture
[00:07:17.660]of some Eastern red cedar trees by a roadside.
[00:07:20.060]And if we're thinking about
[00:07:21.210]when we want to control these trees,
[00:07:23.250]we wanna go for that smallest tree,
[00:07:25.010]that littlest tree that's no bigger than a Yucca plant
[00:07:27.560]or maybe your average size of Border Collie sitting down,
[00:07:30.760]those trees are going to be the easiest
[00:07:32.460]and most effective to control,
[00:07:34.660]with both mechanical and chemical control.
[00:07:37.600]Once trees start moving up into those bigger sizes
[00:07:40.500]so that medium-sized tree into that large tree,
[00:07:42.950]it becomes progressively more difficult
[00:07:45.110]and more time consuming
[00:07:46.350]and a lot more expensive to control these trees
[00:07:48.970]with mechanical or chemical controls.
[00:07:51.230]So think about trying to get a skid-steer in
[00:07:53.410]and clear out multiple acres of large trees.
[00:07:56.090]This gets very expensive per acre
[00:07:57.960]very quickly.
[00:07:59.450]Mechanical control is usually most effective
[00:08:01.290]when we only have a few small trees per acre
[00:08:04.310]and you can move through an acre at a time
[00:08:07.190]with a brush hog
[00:08:08.250]or with clippers
[00:08:09.610]or a chainsaw
[00:08:10.610]without putting forth too much effort.
[00:08:17.080]So what does land look like after prescribed burn?
[00:08:20.150]Well, here we have some more aerial drone footage
[00:08:22.850]of an area in the Southern Les Canyon
[00:08:25.890]in Frontier County.
[00:08:27.110]This is not too far from those previous video
[00:08:29.940]of tree infested area we saw earlier in this video.
[00:08:34.090]So this area was burned earlier in 2020
[00:08:36.520]and well over a thousand acres was burned at the time.
[00:08:40.180]As you can see the areas the fire reached,
[00:08:42.570]had almost a complete control
[00:08:44.707]of the Eastern red cedar trees.
[00:08:46.940]The good thing about Eastern red cedar trees
[00:08:48.620]is once you kill them, they're dead,
[00:08:50.390]that tree won't re-sprout again.
[00:08:52.750]It is difficult to burn with these canyons
[00:08:54.640]that have faced multiple directions,
[00:08:56.740]because you can't necessarily get the fire
[00:08:58.830]into every different direction at a time.
[00:09:02.200]But the canyons that were burned,
[00:09:03.700]look really good.
[00:09:05.540]You can begin to see a lot of that regrowth
[00:09:08.020]underneath the dead trees
[00:09:09.710]or the tree skeletons,
[00:09:11.580]that's filling in really nicely and looks very green.
[00:09:14.360]Remember that 2020 has been a fairly droughty year
[00:09:17.820]and we're still getting a lot of nice regrowth
[00:09:20.030]into these canyons
[00:09:21.450]and look pretty green and lush.
[00:09:23.950]These canyons would have been deferred
[00:09:25.550]from grazing last year,
[00:09:26.810]in order to build up enough fuel for these fires.
[00:09:29.770]But they should be able to be grazed
[00:09:31.330]the next year or two.
[00:09:34.570]I was really happy to be able to look over these canyons
[00:09:37.090]and see a lot of sunflowers
[00:09:38.760]and native Prairie grasses regrowing into them already.
[00:09:42.180]Just look at the difference between
[00:09:44.210]under those burned trees,
[00:09:46.050]compared to those hillsides
[00:09:47.230]where things are still moving in.
[00:09:50.970]That's a lot of additional footage
[00:09:52.600]that wasn't there before.
[00:09:56.780]Eastern red cedar trees
[00:09:57.950]kind of remind me how we have to manage Palmer's amaranth.
[00:10:01.430]Their seeds when strapped
[00:10:02.860]are only viable for a short term,
[00:10:04.550]about three years.
[00:10:05.880]So if you can actively manage your trees for three years,
[00:10:08.940]you'll dramatically decrease the population
[00:10:11.320]and prevent some re-invasion.
[00:10:13.550]But much like our agronomic fields,
[00:10:15.430]it will be important to continually scout these range lands,
[00:10:18.580]to make sure that Eastern red cedar trees are under control
[00:10:21.550]and you've got a good integrated management approach
[00:10:24.100]in cutting down any small trees.
[00:10:26.400]It's also important to keep an eye out,
[00:10:28.250]to see if you need to plan any future burns.
[00:10:35.800]If you're interested in having a prescribed burn,
[00:10:37.900]first reach out to your local burn association.
[00:10:41.040]They've lots of knowledge and resources
[00:10:42.890]that can help you get going on a burn plan
[00:10:45.070]and start your first prescribed burns.
[00:10:49.500]With that, I'm gonna conclude this video for the day.
[00:10:51.840]Thank you so much for attending
[00:10:53.150]our West Central Water and Crops Field Day.
[00:10:55.130]If you have any questions
[00:10:56.310]about the information presented here
[00:10:58.060]or other resources,
[00:10:59.480]feel free to contact me.

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Eastern Red Cedar Tree Control

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