Collins Pine

For the winter break, I went to Chester in California with my family and family friends Leslie & Mike. This post is about one of my favourite experiences there.

Leslie is one of one of the best people I know, always extremely enthousiastic and full of great ideas. Knowing I’m majoring in Natural Resources Conservation and that I’ve had some experience with forestry, she was super pro-active to get us a tour of the Collins Pine forest operation, based in Chester. We toured the some of the private forests and the mill with the Forest Manager, and I was very impressed with what I saw.

In the US, forestry is done somewhat differently than in Canada. In both Canada and the US, the East side is where more of the private land is found due to the initial colonizer settlements, but overall in the States has a higher proportion of private land than Canada. In California, for instance, about 50% is private whereas in BC only about 5% of forestland is private (Vancouver Island is an exception, it’s like 23% private). Half of the Californian private forests is owned by smallholders (usually each owns about 70 ha) and the other half by companies such as Collins Pine.

The Collins Company is a private family company operating in California, Oregon and Pennsylvania. It was the first company in North America to become FSC-certified back in 1994. It has no publicly traded stocks, so I think this is what drives the sustainability of the operation – things go beyond the short-term profitability needed to make the quarterly statements look good. The land in this part of California was bought in the early 1900s and logging started in 1941. Currently the Collins Almanor Forest (CAF) is abut 94 000 ha with only 10 permanent staff (Forest Manager, RPFs and wildlife biologist) and about 100 mill workers (and logging is done by contractors).

They practice uneven aged management, which is very different to what I had seen in BC (with clearcutting of old growth) or in Chile (with intensive plantation management of non-native species). For this type of management, the maximum area that can be completely cleared is about 1 ha whereas for even aged management the clearcut sizes are 8 – 12ha (versus 40 ha in BC’s coast and 60 in the interior!) In Oregon the maximum is about 50 ha, in Pennsylvania about 260 ha (so a huuuge range of maximums…) The Collins Pine land is intermixed with another company, Sierra Pacific, which is SFI certified and practices even aged management, so we also got a chance to drive through a couple blocks that were completely cleared.

Uneven aged forest management

The Collins private land was also mixed with National forest (public land, which in the States is mostly under federal jurisdiction), and there was a stark difference between the two. Due to decades of fire suppression in the National forests, there is currently a very high level of accumulated fuel that will make any upcoming fire very severe and intense. These National forests are not at all like the natural forests, where early settlers could drive their carts through. Nowadays it is hard even to walk through: tree density is extremely high, trees have a lot of branches and there are many dead and dying trees everywhere. The forest is thinning itself out, but with the potential of fire it is a disaster waiting to happen (like the recent and devastating Moonlight Fire in the area). Even if fire is part of the natural disturbance regime, Collins does not use fire in its management practices. Instead, they use selective logging and biofuel harvest to thin the forest and get rid of excess biomass.

National forest with tons of fuel accumulation

Thinned demonstration private forest

With selective logging, about 30% of the trees in a stand are taken every 15 years or so, creating a multicohort forest with a variety of species, ages and sizes. There is a lot of natural regeneration and good wildlife habitat with all the seed trees, snags and downed wood left behind. There are five main species being harvested here: ponderosa pine (similar to the very common Jeffrey pine), white fir, Douglas fir, incense cedar and sugar pine. Usually the trees that are not doing so well are the ones that are logged. For example, the priority is to harvest white fir, an abundant species that is very susceptible to insects, diseases and climate change. All the species are harvested at the same time, but the mill has periods of a couple weeks where a single species is processed. Then the mill is cleaned and another species goes in. The interesting thing is that the mill is made to adapt to the different sizes of logs coming in for processing, they don’t all have to be the same age.


The biofuel harvesting is something I thought was very cool. The smaller trees and all the branches and slash from harves are used for bioenergy production in the 12 MW plant that completely powers the whole operation (the mill, the office, etc.) In fact, only half is used for this and the extra half is sold to PGE. Something else I though very interesting where the permanent plots that are scattered throughout the forest. There are 566 of these plots and every year about 10% of these are visited and measured to calculate the growth of the trees and determine the amount of wood that can be cut each year. Plots are about 1 acre (0.4 ha) and all the trees 28 cm in diameter are individually tagged and measured at DBH every 10 years (the “DBH” is quite subjective so these trees have a line marked around so that they are measured on the same spot every year). To avoid bias, these plots are not treated any differently than the surrounding forest, and trees inside the plot are managed and harvested as normal. There is a downed wood inventory too, as well as regen surveys on temporary plots (pretty much what I spent my Vancouver Island summer doing) that were started about 15 years ago.

Wood chips for energy production. They also collect forest waste from people (kind of like a dumping ground)

Not all of the company's forest is FSC certified. To avoid having dual inventories, they can mix the wood (so that it is 50% FSC and 50% non-FSC) as long as only half is sold with the FSC logo.

 

The main product of Collins is softwood lumber, which goes to the US and to China. There is no pulp production because all the pulp mills in California closed. 

AND NOW... HAVE YOU EVER WONDERED HOW PENCILS ARE MADE?

They make the incense cedar slabs here, send them to China where the pencils are made (no pencil factories in California), and then these pencils (and eyeliners) are sold in Europe.

Blood In The Mobile

Yesterday I went with some friends to watch an acclaimed Vancouver International Film Festival (VIFF) documentary from 2010, "Blood in the mobile", directed by Frank Piasecki Poulsen. The documentary exposed the many horrors of the civil wars in Democratic Republic of Congo being financed by the electronics industry through the trade of minerals used for mobile phones and computers. It brought a huge human-rights problem to the attention of many unsuspecting users worldwide, however the movie itself was lacking and not very powerful as far as documentaries go. There was great potential, considering how much work is being done about this issue all over the world, but this film failed to meet the expectations.

Poulsen travels all over the world trying to talk to Nokia people (he focuses on this one company, as it is one of the largest. He usually got to talk to those who didn't make decisions); going to the illegal Bisie mine in Kivu, DRC, where the mineral casserite is obtained under extremely poor safety conditions; talking to various experts in mineral tracking and conflict minerals; and including politicians working towards having conflict minerals become illegal in the US. The questions he asked the interviewees often lacked the depth required to sound like he had done the appropriate research about conflict minerals beforheand. It seemed he just wanted to get the movie done and get the footage he needed for it, and although yes, the footage he got from inside the mine was very interesting and a great journalistic achievement, it was extremely irresponsible for him to take that boy, Chance, down with him to tour him around, especially considering all the negative reactions as the boy helped the 'white man'. Who knows what happened to Chance after he left?

It was saddening to see that although large companies have been aware about these issues for more than a decade, not much has been achieved in solving this massive problem, and I hope having this movie out there will speed up things. Of course, it all comes down to consumers and what WE demand. The Raise Hope For Congo website contains information about the terrible war going on far, far away, but so, so close at the same time, surrounding us, under my fingers as I'm typing this, and everyday as I use my phone. It explains what consumers can do about the problem, and it's a good resource to start off with if you want to become more informed about the place where people live under extreme conditions resembling slavery, where children stay inside mines for days due to the difficulty of going down. Down these poorly-built mines that collapse and kill people every day. Deaths that finance an inhumane war that leads to even more deaths. And suffering that cannot be explained through words.

Food post

Three really exciting things are happening this term too! And they are all related. So I'm part now of The Veggie Club, Common Energy's Food Subgroup, and The LFS Orchard Garden. WHAAAT are these things?? The Veggie Club and Common Energy are both UBC clubs, and they both deal with food and sustainability, and the Orchard Garden is a garden two minutes away from my place and Forestry (behind LFS building) where I volunteer every week. A really cool project is in the working, involving these three. Speaking of the Garden, I absolutely love it! When I started at UBC I was like, yeah I want to volunteer at the Farm! Well, guess what, the Farm is SO far away!! It's quite unrealistic for me to fit a Farm trip in my schedule. SOOO the Orchard Garden is the PERFECT solution! It's a joint-management thing between the Faculties of LFS, Education and Landscape Architecture. They grow many many delicious things, and most of the produce is sold to Agora, the LFS Café.

So far, I've harvested onions and zucchini, and we are clearing the beds to plant cover crops for the winter. Last week we composted lettuce which was flowering and was therefore very bitter, and we could take it home if we wanted to. It was too bitter for me, but they looked spectacular - well rounded, fresh, giant. A girl working with me ate lettuce like a rabbit, as she worked. This week I took home the zucchini flowers and made zucchini flower and cheese quesadillas. I have a pepper plant at home (Pepe the Pepper, and Knickers has Pancho The Pepper) and eating the peppers from there is amazing, I just go to the living room and get a pepper from Pepe, and in exchange I only have to water him, clean him and love him. I think it's a good deal, so I decided my goal for when I have my own place is to have a garden with lettuce, tomatoes, carrots, potatoes and everything else! Taking care of the garden would definitely require work, but it is so relaxing, rewarding and connected with nature.

Zucchini and flower in LFS Orchard Garden

 Chilli peppers from Pepe The Pepper - he makes (on average) six of these every week

Dreams

TODAY I will start my Notebook of Dreams. That is a a Notebook that will always be next to my bed and I'll write my dreams as soon as I wake up. I think it's time to start it (another project that has been postponed for YEARS), as I have been having very vivid dreams in the last few days, whereas before I used to dream black. Just black. Or I wouldn't remember anything at all.

The other day I was talking about "waking up" in dreams, or realizing that you are dreaming, so that you can just do whatever you want in your dream. That had never happened to me before, but it did last night. I think because I had this idea in the back of my mind and it occurred to me to wonder if I was dreaming or not. I tried to float and I could (the little test analogous to the thing that turns and turns and never falls in Inception), so I decided I was definitely dreaming. From then on it was great fun, I could really do anything and also create things... I'll try it again tonight. In either case I feel very ignorant in this whole dream business, but I find it very appealing and want to learn more. Same with hypnosis.

Shopping Stories

SHOPPING WITH MOM

Today a typical shopping incident occurred, which has been happening for as long as my sister and I can recall. When my mom likes something in a store, she HAS to buy it for us. This is how a typical conversation goes:

- Look Carolina/Olivia, this sweater/pair of shoes/blouse is so classy and nice.
- Hmm I don’t know, I don’t like it that much...
- Well, how can you say that if you haven’t tried it, huh? Try it on!
- No Mom, it’s just not my style, I don’t want to…
- Come on, won’t you do your mother this small little favour? It’ll take only two minutes. Just to see what it looks like!
- Mmm okay Mom, but I don’t want it…
- No, just to see what it looks like [pushes us into the dressing room]
[We try it on, and it looks bad]
- See Mom, it doesn’t fit, I look fat and the colours are horrible.
- Wow, what a lady! It looks SO good! But SO SO good…You can’t imagine how good you look, really.
- Well, I’d rather not.
- It would go amazingly well with your black pants. It makes you slimmer. Ok, we’ll take it! It’s only half price!
- MOM, I will NEVER use this, I don’t want it!
- You will one day.
- Mom, it will stay in the closet forever and no one will ever wear it, I don’t like it!!
- Well, if you don’t wear it, I will.
- Mom you always say that, it’s not even your size.
- Well, your sister can use it then.
- Mom, pleaseeee...
- Try it at home, and if you don't like it we can always return it.

[We buy the sweater/pair of shoes/blouse]

THE END

Epilogue: The sweater/pair of shoes/blouse follows one of two fates: a) collects dust in the closet because it really is ugly, or b) we have a revelation and finally see what our mom saw in the first place, so we wear it (“I told you so, Carolina/Olivia”).



SHOPPING WITH MY SISTER

The other day we went to this nice little shop of underwear and swimsuits here in Cremona, one of the typical shops on the main pedestrian street. The owner is an old lady with bleached blond hair and a tan (the characteristic tan of old ladies that can’t hold their sun exposure). My sister got some stuff and this is what happened:

- Great, this will suit you very well. So yes, it’ll be 30 Euros…Great, sign here... here is your receipt… my copy, and here is your card back.
- Thank you.
- AND, before you go, let me give you this nice little booklet with the upcoming fall collection, so that you have a look [takes booklet from a pile and places in bag]
- Mmmm… When exactly will the new collection arrive?
- [Looking surprised at the question] I believe around September…
- Hmm yeah well, we’re not here in September, so you can take the booklet back.



SHOPPING WITH DAD

Last Christmas we were in Vancouver and after Boxing Day found sales and discounts on top of sales and discounts. While we usually drag my dad to the mall and shop while he reads one of his papers at the nearest café, this time he came into United Colors of Benetton and found a hat that costed about $1.68 dollars. This was the price on the sticker at the top of a pile of stickers of ascending prices. Basically the first sticker said ~$40, so my dad was SO proud of this purchase and he went around telling everyone what a deal his one dollar hat was. It’s a really cute hat!

The Coolest iPhone Apps

I became obsessed with two things during exam period (great, just great): How I Met Your Mother (what up) and iPhone applications... Most of them are free so there was nothing standing between them and me... Here is a list of my favourite apps:

To procrastinate & just for fun

STUMBLEUPON

Discover the best of the web, recommended just for you! You can find the coolest things online using this app. It's great when you have nothing to do and you just want to browse the web to find interesting things.

IDAFT

You can play around to make your own combinations of that voice saying things like call it, find it, unlock it, technologic, update it, print it, rename it.

EMOJI

After you download this, you can go to Settings> General> Keyboard> International Keyboard> Add New Keyboard and then you can add emojis in your texts anywhere in your iPhone to better express your emotions with elephants and flowers! No one will see them unless they have an iPhone, though. It's kind of annoying when people overuse them. Very annoying.

MOUTH OFF

You get a bunch of monster mouths to choose from, and then you put the iPhone in front of your mouth and speak. The mouths move, it's very funny.

MOLECULES

For those science geeks! This app lets you move molecules around, really good for visualizing abstract chemistry concept.s

SITUATIONIST
I got this because it's from the creators of This book will change your life, a super fun book that cracks me up. It's to create extremely uncomfortable situations between two people that have this app. You get Push notifications when another person with Situationist is around you, and you get the picture they uploaded of themselves so that you can recognize them. You also get a message with instructions of what to do. They include stuff like "Wave at me like a long-lost friend", "Ask me for my autograph", and "Help me rouse everyone around us into revolutionary fervour and storm the nearest TV station".

YEARBOOK YOURSELF
There are tons of apps for pasting your face on different bodies. This is just one I really like.

To communicate

WHATSAPP

Allows you to message other iPhone AND Blackberry users that have WhatsApp installed. You can send pictures and a map with your location which is pretty cool! It's pretty popular, especially among iPhone users, but it costs $1 so not everyone has it. You need an internet connection to use it.

VIBER

This one is a free app and you can message and CALL other Viber users for free. 

FACEBOOK

You can set the settings to get Push notifications every time you get a FB notification. Great for uploading pictures on the move.

SKYPE

Skype is the new MSN Messenger. And the new telephone. So having it as an app is very useful to communicate with everyone on the go. You can make calls with Wi-fi and with 3G as well.

To do stuff with pictures

PHOTOTROPEDELIC

This app is to create cartoon-like pictures with stars and nice colours. There are tons of settings you can change to get the pictures exactly as you want them. Here is a picture of the original and the Photo Tropedelic version.

DYNAMIC LIGHT

This app is great for making your pictures more powerful, especially really dark pictures. Especially good for landscapes and pictures of clouds, but not to be used for people. Below is a before and after set of pics.

TINY PLANETS

This app is fantastic. It's to turn landscapes into tiny planets! The first example below is not great but I love the colours. The second is four different tiny planets merged together into a piece called Acceleration.

THUMBA

This is pretty simple, but just to make corrections like saturation, exposure and brightness. Useful to edit pictures here before using other apps.

PANORAMA

One of my favourite apps! It's to make panoramic pictures. You take up to five pictures one and then Panorama merges them together.

360

This one is for taking panoramic pictures too. It's not like Panorama where you take a bunch of pictures, but instead you just move the camera around really slowly, like a video, and the app creates the picture.

PERCOLATOR
For converting your pictures into dot images! Below if a picture of a fruit stand with a girl eating a watermelon in the background.

DIPTIC
With this app you can create different compositions with your pictures. You need to pay for it, and there is another app that does the same for free but I forget what it is called...

COLOR EFFECTS
I love this free app! You can make pictures into B&W and colour only the sections you want, either with the original colour or different colours. All of this using your fingers. The only problem I've had is that images loose quality.

PHOTO DAILY

Nice filters.

CAMERA BAG

Many interesting filters to apply to your pictures.

LIVEFX
This app is for effects similar to the PhotoBooth effects of Macs. You need to take the pictures directly with this app though.

PHOTOMESS
Allows you to create collages with your pictures. On a "cork" background.

PHOTOHYPE
For rotating and straightening pictures. Really simple app but useful for those annoyingly crooked pictures.

TILT SHIFT GEN
For focusing on particular areas in a picture and making the rest blurry. You can get some really really nice shots with this. The only problem is that with the free version you need to take the pictures directly with the app.

To share your life

INSTAGRAM

I had never heard of Instragram, but this is not just a normal app. When I got it, it was like opening a door to this close-knit community of IGers. They are super intense about the whole thing, and there are even IG meet-ups and stuff like that. You basically upload pictures and you can use many cool filters, and then people like your pictures and leave comments (with an over use of emojis). You can follow people and people can follow you to get your pictures on their feeds (my name is ladylaser, if you want to check out my feed). If you get a lot of likes for the number of followers you have in a short period of time, you make it to the Popular page. And then more people see you pictures and follow you. That's the ultimate goal most IGers have, to make it to the Popular page. I had this really cool experience where this lady loved one of my pictures of a cherry blossom and she made a painting of the photo! You should totally get this app, at least for the filters, or to make friends too.

TWITTER

I've recently discovered Twitter and that's thanks to this app, which makes it super easy to follow people or organizations you're interested in.

QIK VIDEO

You can video chat and share videos with friends that have Qik. You need to record the videos directly from the app though, and to upload from Camera Roll you need to get the paid version.

FLICKIT

If you use Flickr for your pictures, you probably know how annoying the Flickr app is. This one makes picture uploading super easy!

TUMBLR
Great for posting and reblogging on the go to your Tumblr blog! I use this blog mostly for reblogging pictures, but this app is great especially if you post your own pictures.

To listen to music

TUNE IN RADIO

AMAZING radio app, allows you to listen to pretty much every radio station in the world. I've tried tons of radio apps and this one is by far the best. You get all the stations, the program names, and you can even re-listen to the songs.

REMOTE

With this app, you can control your iTunes without leaving the couch! You need an internet connection. I've never actually had a situation where I was listening to music without being right next to my computer, but hey if that ever happened I would have this app to control the music.

SHAZAM

This is to solve that annoying situation when you hear the best song ever but you're never able to find out what that song was. You record part of the song for like five seconds and then Shazam tells you which song it is. You need internet (but you can also record and then save for when you have internet) and the free version allows you to identify five songs a month.

DEEZER

Used to be my favourite website to listen to music online (until they changed it and put restrictions on the songs you could listen to), but Deezer radio is awesome for discovering new music!

RANDOMRADIO

It shows you random radios from around the world. I used to really like it, but you need to pay for it so if you want a free radio just get Tune In Radio.

LADIDA

This is a really fun app for creating songs! You record yourself singing and then pick a beat and a style and the app creates a song modifying your voice and changing the tones so that you sound better. 

SNOWTAPE
This is for recording songs off the radio. You just hit record and then you can go back and listen to them as many times as you want.

To be productive 

DROPBOX

I love Dropbox. Dropbox is like having an online USB. Get an account using this link (then you'll get 2GB of space PLUS 250MB because I invited you!) and then download Dropbox to your computer. It just becomes like any other folder where you can store stuff, except for the fact that you can access that folder wherever you are using you Dropbox account. The Dropbox app allows you to access it too and look at your pictures, PDFs and other documents. I have a shared folder with my sister and I just upload the pics from my iPhone and she can get them from the folder.

CAMSCANNER

This saved my life when I had to send class notes. My scanner was super annoying and the contrast between the words and the page just sucked, especially if you used blue pen. Camscanner is great, you just take a picture of your notes and the app does magic with the contrast! Really nice. You can email it out as pictures or PDFs super easily too.

IBOOK
I love free stuff, and man there are so many free books you can get here! It's a bit hard with an iPhone because of the scree size, but while I get an iPad (yep, so I made up my mind. In Singapore I will get an iPad, seeing as to how I didn't succeed in winning one) the iPhone does a good job.

BUMP
Allows you to share information with other iPhones when you bump them together!

AUTOCAD WS
Great for architecture students and for anyone interested in experimenting with a simpler version of the computer Autocad.

APZILLA
The free version has 16 apps, including Clinometer, Dice and Passwords. If you upgrade you get 100+ apps.

GOOGLE

Quick access to all the Google apps, including Picasa, Gmail, Google Docs, Google Earth, Google Maps and Translate.

To find your way

NEARME

You need internet to use this, but it's really useful for finding places near you. I used it a lot in Vancouver.

VEGMAN
Allows you to find veggie restaurants near you! In Vancouver you get TONS. In Chile, not so much.. The closest one I found was 1,342 km away in Buenos Aires, Argentina.


UBC

For UBC community and future students! We get our own app fully equipped with event information, useful phone numbers to have, and a great option to find locations on Campus! Future students can watch videos, pictures and get more info... from here.

GEOCACHING
So I've never actually used this, but I LOVE the concept! Geocaching is a high-tech treasure hunt where players search for hidden objects, called geocaches, left there by other players. I saw there is a treasure 2.8 km away from where I am so I'll go look for it next week-end.

In order to use my phone abroad, I went to this place to get it jailbroken. The Apple warranty is void for jailbroken phones, but as you update the OS iPhone version the jailbreak disappears. So I am good as long as I don't drop it in the toilet again or do something to it that won't allow me to connect it to my Mac to erase the traces of jailbrokenness. I just changed the theme, but I hear I could potentially downloading I don't know how many other apps that are not in the App Store...