Horse Logging and Forest Health at Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller

Based on the park's notice for its November 2024 forest management operations.

Horse logging during Forest Festival 2023. NPS photo/Kyle Burton.

The Mount Tom Forest

The Mount Tom Forest at Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park in Vermont is the oldest professionally managed forest in the United States. Management began in 1869, when Frederick Billings bought the land from the Marsh family and set up an estate meant as a model of careful forest and farm stewardship. His granddaughter Mary Rockefeller and her husband, Laurance S. Rockefeller, carried on that approach and entrusted the National Park Service to continue managing the forest.

Two threats

Ash tree bark. NPS photo/Kyle Burton.

Emerald ash borer (EAB). This destructive wood-boring beetle from Asia was first found in North America in 2002 and in the park in 2023, where it is already killing ash. Its larvae feed on the cambium just under the bark, cutting off the tree's flow of water and nutrients and killing mature ash on a large scale. The first phase of the work removes ash along the main carriage roads and trails that could become a hazard to visitors and staff as they die.

Beech bark disease (BBD). It starts when beech scale insects damage the bark and the wounds are infected by at least two species of Nectria fungus. The trunk weakens and eventually breaks, but the roots survive and send up many root suckers, genetically identical new trees just as susceptible to the disease. The dense thickets of young, diseased beech crowd out other native saplings and make a monoculture. The second phase thins some mature diseased beech to encourage varied regrowth, biodiversity and climate resilience.

Why horses

The work plan was developed with Redstart Forestry of Corinth, Vermont, under the park's Forest Management Plan, and the trees are felled and hauled out by Bass Brook Farm and Forest using traditional horse logging, a sustainable method that puts forest health first. Draft horses move easily between trees and avoid much of the harm modern equipment can do, such as soil compaction, felling trees that weren't targeted, and heavy energy use.

The timing followed U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service guidance to protect the northern long-eared bat, reclassified as endangered under the Endangered Species Act in November 2022.

During logging

In 2024 the work ran on weekdays in November, mainly along Mountain Road and McKenzie Road and parts of Cemetery Road, the Precipice Trail, One Less Traveled Trail, Prosper Trail, North Slope Trail and the Pogue Loop, with trails reopened on weekends. The public could watch at a Working Woodlands horse logging demonstration. Visitors during any logging operation should:

• respect trail closures and not cross barricades;
• keep pets on a leash;
• stand on the far side of the trail when equipment is moving;
• stay off log stacks.

Sources

• National Park Service, Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park, "Annual Forest Management Operations at Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park": https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/annual-forest-management-operations-at-marsh-billings-rockefeller-national-historical-park.htm
• Vermont Invasives, emerald ash borer and beech bark disease: https://vtinvasives.org/land/emerald-ash-borer-vermont, https://vtinvasives.org/invasive/beech-bark-disease
• The NPS page's photographs credited to Eli Sagor and Tom Remp, and its uncredited beetle photograph and 2024 closure map, are not reproduced here.