Photo By Scott Sturkol | Logs are shown in piles on April 16, 2025, on South Post at Fort McCoy, Wis. The logs...... read more read more
Subscribe
Fort McCoy’s Forestry Office continued to manage a significant effort during April 2025 with many activities designed to improve Fort McCoy’s thousands of acres of forest land.
During the month, forestry and related work was coordinated by Forester Charles Mentzel and Forestry Technician Tim Parry who both work within the Fort McCoy Directorate of Public Works Environmental Division Natural Resources Branch.
As part of their monthly work, they share work completed with the personnel supporting the Monroe County (Wis.) Natural Resources Committee. Some of those completed work items include:
— The Forestry team administered six timber sales during April.
“We typically have six to nine timber sales a year, or about 600 acres worth,” Mentzel said. “Some get cut the following year.”
Timber sales are administered by the Omaha District of the Army Corps of Engineers and are sold by sealed bid, said Mentzel.
The timber harvest activities also support Fort McCoy’s strategic objective of enhancing the post’s military training value through improved area utilization and land use initiatives, Mentzel said.
— The Forestry team also collected $30,936.00 in revenue for timber sale payments during April. Timber sale bidding is held once each year, typically in December, Mentzel said. Revenue from the timber sales goes into an Armywide forestry account and is returned to fund forestry projects on Fort McCoy.
— Work on an environmental review request for fiscal year 2027 timber sale possibilities were also completed. And maintaining the environment after a timber sale is important, Mentzel said.
When a timber harvest is complete, a Land Rehabilitation and Maintenance (LRAM) crew will use a severe-duty shredder to grind the tree tops and branches left over from logging (called slash) and knock down the smaller trees the logger did not take, in areas where the military needs clear ground or to reduce fire hazard.
The LRAM crew is part of the Directorate of Plans, Training, Mobilization and Security Integrated Training Area Maintenance program, which coordinates natural resource management and training activities.
— In preparation for an April 25 tree planting event, Forestry staff pruned roots for 500 trees to be planted on the cantonment area.
The 500 trees planted April 25 were the major replanting effort for 2025. In 2024, Parry said the post planted 5,000 trees — 500 on the cantonment area and 4,500 in Training Area B-05 on Fort McCoy’s South Post.
Mentzel also noted that the Department of the Army is the steward of the land and the natural resources at Fort McCoy, which are being held in trust for the American people. Trees are one of the most important natural resources contained on Fort McCoy, either singularly, in groups, or forests. These trees benefit Fort McCoy by providing quality training, watershed protection, wood products, food and shelter for wildlife, outdoor recreation opportunities, clean air, noise buffers, and beautification.
— During April, Mentzel said the Forestry team, who is part of the Fort McCoy prescribed burn team, completed prescribed burns that covered 1,133 acres and was done in three different days in five units.
Forestry personnel have long managed the prescribed burn program at Fort McCoy and each year their work helps prepare training areas for safe use.
— Forestry members also announced that firewood areas were closed, however special collection firewood piles were opened for people to get firewood. New maps were created to direct firewood permit holders to the locations of the firewood available.
Learn more about how Fort McCoy’s forestry program helps improve training capabilities and helps create healthy forests by visiting https://www.dvidshub.net/news/493260/fort-mccoy-timber-harvest-improves-training-capabilities-environment-training.
Learn more about Fort McCoy online at https://home.army.mil/mccoy, on Facebook by searching “ftmccoy,” on Flickr at https://www.flickr.com/photos/fortmccoywi, and on X (formerly Twitter) by searching “usagmccoy.”
Also try downloading the My Army Post app to your smartphone and set “Fort McCoy” or another installation as your preferred base. Fort McCoy is also part of Army’s Installation Management Command where “We Are The Army’s Home.”
| Date Taken: | 05.13.2025 |
| Date Posted: | 05.13.2025 13:20 |
| Story ID: | 497834 |
| Location: | FORT MCCOY, WISCONSIN, US |
| Web Views: | 119 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, Fort McCoy Forestry continues managing logging, tree planting efforts across post during April 2025, by Scott Sturkol, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
No keywords found.
