Summer logging threatens our wildlife
Switzerland already has very high percentages of threatened species. Half our 240 natural habitat types and more than a third of our plant, animal, fungi and lichen species are under threat. One in 20 species is critically endangered and teetering on the brink of extinction, ready to join the 242 species that have already been lost.
Against this backdrop, certain cantons have started logging in summer, at the very time when birds are nesting and mammals are raising young.
Tree-nesting birds and bats are particularly vulnerable to summer logging, including many endangered species. Vogelwarte (used to) recommend to stop logging between April to August to protect nesting birds, while the canton of Vaud warns that logging from May to August must be strictly avoided to protect bats whose young cannot fly.
But not all cantons and not all foresters are listening.
They didn’t listen in the Nidauberg Wald on the slopes of the Jura in the canton of Bern where a silvicultural intervention took place over three weeks in June across 10 hectares (ha), reducing tree density from 350 m3/ha to 20 m3/ha in some places. The damage to the soil was extensive and the remaining trees are now much more vulnerable to extreme weather events such as storms and heatwaves. Some trees have already snapped or fallen. At least 70% (1,330 m3) of the extracted trees were burnt whole as energy wood.
Research clearly shows that forest management that emphasises timber production is a major driver of biodiversity loss. And summer logging doesn’t just destroy nests, eggs and fledgling birds or bats, it also disturbs the adults causing them to change their behaviour. Studies in Finland have shown average bird densities of 16 pairs/hectare in deciduous forests and 12 pairs/hectare in spruce forests.
In other words, this single intervention could potentially have affected over 150 pairs of birds.
Yet none of the cantonal officials nor the nature organisations we contacted wanted to expose the practice, let alone condemn it.
On the contrary, the logging was described as “sustainable” by cantonal foresters and officials as well as by a member of the Green Party. Both local and well-known mainstream nature organisations also refused to condemn the intervention, some even described it as “pleasing” because it benefitted “light loving species”. The most surreal comment came from a reptile expert who declared that while it was not a reptile habitat, the increased light and heat would certainly benefit reptiles.
While many foresters do still refrain from logging in summer, others claim there are no laws to prevent trees from being cut down all year round. This is simply not true. (add link to the law section when it is done).
But the increasingly large and expensive forest machinery needs to be amortised and so, like planes, they must be permanently used in order to recoup the initial investment. You can bet that logging will increase, as will summer logging.
Summer logging is all to do with profitability. All other excuses are greenwash.
The question remains however. Why are cantons allowing the practice and why are the mainstream nature organisations not objecting to it more strongly?
February 2024