Blog By: STEVE WILENT, Forester
SFI Director, Sustainability Communications
Steve.Wilent@forests.org
As a forester and skilled writer, Steve’s expertise brings important perspective to SFI’s communications team. Before joining SFI, Steve was the editor and publisher of Natural Resources Management Today. He was also the editor of The Forestry Source, a publication of the Society of American Foresters, for more than 16 years.
If you live in British Columbia, you’ve very likely heard about mountain pine beetle, or MPB. An outbreak of the insect starting in the late 1990s killed so many lodgepole pine trees that the forest-products industry in interior B.C. was devastated.
Autumn, my favorite season, is almost here. Tomorrow, Thursday, September 22, 2022, marks the autumnal equinox—the start of fall in the Northern Hemisphere. Aside from the cooler fall weather, I and many other people love to see the fall colors in the forests, including urban forests, across the US and Canada.
Rayon was invented in the mid-1800s and was manufactured as a fabric in the US starting in 1911. It was called “artificial silk” until 1924, when the name rayon was adopted. Today, rayon is often used to make clothing.
Mention old-growth forests and most people think of giant sequoias in California, centuries-old Douglas firs and western red cedars in British Columbia, red pines in Ontario, or massive live oaks in the Southern US.
A recent Twitter post by EcoWatch stated that “A new study has found an alarming loss in forest areas.” That led me to an EcoWatch article, “Global Forest Area Declined by 60% Since 1960, Study Finds.”