Karen Batten (Forest Manager at F&W Forestry UK) is one of two candidates selected for the Young Professional Foresters’ Exchange Programme 2026 and is spending three months working for the Forestry Corporation of New South Wales. Karen has shared a halfway update on her experience on the exchange programme.
My first month with the Forestry Corporation of New South Wales (FCNSW) has been jam-packed. I spent the first week in Coffs Harbour with the hardwoods division, which specialises in growing eucalyptus for timber, before flying down south to Tumut and exploring their softwood operations. Everyone has been so generous with their time and knowledge, and I hope to convey even a snippet of the interesting work that they undertake in this blog.
The subtropical climate at Coffs Harbour makes it one of the most productive areas in Australia for producing timber. The figures for a 10- to 13-year-old improved seed stand of blackbutt Eucalyptus pilularis are staggering: a mean annual increment (MAI) of 28 m3/ha/year and a maximum top height of 36m (the top height measurement for the 10-year-old stand was 34.1m!) These stands have exceptional growth rates because they were sourced from improved stock. For comparison, spotted gum Corymbia maculata from an unimproved seed source had a MAI of 9. As well as plantation forestry, the hardwoods division utilise selective coupe felling systems to harvest timber in native state forest. These areas are then left to regenerate naturally. The planning team, with which I’ll be working, collates all the data from rigorous surveys for ecology, cultural heritage and timber resource to create an operational plan for harvesting. It’s a turbulent time for the hardwoods division because of the planned removal of 176,000ha of FCNSW’s productive estate to establish a Great Koala National Park.
The opportunity arose for me to spend three weeks in Tumut, which would see me adjust to a much colder climate and a completely different type of forestry. The focus in this region is softwood production, specifically growing radiata pine Pinus radiata across 95,000ha on a 30-year rotation clearfell system. I was surprised to learn they restock at 1,000 trees/ha, a significant difference from the 2,500 trees/ha that are planted in UK softwood plantations, but it was soon apparent that this is because water is a limiting factor to tree growth. The problems associated with stocking at a low density are overcome through improved tree genetics to reduce branching and a thorough herbicide programme to control weeds. It was with the silviculture team that I spent my three weeks producing post-planting aerial spraying plans. I was really impressed with the streamlined process for creating plans; constraints, compartment data and map formats were pre-loaded onto GIS, which users could access through a server. As a new user, I found this made making operational plans so much easier because there was nothing I needed to set up: all the information was already there.
It wasn’t long after my arrival that I was informed about the 2019/20 fires, collectively called the “black summer”. Over 37,000ha of state owned softwood plantation was fire affected, of which, 15,500ha was older than 12 years old. That figure is important, as anything over 12 years old was considered salvageable and a big operation followed which saw on average 2.2million m3 of timber extracted per year (output before the fire was 1.5million m3/year). The scale of the devastation was incomprehensible, and on one site visit we drove 30 minutes without leaving the footprint of the fire. Of the multiple challenges which followed, restocking was a pertinent one; I joined the team as they were managing the restocking of 3,250ha for this season, down from 6,000ha in previous years. Trials were underway to explore the viability of alternative methods for restocking, and I was lucky enough to visit a mechanical planter in action. Built on an excavator, the machine can travel ground that hasn’t been prepped and shows potential for reducing establishment costs. However, it’s not the fastest operation and couldn’t completely replace manual tree planting. Alongside this were the trials to restructure wildlings, a term used for natural regeneration. Because much of the pine which burnt was of seed producing age, there were large areas which saw wildlings spring up in densities of around 10,000 stems/ha. Reducing this density to 1,000 stems/ha had been approached in a variety of ways to see which method would be most effective but also economically viable. Some methods used an excavator to mulch 4-5m wide racks into the stand and then applied more selective thinning methods between the racks, whilst others (admittedly on flatter ground) used a skid steer with a 2m wide mulching head to mechanically recreate the spacing desired. It’s not anticipated that there will be one method which fits every scenario, but it’s hoped that by developing new methods to restock softwood plantations, FCNSW will be better prepared to respond to future wildfires.
If I had to pick the biggest takeaway from my first month with FCNSW, it would be how data collection is utilised across the organisation. During tree planting, for example, field staff collect data on the quality of tree planting which is used to leverage rates and ensure delivery is consistent across large areas. FCNSW have developed this method to quantitively assess quality and calculate an overall quality score out of 100%. Being exposed to this and other data collection techniques has broadened my understanding of the possibilities to move beyond observations and adopt similar approaches to support management decisions. I want to sincerely thank my colleagues and hosts at both the Coffs Harbour and Tumut offices who have shown me around and shared their knowledge so readily. Whilst I’ve learnt so much already, I’m thrilled that my time in Australia isn’t over yet and I look forward to delving deeper into the hardwood operations in the northern region of NSW.
