On the north side of the road along Highway #16 in the Wynyard area, field after field has a row or two of shelterbelts. With the Big Quill Lake serving as a back drop, the trees add some interest to a seemingly level landscape.
On one field belonging to Sherry and Jerry Pytlyk, a mature caragana belt runs east and west on the south side of the field. The trees in that belt were planted about 1952. Their age and location were of interest to researchers from the PFRA Shelterbelt Centre studying biomass production and the amount of carbon sequestered by trees and shrubs. While the Pytlyks are interested in the amount of carbon their trees are storing, they see the trees providing many more tangible benefits.
In a time when there is still some bush clearing occurring, I asked the Pytlyks why they bothered to maintain the old field shelterbelts. Sherry explained, "This land is butted up to the Big Quill Lake. When Dad bought this land in the 40's, he saw how the wind from the lake blew and blew and took the soil with it. He wanted to stop that erosion." The trees did their job. The problem of the soil blowing in to the ditch was reduced. And the other benefits the trees provided back then are still useful to Jerry and Sherry today. Sherry said, "While the trees keep the wind down they also protect our cattle, especially in the summer. And they reserve moisture. It seems the moisture leeches out from the trees throughout most of the summer".
When I asked the Pytlyks if the field shelterbelts created any problems for them, Sherry said, "When the break off, they're a nuisance to clean up, but generally they're trouble-free. People who don't get wind from a lake can't appreciate the value of field shelterbelts. We like farming our own soil so the trees will stay!"
For Sherry's brother, John Burns, the trees do present more of a problem. "The mature belts, especially those with maples in them become very wide (about 35 feet) so they trap a lot of snow and make weed control along their edges rather difficult". While the snow trapping was desirable in the days of conventional tillage and summerfallow, it is less desirable since the Burns' have moved to continuous cropping and direct seeding. John explained how the changes in tillage systems and crop rotations affect the need for trees. "Once you have the stubble covering your field, drifting soil becomes less of a concern. The extra run-off created by the snow trapped in the trees can actually have a negative effect on seeding. One spring when there was ample soil moisture, I couldn't get any closer than 100 feet from the edge of the trees to seed. I then had to go back later in the spring to seed the area around the trees."
While the Burns have not yet opted to remove any of their field shelterbelts, John has several recommendations for anyone planning to plant some trees and for shelterbelt researchers. "It seems that trees that are 10 feet high do a good job of controlling ground drifting yet they don't spread out too wide. For that reason, I feel villosa lilac is a good choice for a field shelterbelt. And because green ash doesn't spread out very much, it works well, too. Mature belts can have a nuisance value especially if they're allowed to grow too tall or too wide".
In the days of the Save Our Soils program in the early 1990's, the District # 20 ADD Board brought in a piece of equipment designed to trim mature trees. The unit was demonstrated on some of the belts in the area and it worked well. John said, "While the equipment was very effective in trimming branches and chopping them, it was a very expensive operation. Finding a way to maintain mature belts that is easy and inexpensive should be a goal of the researchers". John fears that if such research is not conducted, we're in danger of the losing the trees.
Shelterbelts are good for the soil, good for the environment and good for humanity. Establishing and maintaining field shelterbelts is time-consuming and often difficult. Farmers who bother with field shelterbelts deserve to be commended.