TREASURE Forest annual banquet set for Dec. 6 at Palisades Park

Palisades Park is the best-known example of a TREASURE Forest in Blount County. The designation certifies that natural resources are being managed according to best practices for multiple uses, providing benefits to both present and future generations. The Blount County TREASURE Forest Association will hold its annual banquet at Dalton Moss Lodge in Palisades Park on Dec. 1 at 6 p.m., according to association vice president Doug Smith. Featured speaker will be Tim Albritton, state forester for the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), who will will discuss his experience selling carbon credits on his personal forest land property.

Smith said that the December banquet is open to the public and will include a catered meal as well as the educational program. There is no charge for the banquet or for membership in the organization.

The TREASURE Forest Assocation is an organization of about 130 Blount County members including landowners and forest industry representatives – consultants, forest product manufacturers, forest service companies, and state and federal agency representatives. All share an interest and involvement in planned natural resouce management. The acronym itself stands for Timber, Recreation, Environment, and Aestetics for Sustained, Usable REsource.

“We have a collection of world-class resources here in Blount County, and we’d like to invite all landowners to participate in these programs to use and sustain those resources,” Smith said. “This is not just resource preservation. It’s resource use in as many ways as possible while sustaining the resource for future generations,” he said.

“We would like to expand our membership, and word of mouth and mentoring are two of our basic approaches. We also work to present factual and timely information on multiple-use resource management practices on private property at our quarterly meetings.”

Natural resource planning and management focuses on five categories of improvement: timber production, wildlife habitat, recreation, environmental education, and esthetics.

A formal forest program involves planning and implementing management practices to achieve two specific goals with the property, one primary and one secondary. The goals are selected from a variety of possibilities within each of the five categories above.

Once goals are chosen, a multiple-use management plan is developed, then practiced according to prescribed standards. At some point after the plan has been worked over time, the property may be nominated for a TREASURE Forest Certification Award, subject to an inspection by a forester and wildlife biologist, and approval by the Alabama Forestry Planning Committee. There are currently 11 certified TREASURE Forest properties in Blount County, along with many more at some stage of management within the program. The most familiar TREASURE Forest award is the one held by Palisades Park.

“We have something to offer every landowner,” Smith said. “This is especially true as new markets develop – for example, the new market for biomass to produce alternative fuel.”

Smith said an important element in the organization’s program is a grant it sponsors through the Blount County Education Foundation. For the last two years, a $1000 grant has been awarded to the teacher who submitted the most comprehensive lesson plan based on natural resource education.

A motto printed without attribution on a copy of the organization’s banquet program from last year neatly captures its ethos: “We don’t inherit land from our fathers – we borrow it from our children.”