The University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point’s LEAF – Wisconsin’s K-12 Forestry Education Program and the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) – Division of Forestry’s Reforestation Program have been collaborating to get Wisconsin’s School Forests more involved in tree seed collection.
LEAF and the DNR saw an opportunity to encourage tree seed collection in school forests as a way to create a fun and meaningful educational opportunity as well as a way to ramp up for the school forest program’s centennial in 2027-2028. Tree seed collected now will become the seedling stock planted in school forests in 2-3 years’ time.
The project was piloted with three school forests in the fall of 2024 – Almond-Bancroft School Forest (Phillips-Unit), Cedric A. Vig Outdoor Classroom (CAVOC) in Rhinelander, and Laona School Forest. The school forest coordinators worked with LEAF and DNR staff to plan a seed collection trip.
In Almond-Bancroft, science teacher Brenda Sherman brought her 7th-grade students out to harvest red pinecones. Twenty-six students learned about red pine reproduction and assisted in harvesting a half bushel of cones.