Dispatch of about 6.2 million pine seedlings is under way at the Forestry Corporation of NSW’s Tumut Nursery near Blowering Dam. Source: Timberbiz
“We have produced an excellent crop this year and aim to dispatch about 6.2 million seedlings from around eight million seedlings cells grown on benches at the nursery,” Forestry Corporation Nursery Operations manager Mark Stretch said.
“The nursery team comprising four full-time staff and 25 casuals started dispatching the seedlings last week and we hope to finish by the end of August,” he said.
“This work involves loading trays of containerised seedlings into transport pods and onto frames ready to be loaded onto trucks and dispatched across the State.
“The Pinus radiata seedlings are being sent to the corporation’s main pine growing regions around Tumut, Bathurst and the Monaro.”
Stretch said all the seedlings in the state-of-the-art nursery, for the second year in a row, have been grown in containers on raised beds.
“The move away from establishing pine seedlings in the ground has facilitated the production of a more robust plant that can be transported and transplanted with minimal disturbance to the root system,” he said.
“The watering requirements of the containerised crop are much less than those of an ‘in ground’ crop, due to the efficiencies gained by travelling irrigators that keep the plants watered in the new production facility.”
He said the seedlings produced last year were widely reported as some of the best to ever come out of the Tumut Nursery – meeting the high quality specifications demanded by the forest-establishment teams.
“Initial surveys of the areas planted last year are showing an excellent rate of survival in the field, which is very satisfying for the nursery team,” he said.
“Some fine tuning of the fertiliser regime has helped to improve early root development, so this year’s crop should be even better than last years.
“I am very proud of our nursery staff who have produced another great crop of seedlings to replace the trees that are being harvested this year.”
