The New England Forestry Foundation is giving out grants to loggers to defer cutting late-successional and old-growth forests.
NAPLES, Maine — The New England Forestry Foundation (NEFF) is giving out grants to landowners to help preserve some of Maine’s oldest trees.
The organization got $4.3 million from the U.S. Forest Service in 2024 to pay loggers to put off cutting late-successional and old-growth forests, which are typically over 100 years old.
The first grant was awarded to Chaplin Logging Inc. in Naples to conserve 23 acres of late-successional forest and improve other parts of their land.
This type of forest is rare for southern Maine. The one on the Chaplins’ property has been mostly untouched for likely more than a hundred years.
According to Brian Milakovsky, senior forester of NEFF, these trees provide a unique habitat for many important species and they’re good for the atmosphere.
“These store and actually still even sequester remarkable amounts of carbon, and so it can be a really big and important part of a strategy to mitigate climate change,” he said.
Caleb Chaplin is one of the owners of Chaplin Logging Inc. The company was started by his grandfather. He said last fall they were considering cutting their late-succession forest. But then he heard that NEFF was giving out grants to protect these trees.
Now, they will remain untouched for the next ten years—deferring harvesting to give them more time to consider long-term conservation options.
“It just makes every piece of the land we have different, that is, having a diverse forest was a big thing for us, and having an economical way of doing that,” Chaplin explained.
Since these trees are being taken out of production, part of the grant is going toward timber stand improvement, removing undesirable trees in landowners’ other, younger forests.
“That way we’re getting more high-quality timber growing faster on another part of their property,” Milakovsky said.
Chaplin said it’s been helpful. “That was really the selling point for us.”
The grants from NEFF can help improve landowners’ harvests and keep old trees standing for longer without loggers taking financial hits.
“So we can work and have it better for the next generation,” Chaplin said.
The New England Forestry Foundation has a few other contracts signed with landowners.
Milakovsky said they’re still planning to give out several more grants. Their goal is to protect a diverse range of old forests across the state.