NNRG SEPTEMBER FIRESIDE CHAT | SEPTEMBER 20, 2023| 7:30-8:30PM

This month’s Fireside Chat focused on assisted migration: the human-assisted movement of species in response to climate change. Assisted migration is a climate-adaptation strategy increasingly being employed in the Pacific Northwest as land managers decide what to plant.

Matt Distler, Conservation Program Manager at Oxbow Farm & Conservation Center, introduced the ideas and science behind assisted migration, then discussed the ethical considerations of assisted migration in the Pacific Northwest in the context of ecological forestry, followed by a Q&A session.

Matt Distler is Conservation Program Manager at Oxbow Farm & Conservation Center, a non-profit focused on research, practice, and education around issues of sustainable land use and conservation. Matt holds a doctorate in ecology from SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry, and his research and restoration work over the past 20 years have encompassed invasion biology, Holocene paleoecology, wetland science, land management, and wetland, forest, and riparian restoration. Currently, his work focuses on wetland and riparian restoration and wildlife monitoring on working lands in western Washington.

Oxbow Farm and Conservation Center is the site of a fascinating assisted migration project that aims to restore a portion of streambank along the Snoqualmie River.

Links mentioned during the chat:
Oxbow Farm and Conservation Center: https://www.oxbow.org/

Forest Adaptation Network: https://www.nnrg.org/climateadaptatio...

Seedlot Selection Tool: https://seedlotselectiontool.org/sst/

About Fireside Chats:
On the third Wednesday of every month, we invite you to join NNRG Director of Forestry Kirk Hanson, others from NNRG’s forestry team, and fellow forest landowners and land stewards to discuss forest management topics, share information and resources relevant to those topics, and connect with others face some of the same challenges and opportunities as you in stewarding their lands.