Recipient Organization
UNIVERSITY OF VERMONT
(N/A)
BURLINGTON,VT 05405
Performing Department
School Of Natural Resources
Non Technical Summary
The state of Vermont is responsible for half of the US production of maple syrup. Top producers in Vermont report 6-8% yearly market expansion, yet much of the state's maple resources are still, literally,untapped. Despite the importance and growth of sugaring in Vermont, relatively little is known about howmaple production practices (e.g. intensification of collection networks, encouragement of solely maplecomposition in naturally mixed stands) affect Northern Forest biodiversity, ecosystem services andresilience to ecological stressors, including climate change. To fill this gap, our project has five main goals:1) Understand how the intensity of maple sugar production affects biodiversity at stand and landscapescales;2) Assess the impact of maple production on ecosystem services;3) Understand the socioeconomicoutcomes of maple production across the landscape with respect to the scale and intensity ofmaple sugar production;4) Synthesize our understanding of the biodiversity, ecosystem services andeconomic benefits and tradeoffs across maple production landscapes in Vermont, and model a suite offuture scenarios across the Northern Forest landscape;5) Test to see if there exists a potential pricepremium for 'bird-friendly maple (an Audubon certification).In achieving these goals this project willdeliver evidence needed for the development of sound policies for the management of the NorthernForests for sugar, services and species.
Animal Health Component
80%
Research Effort Categories
Basic
10%
Applied
80%
Developmental
10%
Goals / Objectives
Our project has five mutually supportive objectives:Objective 1: Understand how the intensity of maple sugar production affects biodiversity at plot andlandscape scalesWe hypothesize that species and functional composition, richness and abundance will be affected by theintensity of maple sugar production through the pathway where intensity affects tree species compositionand vertical complexity of the understory and structure at the stand and landscape scale. We will test thisby undertaking biodiversity surveys across a gradient of maple production landscapes--from stands ofmixed composition and low intensity production (e.g. less than 500 taps) to stands of predominately sugarmaple in syrup production (e.g. 100,000 taps). This work will focus on two important indicator taxa: birdsand ants (Gardner et al. 2008, Edwards et al. 2014). We will use well established protocols (see methodsbelow), but also scope and test the use of soundscape detection techniques for birds in sugar maplelandscapes. During our first field season, we will scope the feasibility of lost-cost detection methods formammal diversity on the landscape. The goal will be to more directly link management techniques withmammalian species of concern in the Northern Forest (e.g. Woodland vole, American martin).Alternatively this work may take a modeling approach utilizing existing data. The approach will bediscussed at the inception meeting of the project if the proposal is successful.Objective 2: Assess the impact of maple production on biophysical ecosystem services delivered byworking forest landscapesWe hypothesize that the intensity of maple production will impact the delivery of ecosystem servicesheterogeneously across working forest landscapes. We will focus on two main areas of ecosystem serviceprovision 1) Carbon sequestration and storage and 2) Ecosystem resistance and resilience to invasivespecies, pest pathogens and extreme climatic events. Carbon storage and sequestration, in addition tothe ecological roles they play in forest ecosystems, are two functions of forests that have direct impacton human welfare in their roles in climate change mitigation. Additionally, the ability of forest ecosystemsto resist invasive species and be resilient to pest and pathogen outbreaks and extreme climatic eventshave direct impacts on the long-term economic viability of working forest landscapes. We will test ourhypothesis by undertaking forest inventories across the same gradient of maple production intensitiesmeasuring forest composition), invasive species occurrence and density, and indicators of vulnerability toinvasion.Objective 3: Understand the socio-economic outcomes (including cultural ecosystem services) of mapleproduction across the landscape with respect to the scale and intensity of maple sugar productionWe hypothesize that more intensive maple production practices will deliver greater net financial returnsper unit area than less intense production practices, but those gains may come at a cost to biodiversityand ecosystem services delivery. We will conduct a financial analysis to see how the net benefits varyacross management practices given the current financial state of the sugarbush owners. This gives us anadditional equity lens since some producers will not have the same access to capital (e.g. a LapierreHyperbrix evaporator) as others, and therefore productivity gains may represent a net benefit for someproducers and a net cost for others. This will also allow us to look at the socio-economic barriers to largescaleproduction, which likely require access to levels of capital that could leave many of Vermont'sproducers behind and therefore exacerbate existing inequalities across producers from differenteconomic strata. We will test our hypothesis through a series of surveys, interviews and secondary dataanalyses (e.g. census data and grand lists) triangulating the net private and social returns to differentproduction practices and 'who' has the means to undertake such practices. Finally, we will collect data(both qualitative and quantitative) to better understand how stewardship and heritage values play a rolein sugar bush management. This information on cultural ecosystem services and relational values canshed light on the social feasibility of alternative management approaches.Objective 4: Modelling biodiversity, ecosystem service and economics tradeoffs across the NorthernForest landscapeWe will use a spatial modeling environment to take statistical models developed in Objectives 1-3 andextrapolate these models across the Northern Forest. The primary goal is to estimate the biodiversity,ecosystem service and financial values across the region with respect to maple production. We will alsoidentify areas of concern for species of concern and areas of opportunity for maple production. We willthen develop a series of scenarios (e.g. maximum production - where private forest ownership is overlaidwith sugar maple viability) to deliver potential social costs and benefits for the region over the next several decades depending on the climatic, social and policy conditions that could affect maple production. Thesescenarios will be generated in partnership with collaborators and maple producers throughout the project.Objective 5: Evaluating if bird-friendly maple tastes better and can return a price premiumWe will use a field experiment to test whether certified bird friendly maple syrup tastes better that noncertifiedsyrup and if consumers are willing to pay a premium for bird friendly maple syrup. Participantswill take part in a free maple syrup tasting, score the flavor of certified versus non-certified bird friendlymaple, and then have the opportunity to purchase the maple syrup. We will have blind and opentreatments, control for ordering effects, and elicit a bounded willingness-to-pay premium (see Bateman,Fisher et al. 2010). The results of such an experiment can help to inform VMSMA and individual producersabout two phenomena: (1) whether consumers report (imagined or real) differential flavor profiles givendifferent production techniques, and (2) whether consumers are willing to pay more for biodiversityfriendlytechniques, whether or not they perceive a flavor improvement. The results of this experimentmay inform producers desire to engage in such certification programs and market their products as such.
Project Methods
Methods - Site SelectionThe location of the work detailed above in Objectives 1-3 will be carried out across a gradient of sugarbushes and forested landscapes across the state of Vermont. Several sites and sugar bushes have beenused in our previous McIntire-Stennis work and our continued collaborations with implementationpartners will be key in selecting additional sites. Our aim is to identify at least 30 to 40 sites across themajor maple sugar producing areas in Vermont. We will stratify via our conceptualization of 'intensity',which will be defined in collaboration with our partners at an inception workshop. Objective 4 will consistof a spatial modeling exercise across the Northeast to better understand how synergies and tradeoffsamong biodiversity, ecosystem services and financial returns to sugaring could play out across theNorthern Forest landscape in the coming years. Objective 5 will occur on the campus of the University ofVermont.Methods and Analyses - BiodiversityAnt sampling - In each of the sampling sites, we will arrange a 30 ?? 30 m (900 m2) sampling grid with 161-m2 sample plots arrayed in a 4 ?? 4 grid with 10-m spacing. For each 1-m2 sampling plot, we will estimatelocal habitat heterogeneity by assessing litter depth (to the O Horizon) in 5 randomly placed locations toestimate litter depth. Then, within each 1-m2 quadrat, we will use standard and efficient tools for samplingand quantifying ant diversity (e.g., as in Sanders et al. 2007). We will then dry and weigh the litter fromeach of the 1-m2 quadrats to estimate the amount of leaflitter available for ants. We will estimate thermalniches by quantifying ground and soil temperatures in each of the 1-m2 sample plots.Bird Diversity - We will use a modified version of the unlimited distance point count, developed by Blondelet al. 1970 and modified by Ralph et al. 1995. Point counts will be conducted in the early morning, startingpre-dawn, in calm and clear weather conditions. At each point count station will use a single observersurvey for 10 minutes (breaking the survey up into 3, 2, and 5 minute intervals for potential comparisonwith other studies). Counts will be conducted at 250 m intervals along transects with randomized startingpoints at each site. The number of transects will be a function of the size of the sugar bush andsurrounding forest matrix. Surveys will be carried out in years 1 and 2 of the project.Soundscape detection - Across the gradient of sugar bush sites we will deploy bioacoustic recorders(Frontier Labs) to record and explore variations in forest soundscapes. Forest recordings will be made atdawn and after twilight. These recordings will be used to generate an acoustical complexity index andcompared with our traditional biodiversity survey data. Such systems have been used to indicate speciesrichness in agroforestry systems (Bobryk et al. 2015), and tropical systems along gradients of loggingintensities (Burivalova et al. 2018), as well as indicate differences in landscape conditions (Fuller et al2015). We will be testing this technology to see if it offers a low-cost opportunity to survey biodiversityacross active sugarbushes.Methods and Analyses - Biophysical Ecosystems ServicesCarbon Storage, Sequestration and Resilience/Resistance - Within each study area, we will establish 4-6,400 m2 forest sampling plots for quantifying forest structural, compositional, and functional conditionsacross each sugarbush. Plots will be systematically arrayed through representative portions of each studyarea to avoid edge conditions. Within each 400-m2 plot we will measure all living and standing deadoverstory trees > 10 cm diameter at breast height (DBH; 1.3 m), sapling tree species and downed coarsewoody material (CWM; > 7.6cm diameter at the large end and > 1 m in length). Biomass of living and deadtrees, as well as CWM will be calculated using standard carbon protocols for estimating living and deadaboveground biomass. Functional resilience of each study area will be examined using by determiningthe relative abundance and diversity of tree species as well functional groups within each plot and studyarea. Functional traits, including drought tolerance, specific gravity, and maximum height, will be derivedfrom Paquette & Messier (2011) and other sources, when necessary.Plant sampling - Similarly, in each of the plots/sites, we will arrange a similar grid of 16 additional 1-m2plots arrayed in a 4 ?? 4 grid with 10-m spacing to quantify plant diversity. In each of the plots, plants willbe identified and enumerated, both early in the season to quantify early spring ephemerals, and later inthe season to identify those with delay leaf. Plant sampling will be key in identifying the prevalence ofinvasive or exotic species. Finally, for all analyses, site will be the unit of replication, and all samplingdescribed above will occur at each site. Such a design is conducive to analyzing data in a variety of ways,whether via Structural Equation Models or Generalized Linear Models across the intensification gradient.Methods and Analyses - Socio-Economic AnalysesWe will conduct a series of surveys and interviews with maple producers across our landscapes to helpquantify management and production costs, net returns to sugaring, future prospects and impedimentsto production expansion, and cultural ecosystem services associated with sugaring. We already have hadcontact with 153 members of the VMSMA to seed this work. We will develop a sampling frame at theproject inception meeting to stratify our sugarbushes by characteristics likely to affect our outcomes (e.g.size of property, stand composition, property value, elevation). These characteristics are available fromcurrent use management plans, DEM shapefiles, grandlists etc. Sugarbushes will then be randomlyselected from within these strata and owners will be contacted either through our partners at VMSMA orAudubon Vermont. We will use in-person household surveys to collect specific management and financialdata (n>200 or 20% of all VMSMA members, including the sugarbushes where our ecological data will becollected). We will create a statistical model of productivity and financial returns using a suite of socialand biophysical variables from this work. We will conduct at least 30 in-depth, semi-structured interviewswith sugar makers who operate across a range of production intensities to better understand theopportunities and constraints for increased maple production, to characterize stewardship and heritagevalues, and to help generate possible future scenarios for Objective 4.Methods and Analyses - Taste and Willingness to Pay ExperimentWe will conduct a field experiment at the University of Vermont with the aim to examine if taste and pricepremiums exist for bird-friendly maple syrup versus syrup that has not been certified by AudubonVermont. We will set up a tasting station prior to the winter holidays allowing students to taste and ratemaple syrup. Students will either be treated with a single syrup and asked to score it, or given a side byside comparison. Students will be able to buy the syrup and bring home for the holidays. Certified andnon-certified syrup will be priced differentially. Using a GLM and controlling for predictors (e.g. gender,age) we will test to see certification impacts taste scores and syrup purchases (and therefore pricepremium). A pilot phase will inform us of 1) sample size needed 2) how to vary (or not) price premium 3)if there is a baseline perceived (or real) difference in the taste profiles of the syrups used.