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Hi, René Thank you for your time. Tyler Thank you, Tyler, for your letter. I have asked our Chief Forester
at J.D. Irving, Limited to answer your questions. His reply is below.
René At J.D. Irving, Limited we feel that through the present Crown License system our forests that we manage under Crown License already are the real "Community Forests". I say this because our management programs and the thousands of jobs our management provides are built around the local communities where we operate. Our workforce is made up of local people who do harvesting, silviculture or related work - and commute daily from nearby local communities. While there are 6 licensees, there almost 100 mills across the province that also rely on our sustainable management of the forest. Together, they represent many thousands of New Brunswickers. Our forest management plans and activities cover much more than just timber production:
We are trying to work with and be responsive to the needs and desires of the communities nearby where we work:
We are proud of our support for our local communities. Blake Brunsdon. Chief Forester Dear, Rene Can you tell me how many trails there are in the saint-john nature park? Dale Wilson Dear Dale There are a total of seven (7) trails at the Irving Nature Park, with a combined distance of over 13 km. Please visit our website www.ifdn.com and look under the Nature Parks section. A virtual visit of the park can be accessed under the FEATURE # 5 section. Thanks for your interest in our park. Kelly Honeyman Dear René, We are two French students who are researching a project on the chemical processes of papermaking. We must make our presentation on this research at the end of this school term. Could you give us the steps in papermaking stressing particularly the chemistry of the processes? We need to know the kinds of reacations that are produced and also their importance in the whole process. Thank you for your help. Sophie and Linda Dear students, You may be surprised that the most common form of newsprint uses almost no chemicals at all. In the newsprint process woodchips which are a by-product of the lumber manufacturing process in sawmills are separated into their individual papermaking fibres mechanically. This is done in large machines called refiners which are driven by large electric motors. The wood fibres are then pumped to the paper machine at 99 parts water to one part fibre where they are extruded on a rapidly moving wire and then dried. The fibres are held together by hydrogen bonding which can occur as the water droplets evaporate. During evaporation the fibres are brought into close enough proximity to actually form a molecular bond. As paper quality increases bleaching chemicals are used to increase the paper's whiteness. For advertising type papers, this process can be as simple as using hydrogen peroxide and/or hydrosulphite to increase whiteness. Catalogue type papers use kraft pulp in addition to the mechanical pulp. Kraft pulp is made by cooking the woodchips in large vessels called digestors using a combination of sodium hydroxide and sodium sulfate. After cooking, the papermaking fibres are brown (these are the same type of brown papermaking fibres that go into paperbags). To make the paper fibres white they are bleached using a combination of chemicals in a sequence that uses oxygen, sodium hydroxide, chlorine dioxide and hydrogen peroxide (in the old days mills used chlorine gas in the first stage of bleaching). The chemical reactions are similar for both the pulping and bleaching process. In wood there are four main types of chemicals: cellulose, hemi-cellulose, lignin and extractives. The cellulose provides the main structure of the papermaking fibre. The lignin and the hemi-celluloses act as bonding agents to hold the fibres together to form wood. The extractives are the residual "sugars" and colored material that is interspersed inside and throughout the fibres. The sodium hydroxide and the sodium sulfate break down the lignin and hemi-celluloses in a series of very complicated reactions that dissolve the lignin and liberate the cellulose fibres. The oxygen, sodium hydroxide, ad chlorine dioxide in the bleaching reactions remove the residual lignin that is still attached to the cellulose fibres. These reactions are also quite complicated. If you are interested in even more detail on the chemical reactions used in papermaking you may wish to refer to textbooks that have been written on kraft pulping and bleaching. As the papermaking process evolves, chemistry is becoming increasingly more sophisticated as we understand new ways to increase fibre yield from wood and increase the efficiency of the chemical recovery processes. René Dear René, How can woodpeckers bang into trees and not get a headache? David Dear David The Downy Woodpecker, in addition to having a very stong skull, also has air pockets within his head that cushion the repeated blows. Good question! René Message from Maureen to René Hi, I am doing an experiment involving consumer science for my school. (I'm in 8th grade) I am testing different brands of tissues. However, before I can perform any experiment, I have to research the products. I understand that you manufacture, package and distribute Scotties tissues. I was wondering if you could tell me the ingrediants in the tissues and how they are manufactured so I can put this in my lab report. Thank you for taking your time to read my email. ~A concerned student Hi Maureen, I hope you give a full report on the Majesta information, though. It's a fully made-in-New Brunswick product There is a toll free Majesta line as well, 1-888-962-5378. Good luck with your project! René Dear René, I have to do a school project, and I was wondering approx. how many pieces of standard notebook-sized paper can be produced from one tree? Thanks, Rebecca Dear Rebecca, Your question - a very popular one - is not as simple as it seems. It's very difficult to calculate this figure since the fibre for paper comes from so many different sources. You could do an interesting project on the different materials that can be used to make a sheet of paper. The quality and appearance of a sheet of paper can vary enormously depending on the fibre in that sheet. Even if only wood fibre is used, there still are questions about what specie of tree, what size of tree, etc.. So, we no longer try to give an answer to the question, "how many sheets of paper can come from one tree?". We do want you to know that for every tree we harvest, we look after ensuring that five more will grow to maturity. By the end of this summer our company J.D. Irving, Limited will have planted 500 million trees since we began our planting program in 1958. Trees are a truly renewable resource. Your friend, René Dear René, How many trees do you plant and cut each year on average? Jillian Dear Jillian In 1998, Irving Woodlands planted over 18,000,000 trees on our private land and approximately 15,000,000 trees on our leased lands for a total of 32 million trees. The types of trees we plant are as follows:
Each of the above species is planted in a site specific to where
it would naturally grow best (ie, white pine in sandy well drained
areas, and black spruce in poorly drained "wet" areas,
to mimic "Mother Nature"). René, I would like to know if you make paper without using trees? Thanks, Anne No, Anne, the companies of J.D. Irving, Limited do not make paper with fiber other than that of trees. Wood fibre is a renewable resource. We manage our forests so that we replace every tree we cut with five others, either planted or tended so that they will grow to maturity. I hope that you care for trees, too. René Yo René! I have been searching for a log scale and all I can find is
a Dear Bill, In New Brunswick, logs can be scaled a number of ways. Logs can be scaled in units of cubic meters or board feet. If the logs are to be measured in cubic meters, there are two tables that apply: New Brunswick Softwood Cubic Metre Log Scale For board foot measurements, New Brunswick has developed its own
log rule: Copies of the tables and the procedures for their application can be obtained from the New Brunswick Department of Natural Resources and Energy, PO Box 6000, Fredericton, NB E3B 5H1 Walter Emrich, Wood Measurements & Woodlands Information Audit Co-ordinator, J.D. Irving, Limited Hi my name is Sarah and I am working on a school project. I have chosen to do my report on fir trees, especially douglas fir can you tell me where i can find information and pictures. thank you very much The following publications should help you out in your quest for information on the Douglas Fir and other fir trees. I hope you are not going out to look for a Douglas Fir as the nearest naturally growing specimen is in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains (Alberta). In order of preference: "Trees In Canada" - John Laird Farrar (1995) "Native Trees Of Canada"- R. C. Hosie (1979) "Balsam Fir- A Monographic Review"- E.V. Bakuzis and
H.L.Hansen (1965) "Peterson Field Guides - Trees & Shrubs" - George
A. Petrides Good sites online: http://www.ifdn.com Go to the "Irving Nature Parks" section and look under Naturalist notebook for the January 1994 issue on balsam fir. You may also find the balsam fir in the Teachers Resource Guide within your school's Irving Forest Discovery Box (probably in your library). The guide has an identification key (Transparency) in the back of this binder. http://www.for.gov.bc.ca/hfd/library/documents/TREEBOOK/ Kelly Honeyman - Naturalist, J. D. Irving, Limited (Woodlands) Why do some balsam firs have MUCH more fragrance than others? Does it have to do with the age of the tree, or how much cold weather the tree has been exposed to, or what? I have asked this question of many but still haven't found an answer. I grew up in Chatham, N.B. and our trees always were very heavily scented. We cut them from the wild in those days and I remember that they had tons and tons of sap. Could it have been New Brunswick's cold weather? I live in Halifax now and it's much milder than Chatham. Help me out if you can. Thanks! Cathy Dear Cathy, After consulting with two tree physiologists and a great deal of head scratching, we submit the following response: If we are talking about the fragrance of cut trees (ie Christmas trees), then the date of the cut is most important. The fresher the cut, the more heavily scented it will be. Perhaps in the Miramichi, your trees were cut a little closer to Christmas than the ones you receive in Halifax? Trees dry out fairly rapidly, especially when placed indoors. In a matter of 2 weeks, the moisture level of a fir decreases from 115% (super sataurated) to 20% moisture. Temperature differences between Halifax and Chatham should not be a large factor in the smell of the fir. The aromatic scent from the sap comes from a substance called oleoresin which is found between the bark and the cambium layer forming blisters. A consensus of opinions indicates that there seems to be more of these blisters on healthy, vigorous trees. As an aside, this substance plays a part in detering insect pests. You may also be interested in the fact that the fragrance of the needles is due to the high percentage of essential oils in the needles of the balsam fir. These percentages (1-1.4%) are the highest amongst the local conifers. Other trees:
Another fact you may be interested in is that the sap from the balsam fir was once collected (by syringes into the blisters) with the resin used to mount miroscopic slides. Today, synthetic resins are used. The Algonquin tribe used the resin as part of a poultrice for burns. I hope this has answered your question. Kelly Honeyman - Naturalist, J. D. Irving, Limited (Woodlands) [ Next ] |