Readers are always interested in people's backgrounds and their career path. Your M.S. degree is in Natural Resources. Have natural resources and forest management always been interests of yours? Was there a particular event in your life (or person) that sparked your interest in the field and prompted you to study forest management? Did you grow up in Vermont?

Sarah Ford: Growing up in Vermont, I have always been passionate about the outdoors. Even as a child, I spent most of my time in the woods behind my house or friends’ houses. This was instrumental in shaping my decision to major in Environmental Science at UVM's Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources (RSENR). It was in this program that I discovered a more focused interest in forestry via working with Professor Bill Keeton on his forestry field crews for multiple field seasons. After I graduated from UVM, I followed my passion for the outdoors and adventure to the West Coast, where I spent nearly a decade living and working in South Lake Tahoe as a conservation planner for the Tahoe Resource Conservation District, managing programs in erosion control, reforestation, water quality, aquatic and terrestrial invasive species management, and education/outreach. I left the Tahoe Basin to return to Vermont and begin a master’s degree, working with Dr. Keeton and specializing in forest carbon, a continuation of the project I had worked on for many field seasons as an undergraduate. I would say that it was the combination of having great field experiences, a terrific mentor in Bill Keeton, and outstanding faculty in the UVM forestry program that shaped my research interests and career path.

You previously worked as a forester in the maple industry. Vermonters love anything related to maple, but I don't think many people think of the forest management aspect of the maple industry. What did your work in the maple industry consist of, and why is such work important to the health and continuation of the industry?  

Sarah Ford: Sugarbush management is an integral component to sustainable management of our forests and is increasingly important as we tap more trees in Vermont. The Use Value (Current Use) Program in Vermont has a special designation for Sugarbush Management, ensuring proper management of forests and allowing sugarmakers to be eligible for a tax reduction for their properties. Management requirements include things like maintaining diversity in sugarwoods to help with resiliency to pests and pathogens, limiting the number of taps per tree, ensuring the minimum diameter requirements of 9 inches for tapped trees, and removing taps proximate to the end of sugaring season. Implementing certain silvicultural practices can be really beneficial for increased sap yields and tree health. These include things like thinning suppressed and unhealthy trees in order to release or improve growth on healthier trees and ensuring that there are saplings or young trees, which will maintain the future of forests. It is estimated that some counties in Vermont are now tapping more than 50% of the maple trees. Given the fact that the sugar maple makes up 20% of our species composition in Vermont, this means there are many acres of forest that require some level of sugarbush management.

After completing a master’s degree in forestry and natural resources, I worked for Butternut Mountain Farm, one of the largest maple processors and distributors in the United States. It is family owned and run business based out of Morrisville, VT. The farm's founder, David Marvin, is a forester, and at the same time that he started Butternut Mountain Farm—nearly 50 years ago—he also started a forest consulting business to advise sugarmakers and landowners in Vermont’s Current Use Program. The business' original forester and one of their first employees, Fran Sladyk, took me under his wing and showed me the ropes as an additional on-staff consulting forester for the company. Having the opportunity to work in consulting forestry and the maple industry in Vermont for a few years with a mentor like Fran greatly influenced the direction of my career.

You are currently Chief Forestry Officer at Forest Carbon Works. Would you describe the mission of the company in general and your role in particular (for the layperson)?  Is this a big/growing industry?

Sarah Ford: Forest Carbon Works (FCW) promotes long-term conservation and forest stewardship through carbon projects, enabling landowners to earn money for the carbon offsets secured by their forests. By distilling the complex processes required for developing a carbon project into a simple membership service, we create easy carbon market access for all landowners. At FCW, we offer free pilot inventories for landowners owning as little as 40 forested acres, with project options in compliance, voluntary carbon markets, and a new afforestation program. Forest Carbon Works provides turnkey development services throughout the entire duration of a carbon project. The carbon landscape is growing extremely rapidly right now, as are options for landowners of all shapes and sizes. With this, there is a spectrum of quality in products available. My role as Chief Forestry Officer is to manage the natural resources program, which is made up of regional foresters in multiple areas of the country. I am also currently helping develop our new afforestation program. All FCW on-staff foresters provide forest management advising to our staff, landowners, and stakeholders related to our forest carbon programs. This includes everything from climate smart silviculture recommendations that integrate well with our projects to navigating forest tax program compatibility. We also do quite a bit of outreach to educate and build awareness about forest carbon, carbon markets, and the parameters of our programs. Finally, our foresters also assist with carbon inventories for our projects and lead third-party audits or verifications. The industry is growing at an incredible pace. FCW has more than doubled in size over the past year and will likely have doubled again by the end of 2024. I feel fortunate to be working in a growing industry that taps into the skills and knowledge gained in my studies. I also appreciate having diversity in my daily work and being part of an incredibly supportive team. I really don’t feel like I am even working most days.

Your advisor at UVM was Dr. Bill Keeton who is a forest ecosystem scientist.  UVM Today did a recent story about his research on European forests. The research found that "most current forest management in Europe doesn’t imitate the patterns of nature…[and] a growing number of European citizens and land managers seek to have their forests make larger contributions to carbon uptake, protecting biodiversity, and other services like water quality and flood protection. But the results of the new study reveal that only eight percent of European forests are unmanaged or managed primarily for non-timber objectives such as carbon storage, water quality, or wildlife habitat. Human disturbance is very different than natural disturbance." Would you like to comment on any of this work as it relates to the U.S. and/or your work at Forest Carbon Works?

Sarah Ford: Professor Bill Keeton is the primary reason I am working in forest carbon. His work has been making headway internationally for decades. It is pretty amazing to finally see the forestry community recognizing more widely the need for ecological forestry practices that not only store carbon but protect biodiversity and create more resilient forest ecosystems. Keeping forests as forests is the number one solution. Unfortunately, we are losing forest cover in most places. Forest Carbon Works’ program provides a diversified revenue stream for landowners to help them build legacies, maintain their forests, and assist with good management practices. Forest carbon is a forest resource that should be managed—just like the suite of other resources provided by our forests.

 It seems that we have recently (or perhaps the information is just now getting to the general public) learned a lot about the social nature of trees (e.g., The New York Times Magazine's 2020 article, "The Social Life of Forests," featuring Suzanne Simard and her work on how trees communicate). Research has shown that trees, indeed, communicate and do some pretty miraculous things (ideas heretofore dismissed). Is there a recent discovery about trees/forests that you find particularly amazing/interesting?

Sarah Ford: Suzanne Simard’s work is incredible and has very much enlightened how I walk around the forest. I am actually reading Simard's Finding the Mother Tree right now. Having spent countless hours observing the inter-relationships of our forest ecosystems, Simard’s discoveries are all amazing. They are even more amazing when one thinks about how, as a woman in forestry, she was treated for many years. That is, dismissed and underappreciated. Speaking of Simard, there is newer research about how invasive species compositions are affected by mycorrhizal networks specific to certain tree species, which can in turn affect tree species regeneration. This is really interesting since I think many would agree that invasive species are one of the biggest threats to the future of our forest ecosystems and one of the biggest challenges in forest management.