Representatives from nature conservation organisations, LIFE+ projects, state forest enterprises and forest associations (communal and private forest owners) situated in North Rhine Westphalia visited the Marteloscope Jägerhäuschen. The Marteloscope is located in the Kottenforst area at the Regional Forest District Office Rhein-Sieg-Erft just outside the City of Bonn. The participants were divided into two groups (nature conservation and forest manager group) and performed an exercise on two separate days (13th and 14th of November 2017). Andreas Schuck (EFI-Resilience Programme) and Frank Krumm (WSL) introduced the Marteloscope as a training tool and how it can be used for performing virtual selection exercises. They explained jointly with the head of the Regional Forest District Office Rhein-Sieg-Erft, Uwe Schölmerich the exercise which reflected operational management targets for this forest type in Kottenforst. The participants of each group were divided into teams of two for exercise implementation. Each team was asked to present their decisions supported by revisiting specific trees in the Marteloscope. The exercises were accompanied by social scientists from the WSL and the University of Freiburg who aim at investigating decision making processes in tree selection.
The two groups were pleased with the exercises. They emphasized that such type of field training using mobile software that immediately displaying results allows for objective fact based discussions. The user friendliness of the software was highlighted and the option of running it in the native language. It was acknowledged that there are many ways to apply the tools also for other educational purposes (e.g. silvicultural training programs) and target groups including the general public. Both the nature conservation and the forest manager group independently proposed to follow up with a joint Marteloscope exercise in the near future.
