Press "Enter" to skip to content

Category: Integrative Forest Management

Life in DeadwoodLIFESPAN still

Life in Deadwood

Published April 29, 2026 by Gesche Schifferdecker

Blogpost by Gesche Schifferdecker and Andrea Barzagli

“Today, there is no longer discussion about the general value of deadwood. Now the discussion is only about how, when, and where to preserve it.”

I heard that line like a door closing on an old argument. And then, just as quickly, another door opened onto the real question: what does “keeping deadwood” actually look like in a forest that is also being managed for people?

That’s the thread running through The Life in Deadwood, the final documentary of the LIFE SPAN project – filmed across two pilot sites, the Cansiglio Forest (Italy) and the Sailershausen University Forest (Germany). Guided by Jörg Müller, professor of conservation biology and forest ecology at the University of Würzburg, the ~20‑minute film follows a quiet, ongoing “competition between humans and saproxylic organisms”.

Continue readingLife in Deadwood
Leave a Comment
Who are the women shaping the Integrate Network?

Who are the women shaping the Integrate Network?

Published March 24, 2026 by Rahel Könen

Women’s voices are not optional in forest management – they are essential for its future. By bringing women’s expertise into integrative forest management, we can unlock knowledge that better balances biodiversity, production, and social needs. When women are at the table, forest governance becomes more legitimate and democratic – reflecting the realities of all those who depend on and care for forests. 

On March 8, when the Integrate Network celebrated International Women’s Day, it featured the perspectives of women who actively shape the direction of its network through their work and leadership:

Continue readingWho are the women shaping the Integrate Network?
Leave a Comment
Five Students, One Mission: To Set-up a New Belgian Marteloscope

Five Students, One Mission: To Set-up a New Belgian Marteloscope

Published March 17, 2026 by Rahel Könen

For one semester, Simon Musin, Antoine Van Lede, Samuel Konsdorff, Louis Uytterhaegen and Tom Schriewer shared a mission: To figure out how to create a new marteloscope close to their Gembloux Agro-Bio Tech faculty in Belgium. 

But how does one set-up a 1-hectare forested, monitored, and mapped site, used to train forest managers, owners or students on the intersection of biodiversity conservation and timber production? 

Continue readingFive Students, One Mission: To Set-up a New Belgian Marteloscope
Leave a Comment
SimInForest Project – building an innovative approach to link marteloscope exercises to simulation models

SimInForest Project – building an innovative approach to link marteloscope exercises to simulation models

Published February 18, 2026 by amschuck
SimInForest Project – building an innovative approach to link marteloscope exercises to simulation models
The marteloscope Sailershausen 2.

Written by Andreas Schuck, Senior Researcher at the European Forest Institute

For forest managers, it is quite challenging to integrate multiple forest management objectives and increase forest resilience considering our uncertain climatic and socioeconomic future. Marteloscopes, field plots in which every tree has been mapped and measured, are a great tool for silviculture training addressing these management challenges. With the help of a software that runs on mobile devices (“I+” software package) we can perform virtual silviculture interventions directly in Marteloscopes and retrieve the results immediately. This way, training participants can observe the impact of their interventions on various ecosystem services and discuss their results and applied silvicultural practices. This training approach has become very popular in the past ten years and a large network of marteloscope sites has emerged across Europe and beyond.

However, so far quantitative analyses of marteloscope exercise results are limited to comparisons of the forest stand before and immediately after a single silvicultural intervention. Currently, potential stand evolution after a virtual thinning and potential management prescriptions are mainly discussed based on the expertise of marteloscope trainers and the participants but lack quantitative support. Here, SimInForest “Combining field exercises and simulations on marteloscopes to develop integrative and sustainable silviculture approaches” comes into play.

Continue readingSimInForest Project – building an innovative approach to link marteloscope exercises to simulation models
Leave a Comment
Establishing a Network of Marteloscopes in Western Ukraine

Establishing a Network of Marteloscopes in Western Ukraine

Published February 10, 2026 by amschuck

Guest article by Vasyl Lavnyy and Peter Spathelf, originally written in German and published here.

One of the central tasks of forest management is deciding when, where, and what kinds of interventions are needed in a forest. But what factors should influence those decisions? 

Participants of forestry workshops often bring very different goals, motivations, and levels of experience to this question. Because of that, it is important to ask how silvicultural interventions affect various ecosystem services and the biological diversity of the forest. Marteloscopes are particularly useful for this purpose, because they allow users to make virtual interventions and immediately discuss the outcomes while standing in the forest. 

Marteloscopes aren’t just valuable for people with a solid forestry background – they are also excellent tools for students and other groups interested in forests. 

Over the last 20 years, Prof. Vasyl Lavnyy, Professor at the Ukrainian National Forestry University, has led many field trips through Ukrainian primary forests for foreign researchers and foresters from Germany, Switzerland, and France.

Continue readingEstablishing a Network of Marteloscopes in Western Ukraine
Leave a Comment
From Clear-Cutting to Continuity: 11th Integrate Network Annual Meeting

From Clear-Cutting to Continuity: 11th Integrate Network Annual Meeting

Published January 7, 2026 by Silvester Boonen

It was a dark and murky evening as I paved my way through Harcourt Street in Dublin. That’s when I suddenly found myself in a pub – not the kind where a lad or lass would sing a folk song – but rather a cosy, wooden, meeting room turned pub, where I’d stumble across familiar forest faces. Of course, I was in the right place – the social reception of the Integrate Network Annual Meeting! Starting off with a traditional Irish dance workshop, organised by the Integrate chairs, we started our gathering with some artistic engagement and reminisced about our past meeting in Austria. Such a social reception provided fertile ground to dive into an intensive 3-day programme on “Promoting Integrative Forest Management Practices in Managed Forests through Policy, Science & Practice” – reflecting on pioneers in young forest lands and the journey of “a forest culture emerging” in Ireland!

Continue readingFrom Clear-Cutting to Continuity: 11th Integrate Network Annual Meeting
Leave a Comment
Forests Dialogues – Our guideline to genuine exchange and the path toward it

Forests Dialogues – Our guideline to genuine exchange and the path toward it

Published October 29, 2025 by Katharina Freund

How can genuine dialogue about forests succeed?

This question stood at the beginning of our project and became the starting point for our new guide “Forest Dialogues”, developed at the European Forest Institute (EFI) together with colleagues from the Forest Research Institute Baden-Württemberg (FVA).

The debate about the future of our forests is no longer purely technical. Climate change, nature conservation, timber production, and recreation – all play a part in forest management in Germany. Yet both citizens and forestry professionals often feel that their concerns are not fully understood. Foresters, as representatives of forest management, are also mediators between their profession and a society that increasingly demands participation and wants its views to be heard.

Continue readingForests Dialogues – Our guideline to genuine exchange and the path toward it
Leave a Comment
Not just trees growing here: How the Integrate Network cultivates cooperation

Not just trees growing here: How the Integrate Network cultivates cooperation

Published October 14, 2025 by Daria Kononenko

“It’s the exchange of experience in many different ways – to learn from each other, and even to build friendships,” reflects Johannes Shima, Deputy Director General of the Forest Section at Austria’s Ministry for Agriculture.

That is the promise of the Integrate Network: a place where forests become the classroom and countries learn together. It’s where policymakers, researchers and practitioners step out from behind desks, walk the same ground, and discover how integrative forest management (IFM) makes biodiversity and production work with each other.

Continue readingNot just trees growing here: How the Integrate Network cultivates cooperation
Leave a Comment