Where Did The Trees Go?

On the challenges of monitoring seedling survival

A couple weeks ago I found myself assigned to the role of professional photographer as my team and I navigated through the eastern and northern provinces of Rwanda. The office crew was meeting up with our field leads to test a monitoring procedure. The monitoring strategy aims to capture tree seedling survival rates of different reforestation strategies. We had progressed far enough in the development of the strategy to field test our work. This particular visit to the field was not directly related to my project but provided key insight into the reforestation projects IUCN is supporting in Rwanda and gave me some indication of the monitoring challenges faced by the field staff internal and external to IUCN.

Though Rwanda is relatively small even compared to Wisconsin (Rwanda is 26,338 km² compared to Wisconsin’s 169,639 km²), the condition of roads makes driving across the country somewhat slow. Outside of the capital city of Kigali, paved roads are not too common and most roads have pot holes that put Wisconsin’s post-winter potholes to shame – we’re talking deep enough to lose your Schnauzer in. Yet the progression of road construction is impressive and can be seen at various stages all over the country. And the countryside is absolutely stunning. There are lakes and streams scattered amongst the rolling hills and brightly colored buildings.

Our driver and all around amazing office assistant, Japhet, jumped out of the car to help clear the road after a truck, which was hauling dirt, got stuck.

One field lead, Donatha, works in the Eastern province and the other field lead, Jean Pierre, works in the western province. Both have been implementing reforestation programs which begin with the development of local tree nurseries. From there, the trees are distributed to a variety of actors including farmers, schools, and community groups. For the botanical nerds out there, I’ve included a list of the five tree species distributed by IUCN supported nurseries – though the main tree being planted (by far) is eucalyptus.

Tree species: Eucalyptus spp., Grevillea robusta, Alnus acuminata, Markhamia lutea, and Polyscias fulva.

Cabbage and corn crop interplanted with Grevillea robusta

Here’s the basic description of the program. Right before the tree seedlings are ready for planting, the IUCN field staff does a little old school PR, spreading the word to community leaders and previous program participants. Then if all goes well, the seedlings are ready for distribution prior to the rainy season in September/October. Then farmers, school headmasters, and other landholders come to distribution sites to pick up the seedlings and receive a quick training on where, how, and why to plant trees on their property. For example, a farmer in a valley may want to plant trees in a way that will protect their crops from strong winds while farmers on a hillside may want to plant trees in a pattern that helps prevent erosion and landslides. IUCN then records the number of seedlings each person takes as well as some basic information about the farmer.

Sometimes communities or a small group of actors come together to participate in a woodlot/agroforestry program. Essentially this method contracts out tree planting and care of the trees to community members in exchange for the ability to use the rest of the land for crop planting. IUCN gives these groups specific planting instructions and in return, the community members are encouraged to farm the land around the planted trees. This not only results in planted trees but also ensures that weeds are abated and that someone local is caring for the plot. A few years down the road, these intercropping systems are then often transitioned to woodlots when the canopy becomes too thick for sunlight to pass to the understory.

Some problems with this system are that some of the community farmers aren’t always as methodical or meticulous at implementing the tree planting plans as desired by IUCN and it’s partners. For example, the plans may say that the trees should be planted at 2.5 meters apart but are actually planted 4 or more meters apart, despite having the resources necessary to accurately space the trees. There’s some speculation that the farmers may do this to allow more space for crops or simply because they have to plant far fewer trees with this method.

Additionally, based on what we observed in a few intercropping lots, it seems like all of the holes were dug but not all of them were actually planted with a tree seedling, though we weren’t totally sure what the story was. In the field while reviewing these lots, we were faced with a lot of potentially unanswerable questions. Were the holes dug empty because the seedling died? Did a seedling ever make it into the ground? Were there enough seedlings distributed to the lot? Did they die due to dry conditions? These unknown factors were actually the main challenge and theme to this field visit – it’s very difficult to know the seedling survival rate if you don’t know how many seedlings were actually planted or what happened to them. And often the community members responsible for the lot’s care weren’t forthcoming about the issues or problems they faced. One of my coworkers mentioned to me that recording this information was indeed part of the planting and program methodology yet, monitoring progress and recording information like this isn’t necessarily standard in Rwandan culture.

In other instances, seedlings went directly to farmers to be planted on their farms. Farmers participate in this program for a variety of reasons. Many farmers want to plant more trees to prevent erosion on the steep hills. Some farmers plant trees to have a windbreak. In the valleys strong winds threaten to flatten whole fields of corn.

Other farmers see how the lack of trees is impacting the natural world. On this farmer’s property there is only one tree that the birds nest in, though I’m not sure if in this case the birds were colonial nesters or if the birds were truly nesting together because it was one of the only trees next to the river which ran through the valley. In either case, the birds certainly seemed crammed onto this rather small and stressed tree.

A farmer directing the planting additional tree seedlings near the stream to stabilize it’s banks

Surveying a farmer’s land is even more challenging than surveying community intercropping lots because farmers usually have small lots but they may plant the trees anywhere on their property. IUCN advises erosion control patterns on terraces or property border planting. However, in practice, people basically plant the trees in every imaginable configuration. And when you don’t have the time or resources to count every individual tree on someone’s property and the trees aren’t planted in any consistent way, it’s hard to devise a quick and efficient methodology which applies to all situations. The challenge is compounded when the farmers themselves don’t remember where exactly they planted the tree seedlings.

What makes this more challenging is that although IUCN knows how many seedlings they gave to a farmer, most farmers give away excess seedlings to their friends and neighbors. Furthermore, those neighbors give some seedlings away as well. But records of these transactions are informal. So once again, no one is sure of the survival rate because we’re not sure how many seedlings each farmer planted. From a conservation standpoint, it’s generally good that more people are participating in the program. Yet it still needs to be recognized that these additional farmers and landowners may not receive the same information about planting techniques, tree care, etc that the original farmer received. And even if a more formal process were devised to somehow pass on that information or capture data about farmers who received seedlings from their neighbors, it would have to account for varied literacy rates, lack of access to resources like cell phones or paper, which may be used to pass on information or report these transactions.

Our team recorded these challenges and took them back to the office to devise potential improvements to the methodology and solutions to some of the more pressing problems. Though in the end, the team must accept certain levels of uncertainty given the various challenges to monitoring.

Despite the tenuous ability to monitor survival rates, the program is clearly making massive progress. The photo below shows one project site that Donatha and the IUCN team have been working on. The reforested land can be seen on the left and the untouched land on the right. The tree line extends far into the distance, covering many miles of land.