H&H provides various silvicultural services as part of its ongoing long-term management of client lands as well as turn-key to individual landowners, forest industry, government agencies and other resource professionals. Our services are fully qualified under all state and federal cost-share programs including Virginia RT, EQUIP, WHIP and SPBB. If you are seeking specific silvicultural services, we encourage you to review the information below and contact an H&H forester to discuss your project. |
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ReforestationH&H administers an annual tree planting contract on its clients’ land. This contract typically includes 1,000 to 5,000 acres across multiple ownerships. |
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Herbicide Applications
Many landowners and foresters alike will take a cook book approach to herbicide prescriptions. This most often leads to either wasted money, poor performance or a combination of the two. When chosen correctly, selective and broad spectrum herbicides can be used in many ways to achieve different competition control objectives, from bare ground conditions for intensive site preparation to selective brush control in understory and wildlife habitat applications. When it comes to prescriptions, don’t use a cook book, trust a professional. We evaluate the vegetation complex on your site and match it with a prescription to fit your goals and budget. |
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Prescribed BurningPrescribed fire is the oldest and potentially the most widely used management tool in forestry, dating back to pre-Columbus America. The benefits to wildlife and timber alike are innumerable and include increased nutrient availability, soil aeration, native seed scarification, improved browse and fuel reduction. H&H foresters are Certified Prescribed Burn Managers and provide understory and field burning services for timber and wildlife management. Site prep burning is provided on a limited basis. H&H has more than 2 decades of combined burning experience for private landowners and the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries. |
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Food Plots and Warm Season Grass RestorationWildlife food plots have become a main stay in modern wildlife management programs. A good program will always begin with proper management of the natural habitat first. Dollar for dollar a manager can make a much greater impact manipulating native vegetation through selective herbicide use and prescribed fire. However, as a compliment to such efforts, proper food plot management can have a tremendous affect on health, trophy quality and hunter success. The first step of a good food plot program is to determine the limiting factor in the target species diet. Second, meet that need with the proper selection of forage. H&H provides food plot design and establishment either in conjunction with our Wildlife Management Plans or on a turn-key basis for hunt clubs and individuals who simply need the resources to put in place a design they have already developed. We have access to a full line of planting equipment including tractor, disks, plows, drags, cultipackers, spreaders, drills, and liming and fertilization equipment. We engage our core group of excavation contractors from across the state to assist in the clearing of new plots in cutover sites. Hunters waste thousands of dollars a year and hundreds of man hours on failed food plots, usually from a lack of experience or failing to implement that final step in the process that would have led to success. |
Professional Forestry Management and Wildlife Consultants
By pooling multiple landowners under one contract H&H provides economies of scale that allow higher levels of supervision and better overall planting quality at a competitive price point. Our role in the process is the identification and or mapping of areas to be replanted, species selection, spacing recommendations, coordination of seedling delivery and storage, and most importantly direct on-site quality control. We are on-site with the crews 85-90% of the time, taking plots and ensuring trees are planted according to specifications. Tree planting is the culmination of the stand establishment process, if not done correctly landowners are faced with costly inter-planting or failed stands. Our experience shows that the same crew that performs at 85% correctly planted level when supervised will drop to 50-60% when unsupervised. A high percentage of incorrectly planted trees die and the surviving trees lag dramatically behind in their initial growth. As with any farmer, a tree farmer plants a crop on faith that the stand will survive. Hedge your bet by engaging a professional to oversee the operation. Planting services are typically billed on a turn-key per acre basis using genetically improved seedlings matched by family to your site. Labor and supervision only contracts are available if you wish to provide your own seedlings.
For the past three decades, herbicides have made significant contributions to our ability to increase yields from plantation forestry. H&H is a BASF certified advisor and our foresters are certified commercial applicators with 10’s of thousands of acres of experience with aerial, ground, and hand herbicide applications. H&H has administered spray contracts for countless private landowners, Bowater Corporation, International Paper, Weyerhaeuser and more than 30,000 acres for the Virginia Department of Forestry since the privatization of the State’s program in 2006.
We offer both low cost “dead brush” generic product applications and competitively priced branded products fully backed by performance guarantees. In addition to aerial programs, H&H provides in-house ground based spraying for herbaceous weed control on old field sites, understory brush control, and kudzu eradication programs using full GPS guidance tractor based equipment. If you want the most from your site prep or release application trust H&H to get you there. Herbicide applications are typically billed on a per acre basis or for complex projects can be billed per acre for application and per gallon for chemical usage.
As the number of acres that can be burned in a season (October – April) is heavily limited by weather, and demand is high, don’t procrastinate scheduling your burn. In conjunction with the burning services, H&H will coordinate the installation of new firebreaks using one of our established contractors or we will reinstall existing firebreaks in-house using our woods tractor and offset harrow. Since correct firebreak installation is of paramount importance, we recommend contacting your H&H forester prior to establishing your firebreaks. Firebreak installation is billed by the hour and prescribed burning is typically billed by the acre. A minimum fee applies.
Farming is an art learned through experience and successful food plot establishment is nothing short of farming forage for wildlife. Through our wildlife management and soil science expertise and experience we’ve established guaranteed programs for success for both annual and perennial food plots and native warm season grass restoration projects. Often for only a fraction more than your costs of material, time and energy you could know it will be done right. Whether you own or lease 50 or 50,000 acres, H&H has the knowhow and resources to get you on the path to success.