Arthur Temple College of Forestry and Agriculture

sylvans winreducedMembers of the Stephen F. Austin State University timbersports team, the Sylvans, personified the university’s mascot during the second annual Lumberjack Match held at the Ouachita County Fair in Camden, Arkansas.

During the Lumberjack Match, participating universities competed in a range of traditional timbersport events, such as crosscut sawing, bowsawing, log chopping, and axe and knife throwing.

The Sylvans placed first in men’s crosscut sawing; men and women’s bowsawing; Jack and Jill crosscut sawing; single buck crosscut sawing and knife throwing. The team took second and fourth place in women’s crosscut sawing and axe throwing, respectively.

“Our students were professional and did an excellent job representing the university and the Arthur Temple College of Forestry and Agriculture,” said Dr. Jeremy Stovall, associate professor of forestry at SFA and Sylvans faculty advisor.

The University of Arkansas at Monticello finished in second place, followed by Louisiana Technical University and Louisiana State University.

HDM 0087webDwelling beneath the soil’s surface are intricate communities of organisms whose very existence is vital to ecological health and well-being. While it is widely understood that these creatures are important, little is known about their direct relationship with plant communities, and far less is known about the sheer number of species that may exist. Dr. George Damoff’s life passion is to change that.

“In a square meter or yard, you can have hundreds of earthworms,” said Damoff ’80, ’87 & ’08, an SFA Division of Environmental Science adjunct faculty member. “In a typical acre of pastureland with good soil, you can have a million earthworms per acre.”

In the past year alone, Damoff has described and published information about two entirely new species — Diplocardia deborahae and Diplocardia hebi. And with the backlog of specimens awaiting dissection in his Dallas-based home lab, that number is likely to dramatically increase.

“This is a species from Oklahoma that is new to science,” Damoff said, holding up a vial containing an earthworm in SFA’s forest soils lab. “In Oklahoma and Texas, I have found nearly two dozen new, unnamed species.”

Although Damoff has discovered a number of other new species, they will not be officially recognized until his descriptions have been peer-reviewed and published in Megadrilogica, a scientific journal solely dedicated to the study of earthworms.

One of the new species now under review was collected on the banks of the Colorado River east of Austin and will be named in honor of Dr. Kenneth Farrish, director of SFA’s Division of Environmental Science and Hiram and Gloria Arnold Distinguished Professor. It was Farrish who introduced Damoff to megadrilology, also known as the study of earthworms.

web 2Researchers at SFA Gardens are reaping the sweet rewards of their ongoing investigation into the feasibility of adding kiwifruit to the state’s long list of agricultural commodities.

Since the initial crop produced in 2014 –the state’s first-ever successful kiwifruit harvest – the expanding plot of golden kiwifruit, located on the Stephen F. Austin State University campus, has produced more than 1,500 pounds of the small, tender-fleshed fruit.

“We collected 750 pounds this year,” said Dr. David Creech, SFA professor emeritus of agriculture and director of SFA Gardens. “The harvest came a little early this year, likely due to the intense heat we’ve had.”

While kiwifruit is eaten when tender, Creech explained they are harvested while still firm. To know when the crop is ready for harvest, the sugar content of the fruit is regularly monitored.

“We check the sugar content with a refractometer, which is a hand-held tool,” Creech said. “You cut the fruit in half and place some juice on the tool, and when the sugars hit a brix measurement of 10 to 12 you’re ready to harvest.”

In 2011, Dr. Jay Spiers, associate professor of horticulture at Auburn University and a longtime friend of Creech, provided SFA with the initial 30 vines comprised of three female and three male varieties

These fruits do not share the appearance of the typical fuzzy-skinned, green-fleshed kiwifruits commonly found at supermarkets. These varieties, known as golden kiwis, have a smooth, edible skin and golden-colored flesh.

westernRatSnakewebDo you know what the Texas horned lizard, Western diamondback rattlesnake and Lucifer hummingbird have in common? Through the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department’s Conservation License Plate program, images of these iconic, native wildlife species are featured on many Texan’s license plates and signify a concerted effort to better understand and conserve the state’s natural resources.

Each year, the funds generated through the purchases of a Wild for Texas Collection license plate enable the agency to finance yearly grants explicitly focused on wildlife conservation.

This year, Dr. Christopher Schalk, assistant professor of forest wildlife management at Stephen F. Austin State University’s Arthur Temple College of Forestry and Agriculture, and Dr. Daniel Saenz, research biologist with the U.S. Forest Service, received one of these highly-sought-after grants and are currently investigating the effect of erosion control materials on snakes.

Layers of woven mesh mats made of varying materials are often used as erosion control devices during construction along Texas’ roadways, but little is known about their impact on wildlife species susceptible to entanglement in the mats.

“A lot of the documented deaths have been anecdotal observations,” Schalk said. “No one has done consistent surveys or entanglement trials to determine which products are more dangerous to snakes.”

36188644 1679569855473901 8693392575974866944 nWhile many view summer break as a time to unwind and relax, others embrace it as an opportunity to immerse themselves in a new culture while working long hours to accomplish meaningful projects. This past June, Stephen F. Austin State University students from the academic disciplines of agriculture, early childhood education, environmental science, forestry, nursing and social work did just that — dedicating almost two weeks of their summer break to accomplish a variety of projects in rural Haiti.

This marks the second summer in which SFA has partnered with One Foot Raised, a local mission-based nonprofit organization founded by SFA alumni. While the organization was officially established in 2016, its founders, Becky and Zac Weems, have led outreach teams in the country for a decade. The Weems said they work closely with leadership from a small number of villages to learn the exact needs of residents and then work hand-in-hand with them to achieve these goals.

In partnering with SFA, the Weems said they now have access to a vast amount of knowledge and skills in the form of faculty and staff, as well as students.

JilinwebFaculty members within Stephen F. Austin State University’s Arthur Temple College of Forestry and Agriculture spent a week in June touring China’s Jilin province as guests of the Jilin Provincial Academy of Forestry Science.

The purpose of the trip, attended by SFA faculty members Dr. Hans Williams, dean of the Arthur Temple College of Forestry and Agriculture; Dr. Kenneth Farrish, director of the Division of Environmental Science; Dr. Shiyou Li, director of the National Center for Pharmaceutical Crops; Dr. Brian Oswald, Joe C. Denman Distinguished Professor of fire ecology; Dr. Jeremy Stovall, associate professor of silviculture, and Dr. Yuhui Weng, assistant professor of forest biometrics, was manifold and included discussions regarding research partnership and scientist exchanges. Williams said the two institutions plan to focus on research collaborations that address forest ecology, silviculture, tree physiology and tree genetics.

Faculty members also visited the College of Forestry at Beihua University, which enrolls approximately 1,100 forestry students and includes programs in food, environmental science, forestry and landscape gardening. Beihua University forestry students were introduced to the academic programs offered at SFA and held a meeting with university leadership to develop student and faculty exchange programs.      

  1. Dr. Craig Morton named 2018 Agriculture Educator of the Year
  2. Wildlife research project encourages citizen contributions via iNaturalist app
  3. SFA’s spatial science program provides key imagery for local non-profit
  4. SFA students showcase research at Texas A&M symposium
  5. Old roots, new beginnings at Polk-Sharp Farm
  6. 2018 ETFES Spring Conference
  7. SFA Sylvans clinch Southern Forestry Conclave championship
  8. Resource Management Service offers new scholarship to SFA forestry students
  9. ATCOFA to host lecture by renowned hydrologist
  10. Forestry students complete conservation projects in Montgomery County
  11. Forestry students participate in large-scale tree planting during Arbor Day Celebration
  12. ATCOFA to host GIS & GPS User Group meeting
  13. Special lecture to feature director of the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality
  14. Compound patented by SFA’s National Center for Pharmaceutical Crops shows promise in treating cancer
  15. ATCOFA enters partnership with China’s Jilin Provincial Academy of Forestry Sciences
  16. ATCOFA students continue wildland fire data collection in the Netherlands
  17. Urban forestry student wins title at tree-care industry exposition
  18. Students receive first place honors at statewide GIS forum
  19. ATCOFA alumnus named executive director of Texas Forestry Association
  20. SFA students conduct service-learning project on Lake Naconiche