SYLLABUS

Non Timber Forest Products (NTFP)

Instructor: Susan Moegenburg
Thursdays 4:00 – 6:45
TBD

Contacting Susan:
Susan.moegenburg@uvm.edu
Office Hours: meetings available upon request

COURSE DESCRIPTION AND OBJECTIVES

Around the world, millions of people harvest non-wood resources from forests and
woodlands. These products include fibers, such as palm thatch in Indonesia; latexes,
such as rubber from Amazonia; mushrooms, such as morels in Oregon; and fruits, such as
wild blueberries in Maine. More locally, Vermonters collect maple sap, fern fiddleheads,
balsam boughs, and medicinal herbs. In some cases, harvesters use the products solely
within their homes; in others, collectors secure a large portion of their earnings from
forest products. Some products have been well researched; others have never been
studied. They all serve a role in the increasingly pertinent topic of sustainable forest use
and biodiversity conservation.

This course examines in detail the harvest of non timber forest products in Vermont and
across the globe. We will study key issues concerning NTFP, such as the cultural value
of NTFP to harvesters and their communities; the economic importance of marketed
NTFPs; the ecological impacts of NTFP harvest, including efforts at inventory and
monitoring; policy of NTFP harvest on public lands; and the role of NTFPs in
biodiversity conservation. Drawing upon lectures, readings from the literature, guest
lecture and field trips with NTFP harvesters, and in-depth assignments and group
activities, this course will provide a thorough introduction of the current knowledge of
NTFP harvest, including areas needing further investigation.

Upon completion of this course, students will:

- Understand how NTFP harvest connects contemporary cultures with their

surrounding forest lands, and with traditional cultures;
- Appreciate the diversity of non-timber resources harvested from public and private
forests around the world, and how their harvest relates to the harvest of wood
resources;
- Know basic techniques for conducting inventory and monitoring studies of NTFPs;
- Understand the issues dominating the field of NTFP research, such as forest
management policy, intellectual property rights, and sustainable harvest, and how
NTFPs relate to forest conservation and biodiversity;
- Be familiar with many of the NTFPs harvested in Vermont, and;
- Possess a thorough understanding of one NTFP species, via a term paper.
WEEKLY ACTIVITIES

- Read assigned literature and participate in online Discussion

- Attend class and participate in Discussion and group activities
- Homework assignment

COURSE REQUIREMENTS

- Attendance at lectures and field trip (at least one of the two trips), and participation
in class discussions, online discussions, and group activities (20%)
- Completion of homework assignments, resulting in final paper (40%)
- Midterm and Final Exams (40%)
Week-to-Week NTFPs
Week Topic
1 Introduction to temperate
NTFPs
2 Introduction to Tropical
NTFPs
3 History of Gathering:
ancient cultures, the pre-
industrial age, and pine tar
4 Contemporary Harvesting
Cultures, Traditional
Knowledge
5 Politics of Gathering &
Native American Reserved
Rights
6 Contemporary Harvesting
Cultures: Guests Nova Kim
and Les Hook1
In-class Activity Readings (for Homework (for next
next time) time)
Sample various NTFPs. Discuss Readings from Scavenger hunt for NTFPs
what NTFPs are and how their Tapping the Green in home products, local
study differs from Ethnobotany Forest; Alexander markets
and Herbalism and McClain 2001;
Ciesla 2002
(reference)
Seasonal Gathering Calendar Emery 2002; NTFP databases. Create a
selections from list of 3 prospective
Minnis 2003 NTFPs for term paper
Discuss and choose term-paper Eastern Gatherers; Build bibliography of
NTFP pages 32 – 42 in chosen NTFP covering
Jones, McClain, topics on Guidelines;
Weigand; Bilger Short essay on History for
2007 chosen NTFP
Group work to develop interview Antypas et al Interview of NTFP
questions 2002; Morel Harvesting Habits of
reading friends and/or family
members
Class debate regarding harvesting Article on guests; Survey of harvest
on public lands selections from policies/regulations in
Euell Gibbons National Forests and
2005 States
Discussions with Guests; Tewari 2000, Pilz Essay on contemporary
Harvesters Dilemma Game and Molina 1998 harvest and political
issues of your chosen
NTFP (3-5 pages)
7 Economics of Harvest Review policies/regulations from Whitney and Commodity chain for
homework; Harvester’s dilemna Upmeyer 2004 term-paper NTFP
game
8 Break Week

9 MIDTERM EXAM Anderson 1988; Tapping or Timber: forest

Moegenburg and management decision-
Maple & Introduce Levey 2002; making
feasibility study Arnold and Ruiz
Perez 1998
Saturday Field Trip to
Sugarhouse2
10 Açaí: how one NTFP went Feasibility study of NTFP Vance 2002; Profitability analysis of
from Amazonian survival enrichment planting in Northern Anderson 1998 cultivating NTFPs
food to global superfruit. Forests
Also NTFPs as forest
conservation strategy
11 NTFPs in forest Small group work learning Term Paper
conservation inventory and monitoring
methods
11 Saturday Field Trip to
2 Proctor Maple Research
Center in Jericho
12 Term Paper Presentations TBD Term Papers Due
(15 minutes each)
13 Term Paper Presentations TBD
(15 minutes each)
14 Field methods to inventory Learn and practice basic TBD Analysis of data from
and monitor NTFP surveying and monitoring field trip
methods for NTFPs
 15 In-class Field trip: Spring Harvest early Spring NTFPs and
gathering and feast prepare feast

16 Final Exam
1
Nova Kim and Les Hook are contemporary harvesters who run a wild foods CSA out of the northeast kingdom, Vermont
2
Field trip to either Sugarhouse in Starksboro or UVM’s Proctor Maple Research Center in Jericho

Selected Readings:
Anderson, A.B. 1988. Use and management of native forests dominated by açaí palm (Euterpe oleracea) in the Amazon estuary. In:
The palm – tree of life: biology, utilization, and conservation. Advances in Economic Botany 6: pp. 144-154.
Bilger, B. 2007. Letter from Oregon: The mushroom hunters. The New Yorker, Aug. 20, 2007.
Emery, M. R. 2002. Historical Overview of Nontimber forest product uses in the Northeastern United States. In Jones, Eric T.,
Rebecca J. McLain and James Weigand, eds. 2002. Nontimber Forest Products in the United States. Lawrence: University
Press of Kansas. Pp. 3-25.
Gibbons, Euell. 2005. Stalking the Wild Asparagus. 303 pages. Hood, Alan C. & Company, Inc.
Jones, Eric T. and Kathryn A. Lynch. 2002. The Relevance of Sociocultural Variables to Nontimber Forest Product Research, Policy,
and Management. In Jones, Eric T., Rebecca J. McLain and James Weigand, eds. 2002. Nontimber Forest Products in the
United States. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas. Pp. 32-42.
Kerns, Becky K., Leon Liegel, David Pilz, and Susan J. Alexander. 2002. Biological Inventory and Monitoring. In Jones, Eric T.,
Rebecca J. McLain and James Weigand, eds. 2002. Nontimber Forest Products in the United States. Lawrence: University
Press of Kansas. Pp. 237-269.
Minnis, Paul. 2003. People and Plants in ancient Eastern North America. Smithsonian Books, Washington, D.C.
Moegenburg, S.M. and D.J. Levey. 2002. “Prospects for conserving biodiversity in Amazonian extractive reserves”. Ecology Letters
5:320-324.
Pilz, David; F. Douglas Brodie; Susan Alexander; Randy Molina. 1998. Relative Value of Chanterelles
and Timber as Commercial Forest Products. Ambio Special Report No. 9: 14-16.
Tewari, D.D. 2000. Valuation of Non-timber Forest Products (NTFPs): Models, Problems, and Issues.
Journal of Sustainable Forestry. 11(4):47-68.
Whitney, Gordon G. and Mariana M. Upmeyer. 2004. Sweet trees, sour consequences: the long search for sustainability in the North
American maple products industry. Forest Ecology and Management 200: 313-333.