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VFA News
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Friday's family dinner offered
opportunities for fun and fellowship. Pictured from
top, left to right: Secretary of Agriculture and Forestry
Robert Bloxom and Pat Bloxom with Delegate Beverly Sherwood
and Frank Sherwood; A group of young attendees enjoyed
Friday's banquet; Musicians serenade Sarah Webster and Bryan
Hilbert before dinner; Mike Jones accepts the 2007 Tree
Farmer of the Year Award. |
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VFA
Annual Convention Celebrates
Virginia’s Past, Looks Toward The Future
by Neil Clark |
In celebrating
the 400th anniversary of the first permanent English
settlement at Jamestown, the Virginia Forestry Association
held its 2007 annual convention in nearby Williamsburg. In
this location where so many adventurous decisions made and
significant battles fought which transformed our country
into what it is today, we contemplated another bold
exploration—using wood to address our nation’s energy needs.
Leading off this journey was a Biofuels! Bioenergy! Biomass!
workshop where Shawn Baker reminded us that redeyes (fish),
buckeyes (trees), and cowpies (well, you know) were all
valid renewable energy sources. Then, loggers and producers
from the piedmont of Virginia shared how wood chip energy
markets enhanced their forestry operations and
profitability. Two outstanding PLT workshops were held as
well, further expanding the educational capabilities towards
the youth of Virginia.
This lead into the General Session where a qualified and
knowledgeable panel addressed the prospects of energy from
forest biomass from the production and availability to
various ways of processing wood pellets, multiple products
from a
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biorefinery model, to wood gasification. More
details are presented in the “High Cost of Energy” article
beginning on the next page.
The guest tour to Brent and Becky’s Bulb Farm and the field
trip to Jamestown were both quite spectacular. The group who
went to explore the Jamestown settlement was pleasantly
greeted by incredibly gracious and knowledgeable volunteers
who explained in context the existing native American
culture in 1607 as well as details of the voyage of the
Virginia Company and the details of the early English
settlement.
The VFA community shared tears of both
sorrow and laughter at the Saturday evening
banquet. Sorrow was expressed for the April 16 tragedy at
Virginia Tech that was so fresh in everyone’s minds. Dean
Michael Kelly gave a thoughtful and memorial presentation of
that horrible event. These sentiments were continued by Tech
alumnus and Virginia Tree Farmer of the year Mike Jones, who
eventually turned our tears of sorrow to tears of uproarious
laughter as he described the supposedly controlled burning
that he performed on his property. |
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