Mack brought up the topic in the coco mat post concerning tree fern panels and Cork bark. How unrenewable are they? I love using cork bark, but now I'm feeling a bit guilty. But I figure since cork bark comes from a cork tree and trees grow; it is renewable. What;s the story? I'm not exactly captain planet, but I am certianly concious of my impact on the environment.
Any thoughts or info on this is apperciated.
Peace.
E
fishinmagician Wrote:Mack brought up the topic in the coco mat post concerning tree fern panels and Cork bark. How unrenewable are they? I love using cork bark, but now I'm feeling a bit guilty. But I figure since cork bark comes from a cork tree and trees grow; it is renewable. What;s the story? I'm not exactly captain planet, but I am certianly concious of my impact on the environment.
Any thoughts or info on this is apperciated.
Peace.
E
If done right, cork is harvested sustainably. It doesn't kill the tree. If I recall, bark is removed from larger cork trees (Quercus species, it is an Oak). But the bark grows back. Or they grow the trees in some fashion that allows the trees to regrow. They have big cork plantations in portugal...
Here is a link, remarkably...
http://www.fao.org/documents/show_cdr.a ... 880e08.htm
littlefrog,
thanks for the info. i had heard that the tree fern panels were being harvested in a way that is harmful and not sustainable, but took the info second hand and haven't done my homework. does anyone know if this is the cork we use? the pic's definitely looked like it.
mack Wrote:littlefrog,
thanks for the info. i had heard that the tree fern panels were being harvested in a way that is harmful and not sustainable, but took the info second hand and haven't done my homework. does anyone know if this is the cork we use? the pic's definitely looked like it.
I hope so. We use a lot of cork for orchid growing (mounts) as well. I did a little more reading after I posted the above, and it turns out the cork producers may be vulnerable to a downturn in the use of 'real' cork for wine bottles. Could result in a lot of trees getting chopped down and turned into parking lots, making cork less available (or not at all available) to us.
So, buy more cork slabs!