Hardly a day goes by when there isn’t mention of how trees might be our saviours. In the face of climate change, increasing urban density and decreasing biodiversity, everyone is talking about the benefits of the arboreal. There’s a general understanding that trees matter, pure and simple.

But Rowan Reid says cutting them down matters too. Reid is a forester and if he had his way, more of us would see the value of felling a tree.

Rowan Reid pruning the lower branches from an Australian Red Cedar.Credit:Megan Backhouse

Make no mistake Reid is passionate about trees. In the 35 years since he and his wife acquired 42 hectares of land in the hills of the Victoria’s Otway Ranges he has planted thousands of them. Rather than opting for tidy rows, he goes in for irregular patterns.

He has a copse of 30-metre-tall Coast Redwoods that create a space that is as still and silent as a cathedral. He has poplars and silky oaks, English oaks, black walnuts, eucalypts, acacias, banksias, cedars, pines, kauris and much more besides.

Reid is part of a new wave of farmers turning conventional forestry on its head. He says he wants his Bambra Agroforestry Farm to make the whole process of both nurturing and cutting down trees a more attractive option for all of us.

Rowan Reid actively manages the growth of all his trees.Credit:Megan Backhouse

His approach is relevant for gardeners, not least for how he actively tends his wide mix of trees in the decades before cutting them down. He thinks about every move, starting with his spacing. “Most people put trees too close together. But if you are growing a 12-metre-diameter tree it needs to be 12 metres away from the next tree if you don’t want the first one to shade it.”

He is careful about the timing of his planting too. While deciduous trees and conifers are planted in mid-winter, he plants most of his native species in early spring just prior to when the growing conditions are best.

He keeps an area of at least 75cm around the seedling weed free for at least one growing season and installs extra high tree guards to protect his seedlings browsing animals. While he waters on the day of planting if the day is warm, he doesn’t apply any ongoing irrigation. As for fertilizer, he only adds it ­– if at all – when the trees are two or three years old.

He does, however, actively manage the growth of all his trees – largely through pruning – to ensure each specimen has a straight, single trunk and no lower branches. In winter he visits every tree to reassess as to whether it will grow into “something useful” and, if not, then whether it might be better removed to improve the vigour of the trees growing around it.

Coast Redwoods have thrived in Reid’s clay soil.Credit:Megan Backhouse

And, because this is a working forest farm as opposed to an arboretum, there is other felling as well. Once trees are big enough they are selectively cut down and milled into timber. Reid sees it as a way of locking up carbon.

That might seem strange in this age when planting trees and protecting forests is touted as critical for removing carbon from the atmosphere. While that is true, the trouble with relying only on living trees to swallow carbon is that, if the trees go up in flames or are felled by disease or are cleared without their timber being saved, all the carbon contained within them ends up back in the atmosphere.

Reid says that repeatedly harvesting a proportion of his trees and milling it into timber allows the carbon his trees have captured to be stored for as long as that timber remains in service. It also allows him to free up land to plant more trees and thereby lock up more carbon.

“Rather than a secure carbon store I see our planted trees as a perpetual carbon sequestration plant,” he says.

He also sees them as habitat for wildlife, shade for people, a way of reducing soil erosion and increasing biodiversity. By planting trees, and then selectively cutting them down, Reid has found a way to cover all bases.

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