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A long-term experiment in Victoria’s mountain ash forest found that heavily thinned stands later had larger biggest trees and wood-carbon stocks that caught up with or exceeded unharvested controls. Those are striking local results—not proof that thinning is best for every forest, or that it benefits wildlife everywhere.
What was the forest experiment?
The Silvicultural Systems Project (SSP) was established between 1987 and 1989 at two Victorian sites: Tanjil Bren in the Central Highlands and Cabbage Tree Creek in East Gippsland. The new findings concern Tanjil Bren, a mountain ash forest. The study’s authors describe revisiting that site in 2014 to assess outcomes decades after the treatments.
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The project compared different ways of harvesting or retaining trees, alongside unharvested areas used as benchmarks:
- Traditional clear-cuts: 250–350 metres wide.
- Small patch clear-cuts: 50–140 metres wide.
- Heavy thinning: removal of 50–70% of trees.
- Unharvested areas: retained as controls for comparison.
These approaches were not interchangeable treatments, and the findings concern distinct outcomes—regeneration, tree size, wood carbon and wildlife observations.
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What did researchers report about tree growth and carbon?
In their account of the 2026 paper, Kaitlyn L. Hammond and co-authors report that the largest trees in heavily thinned stands were about 20% greater in diameter than the largest trees in unharvested controls. They also report that, after roughly 30 years, thinned stands stored as much or more carbon in their wood as the controls.
The authors describe the thinned stands as having recovered the wood carbon removed during harvesting, then gained additional carbon comparable to the increase in the controls. This is a statement about carbon stored in wood, not a complete accounting of all greenhouse-gas effects or a claim that thinning always produces a net climate benefit.
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The result is a contrast across time and outcomes: the authors say early project results found mountain ash regenerated best on clear-cut sites, while the later revisit found larger biggest trees and recovered wood-carbon stocks in thinned stands. Better regeneration in one treatment does not by itself mean it leads on every other measure.
What did the camera traps show about Leadbeater’s possums?
Camera traps detected Leadbeater’s possums in every surveyed silvicultural treatment plot, but not in the surveyed unharvested areas. That describes the observations reported at Tanjil Bren; it does not establish that thinning generally benefits the species or that unharvested forest is unsuitable habitat.
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The authors also discuss acacia understory as habitat that can support possums’ foraging and movement. Their account says early observations found common understory plants such as acacia favored by smaller gaps or retained tall canopy, underscoring that habitat responses and tree-growth results do not reduce to a single winning treatment.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.What the findings do—and do not—establish
The authors present the results as evidence that alternative silvicultural systems can maintain multiple values in this tall eucalypt forest. They also caution against treating thinning as a universal prescription, saying it cannot and should not be done everywhere. They suggest it may help create greater variety in tree ages and sizes, particularly in forests affected by clear-cutting or high-severity fire.
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The reported findings are specific to the Tanjil Bren site and to the treatments and observations described by the study authors. The journal DOI landing page for the 2026 paper was not accessible in the source account available here, so plot counts, replication, measurement methods, statistical uncertainty, carbon-accounting boundaries and camera-trap effort cannot be independently assessed from that account. The findings should not be generalized to all Australian forests or all forms of thinning.
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