EDITORIAL: Hard time for hard wood

Apr. 17—Call it, "The Case of the Forest Felons."

Or how about, "The Case of the Ozark Outlaws."

Either way, we got to hand it to the U.S. Forest Service, which recently merged some innovative thinking and new technology to crack a walnut caper.

On a serious note, timber poaching is a widespread problem, and not just in the 1.5-million-acre Mark Twain National Forest but across the Ozarks, on private as well as public land.

Not so long ago, the value of 27 black walnut and white oak trees from the Mark Twain National Forest near Cassville was put at more than $20,000.

More than that, timber thieves often leave behind tremendous ecological damage that can cost land managers thousands more to restore.

Recently, they struck at another corner of the Mark Twain, in Howell County, stealing black walnut trees. The wood is desirable for veneers and furniture.

An investigator went to a nearby sawmill, where he found a log matching the dimensions and appearance of one of the stumps, but wanted to be sure. He contacted Richard Cronn, a USDA Forest Service research geneticist based in Oregon. Cronn studies forest tree genetics, which can help land managers select trees to improve growth characteristics. Turns out it also can be used to match trees poached in these kinds of illegal logging operations.

According to the Mark Twain National Forest, they evaluated the stump and log samples using a new test, and found they were identical across 80 genetic markers — "an unambiguous genetic match," the Forest Service stated. "Using this database, the research team determined that the DNA profile probability for the illegally cut tree was less than one in a million-trillion-trillion."

Forest Service law enforcement and timber staff and Adventure Scientists, a citizen-science volunteer organization, also have built a DNA database for Missouri black walnut. Volunteers collected leaf and wood samples across the species' range and, with that, geneticists (and investigators) can analyze samples to determine the "DNA profile probability — or the likelihood that two random walnut trees "would share the same DNA fingerprint."

It proved to be too much for the lowbrow logger. He pleaded guilty last summer to one felony count of depredation of government property and was sentenced to five months of time served, a three-year supervised release, and restitution for the value of timber and ecological damage to the forest.

According to the Mark Twain foresters: "This case has important implications for future Forest Service investigations. Tree DNA sequences, just like human fingerprints, are unique to each tree. These unique DNA fingerprints can be found in all parts of a tree, including leaves, buds, flowers, fruit and wood. Historically, it has been nearly impossible to match milled lumber to the stump of an illegally harvested tree, but this DNA fingerprinting now allows stumps to be matched to cut logs, milled lumber, mill waste, and even some finished wood products."

The Forest Service and the volunteers are building additional DNA databases for eastern white oak, bigleaf maple, Western red cedar and Douglas fir from the Pacific Northwest.

Frank and Joe Hardy would be impressed.

We know we are.