Penn State School of Forest Resources Celebrates Forests

The Penn State School of Forest Resources will host families, friends and Nittany Lion fans at Pennsylvania Forest Fest, a celebration of 2011 as the International Year of Forests.  Festivities will be free and open to the public.  The event is scheduled for Sunday, Sept. 25, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., at The Arboretum at Penn State, on the corner of Bigler Road and Park Avenue at the University Park campus.

Forest Fest will feature forestry demonstrations, exhibits, educational activities for children and adults, food and live entertainment. Scheduled activities include bird-watching walk, identifying the American chestnut tree and its wood, arborist tree-climbing demonstrations, mushroom-hunting walk, logging history in Pennsylvania, tree-identification walk, Penn State Woodsman Team demonstration, and the chemistry of leaf pigmentation.

In addition, musical performances will be offered on the hour, beginning with Hannah Bingman at 10 a.m. Performances by Grain, Pure Cane Sugar, Colebrook Road and Van Wagner will follow.

The United Nations General Assembly declared 2011 the International Year of Forests to raise awareness to how forests enrich our environment. The aim is for citizens worldwide to experience the forest and to understand how our vitality is linked to our ecosystem.

The School of Forest Resources in the Penn State College of Agricultural Sciences provides professional education and research dedicated to the management of forest resources and their use by society.