GEORGIA – Forest Silviculturist Mike Hennigan has been selected to receive the 2024 National Silviculture Excellence Award from the USDA Forest Service, coinciding with his 20th year of employment at the agency.

“It was my honor to join the Region in nominating Mike for this award that recognizes his outstanding contributions to silviculture,” said Forest Supervisor Judy Toppins. “His hard work and dedication to his profession and the Forest Service is abundantly evident in the habitat restoration efforts he leads and his commitment to mentoring new and upcoming foresters.”

Hennigan graduated from Louisiana Tech University with a degree in forest management in 1998 and worked in private forestry in the Atchafalaya Basin for a decade. Collaborations with Forest Service employees motivated him to join the agency.

Hennigan began his Forest Service career in 2004 as a trainee forester at Kisatchie National Forest and later moved to the Ozark-St. Francis National Forest, where he simultaneously served as a timber management assistant and district silviculturist. There, he worked with a team on large-scale restoration projects focused on disturbance-dependent species.

Since joining the Chattahoochee-Oconee National Forest as forest silviculturist in 2015, Hennigan has continued his focus on restoring disturbance-dependent species through reforestation, prescribed fire, and mechanical scarification. He is particularly dedicated to longleaf pine restoration, a species that once spanned 92 million acres but now occupies only about 5 million.

The Hitchiti Experimental Forest on the Oconee Ranger District, maintained by prescribed burns, is one of his favorite areas on the Forest.

“It’s got the native warm season grasses in the understory and is in the historic range of longleaf,” Hennigan said. “In 200 years, perhaps longleaf will be across the entire landscape.”

Hennigan’s contributions extend beyond the Chattahoochee-Oconee National Forest. He provided significant input for the Southern Region’s 2024 pine module, the first in over 10 years, and works closely with partners like the Georgia Forestry Commission. Under his leadership, the Forest staff collect local acorns to grow genetically diverse seedlings, ensuring resilience for reforesting after disturbances.

He has also collaborated with regional silviculturists to conserve eastern hemlocks and other hardwoods. He coordinated a team which supported the insertion of eastern hemlocks into orchards in North Carolina and Tennessee, with the goal of protecting those blocks from the woody adelgid and providing a future source of seeds.

“The ultimate goal is to preserve that species and be able to plant it 40-50 years from now,” Hennigan said. “Silviculture is long term. We’re thinking 100-200 years ahead.”

Hennigan credits the Forest staff for the program’s success, acknowledging contributions from Danny Skojac, Michael Starbuck, Deyonte Johnson, Luke Wilson, Sydney Early, Cree Taylor and Chris Jett.

“Every person getting work done, this award goes to every one of these folks,” he said. “I just went and picked it up for them."