In the forest industry in Alberta, it is common practice to use herbicides after replanting a harvested area in order to control competition and allow the planted conifer seedlings time to become established. The most widespread and commonly used glyphosate-based herbicide for forestry in Canada is Vision® (Forest Growth Organization of Western Canada, 2023). Herbicides containing glyphosate have long been a controversial topic between the industry and the public. Public land users, Indigenous groups, government, and other stakeholders have frequently raised concerns about glyphosate for many years, and it continues to be a popular topic of discussion today (Carnochan & Thomas, 2018; Carnochan, 2019; Brunjes, 2018). Concerns about herbicide use often include the effects on overall biodiversity, forest composition, and plant species abundance (Botten et al, 2021; Defarge et al, 2023; Ferreira et al, 2023; Giaccio et al, 2023; Werner et al, 2022). More specifically, in Alberta, hunters, trappers, and gatherers who use this land have raised concerns about the quality and abundance of traditional plants as well as the effects on wildlife (Carnochan & Thomas, 2018; Carnochan, 2019; Brunjes, 2018) prompting the forest industry to take a closer look at glyphosate persistence in the environment.    

It has previously been shown that glyphosate-based herbicides can be quickly degraded in the environment by soil microorganisms (Helander et al, 2012), or through adsorption to soil particles (Viti et al, 2019), thus leaving the environment quickly and posing little threat to non-target species. However, a recent study conducted in 2021 by Botten et al. found that glyphosate could be detected within plant tissues at least one year after application, and up to twelve years after initial application.

These recent findings of glyphosate persistence in plant tissues have raised further questions about long-term effects on the environment. In particular, how different silviculture treatments are affecting forage availability, forage quality, and the occurrence of browsing animals in recently harvested cut-blocks. A recent study done by McKay and Finnegan (2023) showed that silviculture practices - such as spraying herbicides - influenced the amount of available forage and altered ungulate distributions. Moose were shown to use young harvested blocks more frequently if they contained the animals' preferred browse plants (McKay & Finnegan, 2023).