Remembering Karel Stoszek
Karel J. Stoszek was born August 22, 1935 to Czech parents in Buenos Aires, Argentina. His parents took him to their homeland on the Czech/Polish border to visit family just as World War II was beginning. Travel stopped and he was never able to return to Argentina. As a child, he witnessed first-hand the trains packed with Jewish and other detainees on their way to Auschwitz and saw the Germans and then the Russians marching through his town.
He came of age under the Soviet-dominated regime of his country. Karel earned a Diploma Engineer of Forestry Degree from the Brno School of Forestry in 1959 and soon after took a position as a forest management planner. In 1964, he and his wife escaped across the border to Austria with just the clothes on their backs and their dog. They then found their way as refugees to the United States.
For the first period of his life in the US, Karel supported himself as an hourly paid day laborer before learning English and becoming a graduate student at Oregon State University. In 1973, he concurrently completed his PhD in entomology with a minor in silviculture and plant ecology while working as a silviculturist for the Weyerhaeuser Corporation in Oregon.
Karel’s passion lay in the promotion of sustainable forest management and ensuring the presence of healthy forests for future generations. He felt that he could make the biggest impact through teaching. In 1974 he took a position as a professor in the College of Natural Resources at the University of Idaho, teaching silviculture to undergraduate students and mentoring many graduate students. He taught a capstone silviculture class in the Continuing Education in Forest Ecology and Silviculture (CEFES) program to hundreds of foresters over the years.
Dr. Stoszek left an indelible impression on those who studied with him. He was an animated lecturer and an iconoclast. He was sharply critical of the orthodox approach to forest management in the northwest and plantation forestry in particular. Karel espoused uneven-aged forestry and selection silviculture methods when few other academics in the region supported those approaches. He constantly challenged his students to think about forestry in the context of natural ecosystem functions. His great curiosity and talent as a storyteller illuminated for his students the intricate connections between trees and the other organisms of the forest. As a teacher he epitomized Aldo Leopold’s admonition about land management: “To keep every cog and wheel is the first precaution of intelligent tinkering.”
In the late 1980’s Dr. Stoszek spent a year sabbatical researching the effects of human-caused climate change on forests with the US Environmental Protection Agency. When he returned to academia afterwards, he was typically vocal in his warnings about how increasing carbon levels in the atmosphere were endangering ecosystems and humans dependent on them. This was a new message in those circles, and one that was not especially well received. He would recall later being derided as a “Chicken Little,” but as ever he was unbowed by criticism.
In 1991, he was invited to take a position as the Head of the Institute of Silviculture at the University of Agricultural Sciences (BOKU) in Vienna where he is remembered for sparking heated debate by being one of the first to speak of the effects of climate change on forest ecosystems and the need for “adaptive silviculture”, now recognized as a necessity. Karel cared deeply about the environment. He strongly promoted quantitative research, the use of selective thinning and diversification of plantings with more drought resistant species. He openly worried that future climate pressures would lead to forest die off and increased fire risks. He worked hard in the attempt to prevent that future.
Karel greatly loved the landscapes of the American West and never got over his awe of the natural beauty and spacious expanses of his adopted home. He was an avid outdoorsman, hunter and fisherman. When he retired from teaching at the University of Idaho in 1999, he devoted himself to these pursuits as well as gardening and travel. He continued to reside in the Palouse country he loved until recent years when moved to a retirement facility in Spokane, WA. Karel Stoszek passed away on September 3, 2021.
He is remembered as an inspiring teacher; great storyteller; a singer of the old Czech songs; the keeper of a famously messy office; a passionate lecturer and an equally passionate eater.
Donate by mail
Palouse Land Trust
PO Box 8506
Moscow, ID 83843
Header photo: UI Experimental Forest, Melissa Hartley (Copyright UI 2014)