Forest Career Spotlight: Walker Johnson

Hovering above the trees. See how Walker is taking his forestry career to new heights!           

Walker is 27 years old and graduated from Auburn University with a Bachelors of Forestry in 2020. He now works for Vertical Vegetation Management as a Turn Key Crew Leader and Sales Representative. Vertical Vegetation Management is an aerial spray company that specializes in forestry management. Walker’s day to day responsibilities include managing all aspects of the spraying operation from sales and customer relations to writing chemical prescriptions for a tract of land and making sure the chemicals make it into the helicopter and onto the property. His favorite part of working on a spray crew is getting to travel and see so many different places and types of forests.

Although Walker didn’t grow up in the forest industry he credits his next door neighbor, a forester, for sparking his interest in the industry so much that he shadowed him for a semester as a senior project in high school and pursued his own career in forestry afterwards.

When asked if he had any advice for a young person wanting to pursue a career in forestry Walker said “Just be open minded. Forestry is broad and there’s a lot of unique opportunities beyond buying and selling timber”.

To find out more about careers in the forest industry, click here #ForestryWorks