2008-04-07 18:29:44 - A few weeks ago I volunteered to meet a state forester and 8-10 local residents at my woodlot to discuss the options for managing private forests for fun and profit.

Today we had that meeting. The weather was a bit cold and rainy, and the soil was soft and soggy, but we trekked along for about three hours and discussed what individuals can do if they are fortunate enough to own or manage their own forests. There are tens of thousands of private landowners in the northeastern U.S. who own

forestland, and many of them want to know what they can do to improve the stand for future timber production, to increase biodiversity, to make a few bucks selling the timber, or just to create a more aesthetically pleasing landscape.


Most 'foreigners' to the Northeast, and that includes Americans who live in the Midwest or the West of the U.S., are surprised to learn that the Northeast is now mostly forest. That's right! The area of the U.S. that includes New York City, Boston, and Philadelphia is mostly forested once again after having been almost completed denuded of trees a century or more ago. (Just a 30-minute drive north or west from New York City, you find yourself in relatively old forest, with a tall closed canopy). For example, New York State was classified as about 20% forest in a 1920 survey; today it is about 66% forest. Of course, 400 years ago, it was about 99% forest. The explanation is quite simple. Land was originally cleared for agriculture, most of the land in the Northeast is lousy farmland, farms went under economically early in the 20th century, and the forests grew back on abandoned farmland. I am probably living in one of the few areas of the world where forest acreage is on the increase. We hear so much about tropical deforestation that we forget that land use patterns are different in other parts of the world.


So now, the forests in the Northeast are 50-80 years old, with a high diversity of tree species that may be 20-25 meters tall. Many of these species (sugar maple, red oak, black cherry) are highly desirable for furniture, flooring, or other household uses, have now reached a merchantable size, and are owned by rural residents who often need a few thousand dollars to pay real estate taxes, send their kid to college, or buy single-malt scotch. If you contact your state forester, and every state has one assigned to your geographic area, he or she will come to your property armed with good information to help you decide what to do, depending on YOUR goals for your woodland.


Of course, it is perfectly fine to do absolutely nothing. Just let nature take its course. They are born, they live, and they die. And as a conservation biologist, I am strongly supportive of anyone who adopts this management approach. I happen to heat my home with firewood, so I thin my 50-year old forest, leaving good specimens of a variety of species to enjoy the additional sunlight for more rapid growth. Some of my trees are now large enough that I have them rough-cut into lumber for future building projects. (I will discuss this more in future posts). But the old-time foresters, who have mostly retired from state and federal agencies, were all about timber, timber, and only timber. Their recommendations were easy to define: remove all species of trees of low economic value, remove all specimens that are rotten, stunted, or crooked, and harvest the biggest and best for commercial sale. Of course, these 'poor' specimens are home to woodpeckers, nuthatches, wood-boring insects, lichens, and dozens of other species that comprise our forests' biodiversity.


Management of all natural resources has undergone an evolution, maybe even a revolution during the past few decades. The young forester who led us through the forest today is an example of that new generation. This is encouraging to a student of the natural world. The earth's biota is under tremendous pressure by people everywhere, but our collective improvement in the 'wisdom' behind her management is a reason for optimism.