Greetings:
On Friday, 24 June 1994 Ned Daly <ndaly@essential.org> wrote:
"I work on natural resources issues for Ralph Nader and the
Taxpayer Assets Project. TAP is concerned with the management
and control of publicly owned assets from broadcast spectrum to
the Internet backbone to national forests..."
"...I would like some information, possibly studies, on the ills
of planting monoculture tree farms..."
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I am a forest ecologist employed by the National Council of
the Paper Industry for Air and Stream Improvement (NCASI). We
are a non-profit technical organization funded by the US forest
products industry to conduct research and provide industry
members with technical support on environmental concerns.
I found Ned Daly's concern about monoculture tree farms
within the National Forests puzzling. Based on Forest Service
inventory data, plantation forestry has never been a large
component of National Forest management. During the last several
years the Forest Service has been making considerable changes in
their philosophy toward forest management. Under this new
approach, known as ecosystem management, timber harvesting is
viewed more as an incidental consequence of management for
desired future condition rather than a primary goal. Given this,
it seems that the National Forests will be less likely to
establish plantations in the foreseeable future.
Plantation forestry is most common in the southern part of
the US. Below are some data from "The South's Fourth Forest"
(USDA Forest Service, 1988), that show pine plantations are a
small fraction of the total timberland in both the National
Forest system and "other public" organizations. These data are
from 12 southern states (AL, AR, FL, GA, LA, MS, NC, OK, SC, TN,
TX, and VA). The data were collected and processed by the Forest
Inventory and Analysis branch of the USDA Forest Service.
These data show that:
1. In 1985 pine plantations accounted for 5.4% of timberland in
the South's National Forests.
2. In 1985 National Forests and other public owners accounted
for 5.6% of the South's pine plantations.
3. In 1985 pine plantations accounted for 11.5% of the South's
timberland (across all ownerships).
With regard to Ned Daly's request for "...some information,
possibly studies, on the ills of planting monoculture tree
farms...", I was disappointed that the request was for
information showing only negative aspects of plantations. In my
opinion there is a large volume of literature regarding
ecological functions in plantation forests. These data show that
some ecological functions in plantations are reduced compared to
adjacent naturally regenerated forests, while others are
enhanced. Another valid comparison is between the ecological
functions provided by forest plantations with those provided by
other land uses necessary to meet society's demands for goods and
services, e.g., row-crop agriculture, pastures, mining, housing,
businesses, highways, etc.
If Ned Daly is interested in an objective review of
plantation forestry, I would be happy to provide information.
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DATA FROM "THE SOUTH'S FOURTH FOREST" (USDA Forest Service, 1988)
[Note: The data below were synthesized across the South by
adding timberland areas from the Southeast Region (FL, GA, NC,
SC, & VA), p. 343, with areas from the South Central Region (AL,
AR, LA, MS, OK, TN, & TX), p. 345.]
[Note: Timberland is defined by the FS as forest land capable of
producing >20 ft3/acre/year of wood and is not withdrawn from
harvest consideration by statute or administrative regulation.
Thus timberland is a subset of total forest land.]
AREA (THOUSANDS OF ACRES) OF TIMBERLAND BY OWNERSHIP AND FOREST
MANAGEMENT TYPE FOR 12 SOUTHERN STATES
---------------------------------------------------------------
Year >> 1952 1962 1970 1977 1985
---------------------------------------------------------------
National forests
Pine plantation 239 468 473 450 583
Natural pine 3765 3844 3878 3814 3460
Mixed pine - hardwood 1536 1530 1651 1740 1841
Upland hardwoods 4121 4258 4244 4446 4430
Bottomland hardwoods 708 612 489 460 459
Total 10369 10712 10735 10910 10773
Other public
Pine plantation 97 252 341 407 580
Natural pine 2363 2475 2240 2098 1969
Mixed pine - hardwood 954 874 972 930 955
Upland hardwoods 1581 1611 1895 1844 1936
Bottomland hardwoods 1596 1458 1439 1546 1803
Total 6591 6670 6887 6825 7243
Forest industry
Pine plantation 660 3127 5714 8723 13153
Natural pine 14576 13646 13357 11340 8818
Mixed pine - hardwood 4955 5170 6342 6395 6025
Upland hardwoods 5814 6469 6229 6655 7118
Bottomland hardwoods 7379 7386 6774 6996 7148
Total 33384 35798 38416 40109 42262
Other private
Pine plantation 850 3740 5616 5843 6568
Natural pine 51283 44943 37217 31988 26718
Mixed pine - hardwood 19643 19927 20220 19780 18087
Upland hardwoods 43866 48764 49188 49200 49730
Bottomland hardwoods 27064 26497 23033 21859 20782
Total 142706 143871 135274 128670 121885
SOUTH TOTAL 193050 197051 191312 186514 182163
TOTAL SOUTHWIDE ACREAGE ACROSS OWNERSHIPS BY FOREST MANAGEMENT
TYPE (THOUSANDS OF ACRES)
---------------------------------------------------------------
1952 1962 1970 1977 1985
Pine plantation 1846 7587 12144 15423 20884
Natural pine 71987 64908 56692 49240 40965
Mixed pine - hardwood 27088 27501 29185 28845 26908
Upland hardwoods 55382 61102 61556 62145 63214
Bottomland hardwoods 36747 35953 31735 30861 30192
Total 193050 197051 191312 186514 182163
Relative distribution of area among forest management types
SOUTHWIDE (%)
--------------------------------------------------------------
Year >> 1952 1962 1970 1977 1985
National forests
Pine plantation 2.3 4.4 4.4 4.1 5.4
Natural pine 36.3 35.9 36.1 35.0 32.1
Mixed pine - hardwood 14.8 14.3 15.4 15.9 17.1
Upland hardwoods 39.7 39.7 39.5 40.8 41.1
Bottomland hardwoods 6.8 5.7 4.6 4.2 4.3
Total 100 100 100 100 100
Other public
Pine plantation 1.5 3.8 5.0 6.0 8.0
Natural pine 35.9 37.1 32.5 30.7 27.2
Mixed pine - hardwood 14.5 13.1 14.1 13.6 13.2
Upland hardwoods 24.0 24.2 27.5 27.0 26.7
Bottomland hardwoods 24.2 21.9 20.9 22.7 24.9
Total 100 100 100 100 100
Forest industry
Pine plantation 2.0 8.7 14.9 21.7 31.1
Natural pine 43.7 38.1 34.8 28.3 20.9
Mixed pine - hardwood 14.8 14.4 16.5 15.9 14.3
Upland hardwoods 17.4 18.1 16.2 16.6 16.8
Bottomland hardwoods 22.1 20.6 17.6 17.4 16.9
Total 100 100 100 100 100
Other private
Pine plantation 0.6 2.6 4.2 4.5 5.4
Natural pine 35.9 31.2 27.5 24.9 21.9
Mixed pine - hardwood 13.8 13.9 14.9 15.4 14.8
Upland hardwoods 30.7 33.9 36.4 38.2 40.8
Bottomland hardwoods 19.0 18.4 17.0 17.0 17.1
Total 100 100 100 100 100
RELATIVE DISTRIBUTION OF AREA AMONG FOREST MANAGEMENT TYPES
SOUTHWIDE
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Year >> 1952 1962 1970 1977 1985
Pine plantation 1.0 3.9 6.3 8.3 11.5
Natural pine 37.3 32.9 29.6 26.4 22.5
Mixed pine - hardwood 14.0 14.0 15.3 15.5 14.8
Upland hardwoods 28.7 31.0 32.2 33.3 34.7
Bottomland hardwoods 19.0 18.2 16.6 16.5 16.6
100 100 100 100 100
RELATIVE (%) DISTRIBUTION OF SOUTHWIDE ACREAGE AMONG OWNERS
FOR 1985
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Natl. Other For. Nonindu All
Forest Public Indus. Private Types
Pine plantation 2.8 2.8 63.0 31.4 11.5
Natural pine 8.4 4.8 21.5 65.2 22.5
Mixed pine - hardwood 6.8 3.5 22.4 67.2 14.8
Upland hardwoods 7.0 3.1 11.3 78.7 34.7
Bottomland hardwoods 1.5 6.0 23.7 68.8 16.6
All Types 5.9 4.0 23.2 66.9 100.0
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For similar information on forest and timberland for the
entire United States, see the recent report "Forest Resources of
the United States, 1992" (Powell et al. 1993).
LITERATURE CITED
Powell, Douglas S., Joanne L. Faulkner, David R. Darr, Zhiliang
Zhu, and Douglas W. MacCleery. 1993. Forest Resources of the
United States, 1992. USDA Forest Service. General Technical
Report RM-234, Rocky Mountain Forest and Range Experiment
Station, Fort Collins, CO.
USDA Forest Service. 1988. The South's Fourth Forest:
Alternatives for the Future. USDA Forest Service. Forest
Resources Report No. 24. Washington, DC.
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Regards,
Jim Shepard
NCASI
P. O. Box 141020
Gainesville, FL 32614-1020
NCASI@NERVM.NERDC.UFL.EDU
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