>On 12/5/95, David South writes:
>
>> >On 12/2/95, Bret Diamond writes:
>> >
>> > On another issue, David South gave us some figures the other day
>> >regarding how much federal land has been "protected from logging." I did
>> >some checking on this, and our numbers are a little bit differant.
>> >Wilderness Areas are the only public lands not available for logging
>> >(until the next rider, anyway) and these wilderness areas make up only
>> >3.9% of the total U.S. land area, and 3/4 of this is in Alaska.
>>
>>
>> Yes I agree. Our numbers are different.
>> I indicated there were 13.4 million hectares of US Forest Service Land
>> designated at
>> "official" Wilderness areas. Your figures indicate 35.7 million hectares of
>> protected wilderness areas in the US.
>>
>> Thanks for pointing out that if we include national parks, the amount of
>> public land "protected from logging" is more than twice the amount I
indicated.
>
>Our numbers are still different, my calculations show that 37.2 million
>acres are in wilderness areas and national parks. The point you did not
>address, of course, is that this is only 3.8% of the total land area of
>the U.S, and that in the lower 48 states, only 1.3% of the total land area
>is actually protected. Think we can "get by" by utilizing the other 96%
>for resource extraction?
David South Responds (12/5/95):
If there are 2,263,259,000 acres in the United States, then 3.9% would equal
88+ million acres (35.7 million ha).
Your 3.9% number for 12/2/95 indicates 88+ million acres.
Your 12/5/95 number of 37.2 million is not 3.8% (or 3.9%) of the total US
land area.
If your 12/2/95 numbers do not match your 12/5/95 numbers, no wonder they do
not match my numbers.
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According to US Forest Service (USFS Gen Tech Report RM-234) the amount of
productive forests (>20 cubic feet/acre/yr; or 1.4 cm/ha/yr) is:
acres
BLM 5,754,000
other Federal 6,239,000
City and County 7,484,000
State lands 27,356,000
Forest industry 70,455,000
Farmer 82,484,000
USFS 84,661,000
other private 205,121,000
TOTAL in US 489,555,000
Total Reserved* 35,560,000
Other** 211,565,000
Total forest land area 736,681,000
* Note, In Alaska there are about 6,026,000 acres of forestland in
"productive reserves". Of course the total amount of designated wilderness
is much higher due to rock and ice.
** This is land with less than 20 cu ft/acre/yr. I assume ownership of
"Other" is similar to that of productive forest land.
David South
School of Forestry
Auburn University, AL 36849-5418
USA
dsouth@forestry.auburn.edu
334-844-1022
334-844-1084 (FAX)
http://www.forestry.auburn.edu/coops/sfnmc/sfnmc.html
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"Here was my chance. Biltmore could be made to prove what America did not
yet understand, that trees could be cut and the forest preserved at one and
the same time."
Gifford Pinchot
Consulting Forester
Biltmore Estate
1892-1895
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