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Forest Facts

By: Douglas W. MacCleery

One of the most profound changes in American society has been the transition from a rural, agrarian society to an urban industrialized nation. Although today’s society is no less dependent on natural resources than were 18th century subsistence farmers, most Americans living in cities and suburbs are no longer aware of the very direct link between their consumptive lifestyle and the nation’s.

Over the last two decades, public interest in America’s forests, their condition and management, has increased dramatically. Much of this attention has focused on specific issues and controversies, such as clearcutting, the reduction in old growth forests on the Pacific Coast, the salvage of fire-killed timber and similar issues. Most media stories tend to focus on the controversies, rather than on the good news. Fortunately, there is considerable good news on America’s forests and wildlife, especially when one takes a longer term view.

A long-term view is especially appropriate when the issue is forests. The forests surrounding us today reflect decisions and public policies dating back many decades. In order to make wise decisions for the future, we need toseek to understand how existing forests came to be what they are today.

Today’s interest is not the first time America’s attention has shifted to it’s forests. The first national conservation movement was focused largely on the deteriorating forest and wildlife situation in the late 19th century. Many of the public policies that have shaped today’s forests have their origins during this period.

This paper will briefly discuss the history of U.S. forests, the policies that were put in place to address forest loss and degradation, and the performance of those policies and other influences as reflected in the current condition and trends of forests and associated wildlife.

Pre-European Forest Conditions
A popular perception today is that, prior to European contact, America was dominated by impenetrable, relatively uniform ancient forests that blanketed the landscape in static, longterm balance with the environment. This image is one of continuous, closed-canopy, structurally complex, “climax” forests which nature maintained for long periods in a steadystate, equilibrium balance with the environment. Closely related to the myth of the forest primeval is the “pristine myth” or the popular perception that American Indians lived in the forests and on the plains but never really did much to change either.

The reality was quite different. Pre-settlement forests were exceedingly dynamic—shaped by a myriad of both natural and human-caused influences, disturbances, and catastrophic events that had a profound effect on the age, plant species, composition, and wildlife of the forest environment (Arno 1985, Butzer 1990, Denevan 1992, Doolittle 1992, Bonnickson 2000).

Even though there is overwhelming physical, biological, as well as anthropological, evidence that these myths are seriously flawed, they still strongly shape conservation policy development in the U.S. today (Cronon 1995).

The Effect of European Settlement on U.S. Forests
Of what there be little doubt is that the arrival of Europeans in North America profoundly changed the nature of human impact on the land.

About 46 percent of the U.S. land base was forested when European settlement began. Despite nearly 400 years of use and abuse about 70 percent (747 million acres) remains forested today. Credit nature’s resiliency, conservation, reforestation and advances in forestry. [USFS, Forest Resources of the United States, 1997, GTR-NCC-219-2001] Minnesota’s red pine forests are a fine example of work done by Depression-era Civilian Conservation Corps tree planters.

The America of the early 1800s was overwhelmingly a nation of largely self-sufficient farms. The abundant forests were seen as a primary source of energy and raw materials. Forests were the foundation of early colonial industries, such as shipbuilding and furs (Cronon 1985, Williams 1989). People also cleared the land occupied by forests for growing crops. From 1600 through the early 20th century, U.S. forests were cleared for agriculture at approximately the rate of increase in the nation’s human population.

The 19th century ushered in a period of rapid population growth. During the century the U.S. population rose over 14 times—increasing from 5.3 to 76 million people, or over 25 percent per decade. During the fifty years between 1850 and 1900, the U.S. population rose in absolute numbers ten times more than it had in the two centuries from 1600 to 1800 (increasing from 23 million to 76 million). The rising population began to put significant pressures on U.S. forests, wildlife and other natural resources.

In the sixty years from 1850 to 1910, American farmers cleared more forest than the total amount that had been cleared in the previous 250 years of settlement—about 190 million acres (Williams 1989). The nation’s farmers cleared forest for agriculture at an average rate of 13.5 square miles per day every day for 60 years.

Vast areas of the Midwest, South, and Pacific Coast were logged, and often relogged. The tree limbs, tops, and other debris that remained after logging were often burned in the belief that the logged areas could be converted to cropland or improved pasture. These slash fires burned more or less continuously, and when weather conditions were right, sometimes resulted in massive wildfires, property damage, and major loss of human life.

The nation’s wildlife faced many of the same pressures as its forests. A wide variety of wildlife species, which at the time of settlement had been present in huge numbers, were being severely depleted. The most significant factors were virtually unrestricted market hunting of all kinds of wildlife for food, furs, and, feathers (which in the late 1800s were in great demand for women’s hats), as well as habitat modification caused by farm clearing, logging, and massive wildfires (Trefethen 1975).

Rise of a National Conservation
Movement The rapidly declining forest, wildlife, and other environmental conditions of the late 19th century provided the impetus for the first national conservation movement. The concern that things had gotten “out of balance” was a common theme of early conservationists, such as George Perkins Marsh, and reflected their con-viction as to the need to adjust the direction events were taking.

One of the first priorities of this fledgling movement was a war against market hunting for meat, hides, and feathers. This effort included a campaign to put in place strong state and federal wildlife conservation laws and the professional agencies needed to enforce them. Concurrent with these efforts were actions to reserve public lands for protection and management, e.g., national forests, national parks, national wildlife refuges, etc. (Trefethen 1975). The conservation policy framework that was put into place included the following:

• To close the Public Domain to further private land disposal and to reserve remaining public lands for protection and management, e.g., national forests, national parks, national wildlife refuges, etc,.
• To promote and encourage the protection of forests and grasslands, regardless of their ownership, from wildfire, insects and disease.
• To improve the art and science of natural resource management by acquiring scientific knowledge on the management of forests and wildlife and on the more efficient utilization of raw materials.
• To improve the management and productivity of agricultural lands and forests (70 percent of the latter which were privately owned) through research and technical and financial assistance.
• To adopt and enforce federal and state wildlife conservation laws.

In addition to the conservation policies described above, a number of fortuitous events combined in the early 1900s to substantially reduce human pressures on forests and wildlife. One was the spectacular increase in agricultural productivity,which after the 1930s, rose at a rate greater than population growth. Others were the conversion from wood to fossil fuels and the shift from draft animals to internal combustion engines. These trends greatly reduced the human pressures on forests and other wildlife habitats and populations for food and energy. As the area of cropland stabilized, so did the area of forests. Today the U.S. has somewhat less cropland and about the same area of forest it had in 1920.

How Have Conservation Policies Performed?

The best way to assess the performance of conservation policies is to look at the land, air and water, and the biological communities associated with them: what are they like today, as compared to what they were like in 1500, 1900, and 1970? First a look at 1500:

The Conditions of 1500 vs. today

There is no question that when one compares the current biological diversity in the U.S. with that which is thought to have existed in 1500, there are profound differences. Cropland and pastureland alone account for 553 million acres (25 percent of the U.S. land area) that at one time were forests, grasslands, savannas and wetlands (Langner et al 1994). Most native grasslands and prairies in the humid areas  of the U.S. have been converted to agriculture and other uses. More than one-half of American wetlands have been converted to other uses since 1500. At least 300 million acres of forestland (about one-third the estimated original area) have been converted to non-forest uses since 1500, mostly to agricultural uses.

The majority of ecosystem transformation in the U.S. occurred during the settlement period, before 1900. The driving cause of the transformation was a rapidly growing human population combined with rather  primitive agricultural and resource extraction and utilization technologies. Often unclear and fluctuating land tenure arrangements during the settlement period were also a factor.

The Conditions of 1900 vs. today

When one compares U.S. environmental conditions today with those that existed in 1900, there is no question that many significant gains have been made. The conservation policies and practices put into place in the early some fortuitous events, have been major factors in reducing the rate of biodiversity loss since 1900. This has occurred in spite of an increase in U.S. population from 76 million to more than 260 million.

Wildfires scorched 40–50 million acres a year during the 1930s, making fire control a national priority. By 1960, the area burned annually had been reduced by 90 percent. But wildfires are again gaining ground on federal lands. [Source: USFS Wildland Fire Statistics] Congressional failure to attack the two primary underlying causes—disease and stand density—is making a bad situation worse. This 1996 Nevada fire burned to bedrock killing everything in sight.

A number of wildlife species did become extinct due to human action since 1500. Examples include the great auk, passenger pigeon, heath hen, Carolina parakeet, ivory billed woodpecker, Bachman’s warbler, Labrador duck, and others. A larger number of subspecies were also extirpated, including the eastern elk, Florida red wolf, eastern bison, Wisconsin cougar, and others. The genetic diversity of many other species and populations has likely been diminished, as well. Some of the earlier losses were due primarily to overhunting (great auk); many to a combination of overhunting and habitat loss (passenger pigeon, heath hen, Carolina parakeet); and some to habitat loss alone (Backman’s warbler).

While a number of species did become extinct, given the massive assault on wildlife by market hunters and the transformation of U.S. ecological conditions that had occurred by 1900,  it is perhaps remarkable that more extinctions did not occur. Many species that were severely depleted, or even on the brink of extinction in 1900, have staged remarkable comebacks. A large number ofspecies that would likely  have been on an endangered species list, had one existed in 1900, are today quite abundant.  Examples include: wild turkey; egrets, herons, and many other wading birds; many species of shorebirds; wood ducks, and several other species of ducks; whistling swans; Rocky Mountain elk, black bears, beaver, fishers, and most other fur-bearers, pronghorn antelope, bighorn sheep, and white-tailed deer throughout most of its range. Many other species, although not actually threatened with extinction in 1900, are today both more abundant and more wide-spread than they were in 1900.

Many trends in U.S. forest conditions have, on balance, also been largely positive since 1900. U.S. forest area has been generally stable since 1920, when forest clearing for agriculture largely halted. In the northeastern U.S., forestland has actually increased substantially since 1900. As millions of acres of agricultural lands were abandoned, forests have increased in this, the most populous region of the nation, from less than half the land area to more than two-thirds, an increase of more than 40 percent, or 26 million acres (Final 1997 RPA Tables 2001).

Today forest cover encompasses about one-third of the U.S. land area and half the land area east of the Mississippi River. This is about twothirds of the forest cover that is estimated to have existed in 1500 (MacCleery 1992).

American forests are, on balance, more mature than they were a half century ago. Because forest growth nationally has exceeded harvest and forest mortality for at least a half century, average forest biomass per acre in the U.S. has increased by at least onethird since 1950. In the East and South, biomass per acre has almost doubled since 1950. An exception to these general trends occurs in Pacific Coast forests, where the average biomass per acre has remained relatively stable from 1952 while the volume of trees greater than 17 inches in diameter dropped by one-third  (USDA/Forest Service 2001). The suite of tree and other woody species that  today comprise U.S. forests are largely the same as those present in 1500, although the ages and relative proportions are often substantially changed. Introduced diseases have relegated some former widespread tree species to a minor component, e.g., American chestnut in the eastern hardwood forests. As of 1997, plantation forests constitute a relatively small proportion (about six percent) of U.S. forest area (Brooks 1993) (Final 1997 RPA Tables 2001). In contrast to many other countries, virtually all U.S. forest plantations are comprised of native species.

The U.S. of 1970 vs. today

Similarly to the late 1800s, the 1970s were a period of environmental awakening and concern. Some refer to this period as the second national conservation movement. Environmental concerns found focus in air and water pollution, and particularly concerns over how pesticide use and industrial pollution were affecting human health. Federal legislation enacted during this period reflects this concern. In enacting the National Environmental Policy Act (1970), the Clean Air Act (1970), the Clean Water Act (1972), the Endangered Species Act (1973), the Toxic Sub-stances Control Act (1976), and the Safe Drinking Water Act Amendments (1977), Congress and the Admin-istration sought to protect environ-mental values while allowing for continued development and economic expansion.

Prompt reforestation after harvest is a top priority for virtually all of the nation’s public and private forest landowners. In fact, in many states—Oregon included— reforestation is legally required. Annual reforestation peaked at slightly more than 3 million acres in 1989. Since 1950, nearly 95 million acres have been replanted. [Source: R.J. Moulton, USFS; Tree Planters Notes, 1999] More than 18 million seedlings were planted on Weyerhaeuser land following the 1980 eruption of Mt. St. Helens.

The Clean Air and Clean Water Acts of the 1970s led to actions that resulted in substantial environmental gains: air quality has been steadily improving in U.S. cities. Sulfur dioxide emissions are down over 30 percent; lead emissions are down over 95 percent since 1970; and particulates are down over 80 percent since 1950 (CEQ 1989).

Most U.S. rivers and lakes are measurably cleaner than they were two decades ago. While perhaps justified for human health reasons, improved air and water quality have benefited both the human and non-human inhabitants of the planet, as evidenced by the improving populations of fish and aquatic wildlife in U.S. rivers and lakes. Fish and wildlife have staged significant comebacks in many rivers and lakes that were severely degraded or even biologically dead two decades ago. There have been increases in the populations of egrets, herons, osprey, geese, largemouth bass, and other fish and wildlife associated with the improved water quality of countless rivers and lakes across the country.

Improved water quality, in combination with elimination of the widespread use of persistent chlorinated hydrocarbon pesticides, have led to increasing populations of many raptors, such as bald eagles, peregrine falcons, pelicans and osprey, which had seen major declines during the 1950s and 60s.

Not all trends have been positive. Trends in 406 U.S. breeding bird species between 1966 and 1996 indicate that 27 percent are increasing, 25 percent decreasing, and there is no trend for the remaining 49 percent (Flather et al 1999). Many of the bird species that are declining belong to groups or “guilds” dependent upon specific habitat conditions and types, e.g., grassland habitats. Langner et al. (1994) reported that “(n)ative, endemic grassland birds declined in the past 25 years more consistently, and across a broader geographic range than any other group of birds. The substantial decline in grassland birds is confirmed by Robinson (1997). Meadowlarks, bobolinks, Henslow’s sparrow, and upland sandpipers and other grassland birds have shown large and consistent declines. Other species which have shown declines are those that have specialized or niche habitats. For example, freshwater mussels, crayfish, amphibians, and some freshwater fishes lead the list of U.S. species at risk (Stein and Flack 1997). In the U.S., habitat loss and alteration and displacement by invasive exotics are leading causes of species endangerment (Stein and Flack 1997).

Neotropical migratory birds have also been the focus of concern. Of 132 neotropical migrants, 27 percent have shown population declines since 1966 (Flather et al 1999). Habitat fragmentation is suspected as a cause for these declines. The modification of lower canopy layers by excessive populations of white-tailed deer may also be contributing to the decline of those neotropical migrants that nest in these habitats (Robinson 1997).

More than half of the wetlands in the coterminous U.S. have been converted to other uses since colonial times. Wetlands have been reduced from an estimated 11 percent to about five percent of the land area of the coterminous U.S. (Dahl & Johnson 1991). Most of this loss occurred during the settlement period, but relatively large losses also occurred from the mid-1950s to the mid-1970s, when about 460,000 acres were being lost annually. From the mid-1970s to today, the rate of wetland loss has been progressively reduced. Flather et al (1999) estimated the annual wetland loss between 1982 and 1992 at 79,000 acres annually—a 70 percent reduction in the rate of wetland loss observed during the ten-year period from the mid-1970s to the mid-1980s, or a 0.07 percent average annual loss. Reductions in the rate of wetland loss can be attributed to increased understanding of the environmental value of wetlands (as expressed in individual and federal and state regulatory action to protect wetlands). During the decade of the 1990s the main cause of wetland loss shifted from agriculture to urban expansion.

Lessons of the Past Provide a Critical Foundation for the Future

In 1920 harvest from America’s forests was nearly twice the growth rate. But today growth exceeds harvest by a comfortable margin, and has since the early 1960s. Credit conservation measures and steadily increasing forest productivity on private forestlands. [Source: Forest Resources of the United States, 1997; GTR-NC-219, USFS, 2001; TIM].

Today, the U.S. has almost four times the population it had in 1900, living at a substantially higher standard of living. Yet our forests and wildlife are, in many of their major dimensions, in generally better condition today than they were a century ago.

U.S. forests and wildlife have demonstrated a resilience and responsiveness to management undreamed of by early conservationists at the turn of the century. These leaders were almost universally pessimistic about the future. In their defense, the concerns of early conservationists were logical and understandable given what they saw going on around them. Indeed, they were projecting what they felt would likely occur if past trends continued, and no actions were taken to address the concerns they raised.

But action was taken. New policies were debated and implemented. History has demonstrated that past public policies, coupled with the natural resilience of the resource, have generally served the country well.

America’s forests were also the beneficiaries of a number of major technological changes that collectively acted to substantially reduce the pressure being placed on them to meet human demands. Conversion from wood energy to fossil fuels took a huge burden off American forests, particularly as population levels continued to grow. Today’s farmers, on average, grow five times more food per acre that their grandfathers did in the 1920’s. Because of this, the inexorable, three century-long conversion of U.S. forests to farmland largely halted in the 1920s.

It is inevitable that as past issues have been successfully addressed, new issues and problems will emerge. Frequently identified issues in the U.S. include: reduction and fragmentation of late successional forest habitats because of timber harvesting; loss and degradation of riparian and wetland forest habitats; loss and deterioration of the forest and grassland habitats that once were created by frequent, low intensity fire; habitat fragmentation because of residential subdivision and urban development; effects of air pollution on forests in some areas; and displacement of native species by introduced exotics, to name a few. Of particular concern are rare and unique ecosystem types and species with specialized habitat requirements that are associated with them.

One of the most profound changes in American society in the 20th century has been its transition from a rural, agrarian society to an urban, industrialized nation. This change has been accompanied by a corresponding physical and psychological separation of its people from the land that sustains them.

In a world of farms, forests, and small towns, the linkages between food and fields and between forests and home and hearth were clear and sustained by personal experience. In a world of cities and suburbs, of offices and air conditioning, those linkages have become more obscure, and for many people, virtually non-existent. Yet today’s urbanized society is no less dependent upon the products of its forests and fields than were the subsistence farmers of America’s past.

Yet society remains dependent upon forests for a wide variety of economic products. Indeed, utilization of forests for products has never been higher than it is today on a wood volume basis. Today, the U.S. consumes about as much wood on a tonnage basis as the total for most other raw materials combined—steel, plastics, aluminum, other metals, and cements.

The debate over the use of forests has intensified several trends: 1) a substantial reduction in timber outputs from federal and other public lands, 2) an increasing use of high yield plantations on private lands, and 3) increased imports of forest products from other countries, particularly from Canada. These trends raise complex economic, social, environmental and even ethical and moral issues that will need to be addressed by the public, policy-makers, and forestland managers in the early 21st century as they continue to explore the road to sustainability.

List of References

Arno, S.F. 1985.
Ecological effects and management implications of Indian fires. In Proceedings: Symposium and workshop on wilderness fire. November 15-18, 1983. Missoula, MT. Intermountain Forest and Range Experiment Station, General Technical Report INT-182, USDA/Forest Service. Ogden, Utah.

Bonnickson, Thomas M. 2000.
America’s Ancient Forests: From the Ice Age to the Age of Discovery, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., New York.

Few stories more vividly underscore the nation’s progress in conservation and forestry than the much celebrated “return” of the New England forest. Land clearings for farming and livestock took a heavy toll on forests in Vermont, Connecticut and New Hampshire. By the mid-1800s less than half the region was still forested, but today 79 percent is forested again. [ Regional Silviculture of the U.S, 1980, Forest Resources of the U.S., 1997 and GTR-NC-219, 2000]

Brooks, D.J. 1993.
U.S. forests in a global context. USDA/Forest Service, General Technical Report RM- 228, 7/93.

Butzer, K.W. 1990. The Indian legacy in the American Landscape. In The Making of the
American Landscape, ed. Michael P. Conzen, pp. 27-50. Boston. Unwin Hyman.

CEQ 1989.
Environmental Trends. Council of Environmental Quality, Executive Office of thePresident, Washington, DC.

Cronon, W. 1985.
Changes in the land: Indians, colonists, and the ecology of New England. Hill and Wang. New York, N.Y.

Cronon, W. (ed.). 1995.
Uncommon ground: toward reinventing nature. Norton, New York.

Dahl, T.E. & C.E. Johnson 1991.
Wetland status and trends in the cotermimous U.S.: mid-1970’s to mid-1980’s. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. Department of the Interior, Washington, D.C.

Denevan, W.M. 1992.
The pristine myth: the landscape of the Americas in 1492. Annals of the Association of American Geographers. Vol. 82, No. 3.

Doolittle, W.E. 1992.
Agriculture in North America at the time of contact: A reassessment. Annals of the Association of American Geographers. Vol. 82, No. 3.

Fedkiw, J. 1989.
The evolving use and management of the nation’s forests, grasslands, croplands, and related resources. General Technical Report RM-175,
September 1989, Washington, DC: USDAForest Service.

Langner L.L. & C.H.
Flather 1994. Biological diversity: status and trends in the U.S. USDA/ Forest Service, General Technical Report RM-244, Rocky Mountain Forest and Range Experiment Station, Ft. Collins, CO. 4/94.

MacCleery, D.W. 1992.
American forests: a history of resiliency and recovery. USDA/Forest Service, FS-540. In cooperation with the Forest History Society, Durham, North Carolina. Robinson, S. 1997. The case of the missing songbirds. Consequences Magazine, 6/97.

Stein, B.A. and S.R. Flack.
1997. 1997 Species report card: the state of U.S. plants and animals. The Nature Conservancy, Arlington, Virginia.

Trefethen, J.B. 1975.
An American crusade for wildlife. Winchester Press and the Boone and Crockett Club. New York, NY.
USDA/Forest Service. 2001. Forest Resources of the United States, 1997. General Technical Report NC-219, St. Paul, Minn., North Central Experiment Station.

Williams, M. 1989.
Americans and their forests: an historical geography. Cambridge University Press. New York.

 

"We must always consider the environment and people together, as though they are one, because the
human need to use natural resources is fundamental to our continued presence on earth."