Subject: Tree Tips--Inactive Forest Management--8/17/01

Inactive Forest Management

August 17, 2001

All of our forestland in California is managed. This includes several kinds

of active management that readily come to mind, such as planting,

harvesting, fighting fires (remember that even the decision whether or not

to fight a fire is a management decision), erosion control, and restoration

work. But it also includes something we call inactive management.

Inactive management has a profound effect on the forest. It is a conscious

decision that nothing will be done in order to "let nature take its

course". The belief is that the forest will revert to a functional,

sustainable, ecologically well-balanced ecosystem. The factor that is

overlooked is fire. The results are overgrown forests and forests that

shift from a mixture of species that love light and those that love shade

to forests heavily skewed to those species that can survive in and

reproduce in shaded conditions.

Our forests evolved with and depended on fire to keep them healthy and

diverse. Fires thinned out stands of trees, providing sunlight for

sun-loving species and leaving more resources for trees that remained, in

effect giving the survivors more food on their dinner plates. When fire is

excluded, as it has been for decades by those brave men and women we rely

on to protect our homes and property, forests become overcrowded. They

become stressed, more vulnerable to insect and disease attacks. So long as

we suppress fires, and there is no doubt that we will continue to do so, we

must understand that we cannot by doing nothing successfully return forests

to the ecological balance of the times before humans began manipulating them.

As an interesting note, I recently visited two properties along the central

coast in areas hit hard by the Sudden Oak Death syndrome. These were

properties that had been actively managed, one for over 30 years, under

selection silviculture (harvesting of individual trees and small groups of

trees). What I noticed was that in surrounding areas, there were a lot of

dead tanoaks. On the properties I visited, there were very few dead tanoaks.

Now it may just be coincidence that the stands with fewer trees had less

evidence of this disease, and it is possible that the disease will

eventually hit those stands as hard as it has hit surrounding stands. But

it just may be that the trees that have more sunlight, water and nutrients

available are better able to fight off the disease. We know so little about

the disease, it is hard to say. What we do know is that crowded trees are

more stressed than thinned-out trees.

The point is that it is important to understand that inactive management is

a form of management. Whether under active or inactive management, all

forestland in California is managed.