| A unit of Lasting Forests
evolving since March 30, 1999 |
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A Total Forest Management Plan
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Crescent |
A cautious, modern, sophisticated approach to watershed management developed for private rural lands within the western Virginia region.
There is not much new in the world. Most things are new arrangements, new perspectives on the same old things. Many are re-formulations and syntheses of things seen and known. Crescent or the Crescent strategy is just such a thing. When 20 somewhat new things are put together in new sequences and arrangements and used in ways that other people have not used them, then we think the results is new.
Crescent includes many such things.
We have read, studied, and attended conferences about watershed management for over 30 years. There have been major efforts within the former Soil Conservation Service to encourage watershed management. For years, leaders have suggested, even pleaded for, improved work on watersheds and have advised using a watershed approach to land use planning and actual use. That concept is just one that is developed and used within The Trevey and presented here. Watersheds have been a part of the literature of planning for 50 years or more. The US Fish and Wildlife Service is said to have recently adopted a watershed basis of operation.
We are of the "glass half empty" school; we do not think that there have been major advances and improvements in the acceptance and demonstrated use of the research findings or the active use of the watershed concept in planning. There are some exceptional projects, but these do not deny the observation. Conventional watershed management promotion and practice have not worked (as judged by many criteria). An alternative is needed.
Opposing watershed-based planning will seem to go against the tide of convention and rhetoric, but it is needed and the sooner it is started, the better we will all be. The Trevey and the people whom it serves can lead in this effort. One place where the Crescent strategy diverges from past activity is, briefly, in an answer to: Why should we average and aggregate and group knowledge of land when we now have detailed data on every 100 x 10 meter tract of land in the tract? The North-facing slope is well known to be very different from the South-facing slope of a typical watershed. Why assume that they are the same throughout an area for runoff, percolation, evaporation, or transpiration? Fog drip, for example, is capable of causing differences in perceived precipitation of 10-25 inches within local forests. The drip under a tree stand is likely to be different from that in a pasture in the same watershed. The only real needs for watershed work are for analyzing and predicting runoff and sediment relations. (We use these to relate to the costs (of floods) and benefits to water quantity, quality and the fishery.) Intensive watershed analyses can be used for estimating, measuring, and predicting these 2 parameters. The stream or river is the performance measure of the working land system. It can be depicted by annual hydrographs and thermographs, both of which are primarily determined by the surface geologic and geomorphic setting and vegetation cover of the streamsides. "Primarily" is a key word because hidden behind it is a value judgement that probably changes with objectives and related topics such as flooding risks, landscape esthetics, and publication policies for scientific journals.
The Fishery staffs can ask and answer questions about sediment and runoff. Otherwise, the Crescent strategy is that is doing comprehensive total system management, using the detailed and integrative power of the GIS. It includes an effort to stop forcing things into watershed "boxes." The watershed-oriented effort gives us no advantages, limits some work (groundwater analyses and management), ads to some work (plant and animal species analyses), adds extraneous information to some work (e.g., wide-ranging wild animals or animals with very narrow ranges and most fossil fuel extraction analyses), and prevents us thinking about the unique spots of the Forest (the 10 x 10 GIS pixel each having 200 known factors stored) that are only very peripherally linked (or linkable) to costly-gotten information about the watershed.
"Watershed based" sounds good, was once a big improvement over the older ways of land unit planning, but now has been surpassed and a superior alternative is available. Let the watershed stay the topic of observation and analysis for people interested in runoff and sediment Otherwise, use other structures for planning that can be aided by the GIS.
We believe that there is a valid and viable alternative and we call it Crescent Management for it is unlike traditional or classic work in the field. It is different enough to deserve a special name. The name is not important and almost any name can be used, but herein we use this specific phrase to symbolize a modern, sophisticated approach to practical decision-based work on the land that addresses runoff, sediment, morphology, and groundwater recharge in Eastern US watersheds. Equally important, it addresses the costs, risks, and benefits derived from the watershed for the people of the area (their employment, schools, and communities), for visitors and for the state and national citizenry.
Things we think we now know about watersheds ...
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Its elements:
We operate as if we do not need boundary-based management areas that are the same as large watershed boundaries. The watershed boundary is essential for doing analyses of land cover for estimating sediment loads, runoff, and potential groundwater recharge. We can tolerate the watershed boundary as an extra dimension of small area, pixel-based work for all resources or all cost factors such as soil erosion. We do need to improve watersheds but not constrain planning to thinking within the boundary-box. With ability to estimate conditions within any 10 x 10-meter land pixel in any watershed boundary, it seems silly to add or aggregate this information gathered and stored at such high costs.
One word, "watershed", can have many meanings so the admonition to manage them can also have many meanings. We think there can be a big difference between a north- and south-facing slope of a watershed, and between conditions near the ridges and down in the valley. There are profound differences within each watershed. Each is unique for it is compused of unique entities. Averaging all of the factors, assuming that everything within a boundary is the same average value seem unwise.To aggregate is to lose data and the ability to transform it into ecologically or economically relevant values. We can keep data separate as long as possible within the computer, then use models to synthesize factors into key decision alternatives.
We propose that Crescent Management be integrated throughout the area over time.
Addressing a very big problem very briefly is very difficult.
Assumptions
We all have assumptions about the system with which we work, the present rules and policies, and the likely future. Often disagreements arise because of disagreements about assumptions, not the nature of the problem or even its solution. Some assumptions made in writing this paper:
A watershed is the designated land above a point on a stream, river, lake, or sinkhole. It is a unit of land and its water, a subsystem.
This unit presents strategies for a region roughly known as western Virginia.
The strategy is useful for the National Forests but particularly private land owners of the region. (See Regional Forester Estill's message of Fall 1999 , addressing a regional Perspective.)
There will be minimum support (additional funds, staff, projects, etc. within the Forest Service Region) for the concept or for implementing it. It is unlikely that there will be many new roads and there will be only limited funds used on the current system.
Needs: Rapid adoption; minimum delays; minimum tax dollars invested.
Diverse activities are needed. Harvests of wood (or not harvesting it) may be a means to achieve other objectives.
Needs for road maintenance.
Needs for school funds and other financial opportunities resulting from timber sales
A limited working year (fewer than 180 active days)
Starting at the End (for a Change ...)
We believe that land management must begin at the end, that is, by trying to see or think through what we would imagine the desired and result would be from a really effective program of work over a few years. Describing and listing the desired benefits, is difficult. The concept is one of citizens establishing goals and objectives as best they can, then giving the professional land managers full range and responsibility to achieve those objectives cost effectively ... and to adjust those changes over the years as new knowledge becomes available, as wood processing changes, and as technology for managing and harvesting forests changes. The list of potential benefits is long and claiming them is more political than practical unless they are listed and quantified in terms of (1) demand, (2) relative importance or value, (3) probability of natural occurrence, and (4) peoples' willingness to substitute other benefits for them. Each item in the list of benefits has, for example, different importance or value ... and to different people ... and it is changing over time as people age and as people shift around in the mobile society, and as their financial status changes. Hitting a moving target does not call for a rifle but a shotgun ... and that analogy fails since the shotgun (the resource base itself) is moving. It is very difficult for most people to state clearly exactly what they want, i.e., their objectives. They know their own limits, doubt whether they could be specific for their spouse or children (whom they know best); and have grave doubts about being specific for "the publics" objectives. They do, however, feel confident in stating things that are undesireable and already fixed in laws, regulations,a nd policies. Once that is well done, and somehow removed, the remainder is a vast area of possibilities, the area within which a variety of people, changing over time, and with new ideas and needs, can begin to creatively achieve their objectives.
Land The land of ownerships (both earth and water), is the classical resource base. "We need to get the acre to produce benefits" might be the thought of one forester. "We want the acre to provide services, unimpaired," might be the thought of another. We hold: services and benefits arise from managing well the land volume ...the surface and the volume above and below it ... for the long term.
Part of the old multiple use, wilderness, and other forestry literature was the premise that you cannot meet the needs of everyone from every acre. Hopefully that does not need to be debated again. One acre that provides for sparrows and small mammals as food for the raptors cannot be expected to grow abundant pileated woodpeckers and flying squirrels. Neither can an area good for Frisbees and picnics be equally great for the thoughtful wilderness walker. Each acre can, however, produce many benefits in many categories.
We easily lose sight of a principle of scale when working with the large acreages of the Forest Service or the multiple owners of the forests of the region. Area (or the associated volume of the alpha unit) is more important than type or age in determining benefits potentially derived from the forests. Even a very low production of any resource on an average acre, when multiplied by 100,000 or more acres, can be a very big number. The number of acres in an age class or the number of acres in a type or the number of acres treated is usually more important than the characteristic of the site.
A New (Old) Way to Think about the Land of the Forest
Watershed management was once important and it still is if the topic is runoff and sediment control and the stream fishery, but we now have computer mapping and we no longer have to average and assume that the north-facing slope of every stream is like the south-facing slope ... when we know they are not. Each acre is unique and it can be treated that way. The staff of Rural System has detailed maps of the region.
The Mid-Atlantic Water Region: The General Background
| 1Text from Cushman, R.M., S.B. Gough, M.S. Moram, and R.B. Craig. 1980 Sourcebook of hydrologic and ecological features:water regions of the coterminous United States. Ann Arbor Sciences Publishers, Inc. An Arbor, MI 126 pp. permission to include requested but publisher could not be located |
The Mid-Atlantic basin has an area of about 264,000 km2 (102,000 sq miles) and includes major rivers such as the Potomac, James, and Rappahannock that flow into the Atlantic Ocean and coastal bays. Major reservoirs are generally not important surface-water features, although some tributaries to the Delaware and Hudson systems are impounded. Coastal areas include the Chesapeake estuary (drowned-valley) system (Chesapeake Bay and the mouths of the Potomac, Rappahannock, York, and James rivers), Delaware Bay, the mouth of the Hudson River (including Upper and Lower New York Bay), and the extensive bays between the mainland and barrier beaches from Virginia to Long Island.
Surface waters in the Mid-Atlantic region are of medium hardness (60 to 120 mg/liter hardness as CaCO3) in the James River basin, the lower Hudson and Delaware river basins, and portions of the upper Susquehanna and Potomac river basins. They are typically soft <60 mg/liter hardness) elsewhere. Levels of TDS in surface waters may reach a few hundred milligrams per liter in the Mohawk-Hudson river system, in areas of eastern Pennsylvania and northern New Jersey, and in a belt including the highlands area of central Maryland and the Virginia-West Virginia border. Isolated areas in eastern Pennsylvania may have surface waters exceeding 350 mg/liters TDS. In other parts of the Mid-Atlantic region, TDS levels are generally below 120 mg/liter. Stream TSS levels, although generally less than 270 mg/liter throughout the region, may be higher (270 to 1900 mg/liter) in isolated Piedmont areas of eastern Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia. The hydrologic response characteristics (the percent of annual precipitation that appears as quick flow in small streams), an index of flood potential area, generally showed a stable flow response to precipitation (a hydrologic response of <8%), although some Piedmont areas had a "flashier< hydrologic response (8-20%).
Regional water quality problems include severe thermal pollution, pesticides in the lower reaches of major river basins, and heavy metals, particularly in the more northern states (New York and Pennsylvania). Other toxic pollutants of concern in the region include Kepone (James River), phenols, and PCBs.
Saltwater encroachment in coastal areas as a result of groundwater pumping may increase dissolved solids in groundwater to 3000 mg/liter. In the Mid-Atlantic Region, the estimated amount of groundwater in storage ranges from 5.3 x 1011 to 1.3 x 1012 m3 (4.3 x 108 to 1.1 x 109 acre-ft) for the region. The aquifers are of four general types: unconsolidated coastal plain sediments; crystalline metamorphic and igneous rocks; consolidated sedimentary rocks; and glacial sediments.
The unconsolidated deposts of the Atlantic Coastal Plain consist primarily of sand, clay, and gravel. The sediments range in thickness from 0 to 2,438 m (0 to 8,000 ft) and are hydraulically interconnected to varying degrees. Wells completed in surficial material no deeper than 91 m (300 ft) can produce up to 126 liters/sec (2000 gpm).
The crystalline igneous and metamorphic rocks produce water from fractured and weathered zones. Well yields are typically less than 3 liters/sec (50 gpm); although yields of 0.9 liters/sec (15 gpm) are considered average, some wells produce as much as 25 liters/sec (400 gpm). The groundwater quality is excellent. The consolidated sedimentary rock aquifers are primarily fractured sandstone and solutioned limestone/dolomite. Although some well yields from the folded and faulted rocks of the Valley and Ridge province exceed 63 liters/sec (1000 gpm), most wells produce much less. The groundwater derived from limestone is hard; alkalinity is also a problem. However, the general quality is good to excellent. The sedimentary rocks of the Appalachian Plateaus province are approximately horizontal, and the limestone and sandstone bodies are interbedded with coal seams and shales. The average water well produces from 3.8 to 12.6 liters/sec (60-200 gpm). The groundwater quality is usually good, except in the vicinity of coal-mine areas, where high iron concentrations become a problem.
Glacial outwash deposits are a significant source of groundwater in the region. Many wells are capable of producing more than 63 liters/sec (1000 gpm). Groundwater from the glacial deposits is good except locally, where hardness and iron constitute a problem.
The aquifers are recharged directly at outcrop areas or by leakage from adjacent aquifers. Discharge is primarily to streams and wells, with some interaquifer flow.
In the Mid-Atlantic Water Resource Region, average annual runoff is equivalent to 320 x 106 m3/day (84 Bgd). Of the total off-channel water withdrawal of 200 x 106 m3/day (52 Bgd) in 1975, surface freshwater withdrawals accounted for about 83 x 106 m3/day (22 Bgd); saline water withdrawals averaged about 102 x 106 m3/day (27 Bgd). Groundwater contributed less than 11 x 106 m3/day (3 Bgd). About 7% of the freshwater withdrawn was actually consumed.
The primary user of water in the region is the self-supplied industrial sector, including electricity-generating utilities. Almost twice as much saline water as freshwater is used for condenser and reactor cooling. In contrast to water withdrawals, the greatest freshwater consumption is accounted for by the public supplies sector. Generation of hydroelectric power uses approximately 830 x 106 m3/day (220 Bgd), the Mid-Atlantic Region being the fifth-ranking region in this respect.
Projections to the year 2000 point to probable water-supply problems. Freshwater supply shortages, currently experienced in the Delaware and Potomac rivers, will probably be a factor in the Hudson and Susquehanna river areas as well. However, coastal siting, which is necessary for saline water use (currently the practice in the Lower Hudson, Delaware, and Chesapeake Bay areas), may be limited by site availability. The Water Resources Council has categorized the area, including southeastern New York, New Jersey, Delaware, and eastern Pennsylvania, as being among the nation's most critical in terms of energy-related water-supply problems. Available water supplies may be inadequate for power generation and related cooling needs by 1985.
The Mid-Atlantic Region contains a wide variety of physiographic features such as ridge and valley topography, Blue Ridge mountain terrain, piedmont, coastal plain, and glacial plains that affect aquatic ecological resources. Unglaciated portions of the region contain very few water bodies and virtually no natural lakes. Hot springs occur in a few areas, but their total water volume is insignificant. From an ecological standpoint, however, they are of great interest as research areas because the biotic communities they harbor are very different from those in adjacent waters. The region contains numerous highly productive estuaries--important nursery grounds for many commercial and sport fish and shellfish.
This Region receives the greatest municipal sewage loading of any region, a condition that has caused severe biotic degradation of its major rivers and of many of its lakes. Coal mining in Pennsylvania and Virginia has also caused considerable harm by eliminating trout from some areas and by virtually eliminating all biota from others. Major factors contributing to this degradation include sedimentation, acid drainage, and heavy metals input. Heavy metals from industries, pesticides, and the highest regional output of thermal effluents have contributed to the demise of the major rivers. Although few of these rivers are actively fished and recreation is curtailed on many, some recent progress has been made in reversing their degradation.
Watershed Analyses
So much for the broad view of the region, given above. Within The Trevey a break is made in an evolving concept of watershed management. The break has profound effects in resource planning and thus must be understood well.
| 2Regional Interagency Executive Committee (RIEC)(USFS) 1995. Ecosystem analysis at the watershed scale. USDA Forest Service, Regional Ecosystem Office, Portland, Oregon 26pp. |
The "watershed" is a good unit for land analysis and planning, but not good enough. It is better than the town, the farm, the corporate ownership, but not adequate. It was, before modern computers, the best idea available. Now that has changed. Computers are available and analyses can be made at any or all levels and scales --from 1 square meter up to 30 miles square -- readily. We no longer have to take the watershed -- a large area with utility for studying and solving many problems (but not all of them) -- as the perfect unit for land analysis. It is good, but not adequate for modern decision making. Many things, particularly water and things affected by gravity, are well-studied within watersheds. Bears, bees, butterflies, and birds are not. Perhaps beavers (Castor canadensis) are usefully studied and planned on a watershed basis, but even their population dynamics are more a function of fur market forces than of hydrologic forces. Even groundwater is not well studied within the watershed because it follows geological layers and channels that may bear no relation to the surface, to runoff, or to rainfall. An artesian spring may be re-charged by water several "watersheds" away.
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| Figure 2. Watersheds range in size and shape. A - at the base of a very large watershed where two rivers come together. These large areas are often called "basins." B - a large watershed. A topographic boundary rarely embraces the factors and objectives needed for decision making.D- A small watershed. E - a sinkhole usually in Karst topography. C- A triangular watershed rarely addressed in watershed research. The river "reach"is the receiving unit. There is no single or central "watershed point" unless all runoff is tallied as arriving at C* and the water from the zone, Z is unspecified. |
It may be that a watershed... "becomes an identifiable analysis unit useful for reporting the results, conclusions, and recommendations in sufficient detail to provide the context for management decisions." If "reporting" is the emphasis, this may be true but county, town, or corporation ownership boundaries may be equally useful. It seems good to be pragmatic. In RIEC (1995) is stated that characterizing and analyzing any ecosystem component ... "needs to be done at the scale appropriate for that component." There are so many components for which the watershed is not the proper scale that the point is lost. While areas between 20 and 200 square miles are reasonable for analyses, the significance of including watershed boundaries (or excluding relevant areas) is not well established.
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| Dover Ohio Research watersheds, Muskingum Watershed Conservancy District, 40-acre study areas of R.H. Giles. |
RIEC (1995) is useful, but not because of its watershed emphasis. Watershed analyses are designed to provide inputs to decisions. Analyses appear in plans, within The Trevey, only to affect decisions. "Watershed" is any area of land that tends (at least in concept) to drain water falling on it (any form) to a common point or to a common reach (Figure 1). There are different scales; little ones nest within large ones. Hiearchy may be:
The U.S.G.S. completed major mapping in 1987. Regardless of the scale and physical level selected, one analysis can draw context from larger-scale analyses and provide the context for analyses done at a smaller-scale.
The watershed analysis is of the relation of the water and the land. Analyses are made of the dominant factors that influence the water budget, the equation and factors being.
R = P - ET + S - A
When R = runoff
P = precipitation (all sources)
ET = evapotranspiration
S = storage (as in litter and soil absorption)
A = artesian springs and underground or groundwater additions
The key result of watershed analyses is the amount of runoff in the stream. Other claims and derivative observations are abundant -- about the entire hydrologic system and how any land use affects it or how water affects the land use. We look for physical, biological, and human processes or structures that affect these relationships, the budget. Obviously many factors are related to the elements of the equation. The equation is one way to help pull together a way to compute one results of a system, namely "runoff", to which most people can relate. It is a topic about which most people can at least decide whether they want more or less (but even this varies locally). It is not a bad topic as a means to start the process of large-area resource analysis and planning. It is not the best way to proceed; it is one way.
We utilize GIS maps of probable precipitation. We do not do detailed analyses of srorms and storm frequencies for we think Harlin's (1982) finding likely. It is that correlation between rain gages and stream gages do exist but there tends to be relative stability in rainfall attenuation (watershed response) factor while storm patterns may be quite disparate. In the region precipitation is fairly evenly distributed throughout the year. Future emphasis will be on (1) the amounts during the growing season, and (2) the amounts during unprotected and frozen periods (high probable runoff). Emphases are on peak precipitation and peak runoff potentials (since these levels have the greatest effects on erosion and non-point pollution).
| Absolute rates and volumes of runoff increase with watershed size; per-unit-area rates and volumes decrease |
We analyze each unit separately, then analyze uphill and downhill relations. It is the cumulative and sequential effects of very different alpha units that provides advantages of The Trevey analyses of watersheds. The watersheds are being analyzed at an appropriate wildland scale, several hundred acres, not at the "field level", not at the basin level.
The key water-related topics are:
There are so many water-related phenomena in a land area (these 16 or more) that to suggest that "more" need to be considered and included in plans and decisions sounds silly. That is the case, however, and mnay phenomena (e.g., economics, fire hazard, timber markets) are far removed from but profoundly affect the decision (any) in the watershed.
The analyses suggested within RIEC (1995) have been helpful. The analyses we propose, partially based on their work, is in two modes. One is for ponds and lakes, the other for streams. The differences in the analyses of an inpoundment, natural or made by people, large or small, is so different that for relatively free-flowing stream systems a distinction is needed as well as separate analyses.
The analytical pathway is:
We believe every acre is unique but we prefer to discuss 10 x 10-meter squares of land across the map. These are about basketball court size tracts. We call them alpha units and we know there are millions of them. They too are unique, but data which are now available for them makes more sense than the acre within which there is potentially very high variability. The 10 x 10 dimensions are a reasonable balance between too large and gross and too small to be practical. We hold: Use the knowledge we now have about each alpha unit of the region.
Fauna
The modern forester no longer uses "wildlife" any more that he or she only says "trees." Foresters discuss chestnut oaks on the ridges and white oaks in the flats and the suitability of coves for tulip poplars. The new forester discusses wild animal species. On most Jefferson Forest areas and other forests of the region of about 1000 acres there are about 200 large animals possible to be seen. That list is what some people call "diversity." Laws call for "Managing for diversity" but the meaning of that term is in doubt. Most technical discussions center on numbers of species and on forest types. The measures express evenness of distributions and numbers of types (The more even the better). Managing for 200 species is beyond current abilities without substantial investment in analyses and very specific fieldwork. We do know enough to manage actively for 200 species (and Waldon has demonstrated a technique for doing so for 40 species) but the assumptions above make such claims irrelevant.
Many people call wild plants "wildlife" and thus another 1000 items for management are added for consideration (having left out discussions of all of the important invertebrates, the food base of the larger forms of importance ...the butterflies and moths, the mosquitoes and ticks, and insects that are essential for pollinating many plants such as the wild orchids). There are too many species (over 2000) for intensive, species-specific management given current funding and staffing! It can be done; but it is not likely to be done without radical restructuring of government funding priorities and refuting the above assumptions. We hold that: to act like it will be done is unreasonable.
Wildlife is too general to be meaningful. What is good for one species may be very bad for another. "Good for wildlife" has absolutely no meaning (about as much as "the site is good for trees") and why it still persists has many hidden answers. We use wild animals (and only mean the large and conspicuous ones) and wild plants and immediately shift to discussing needs of each species. "Indicator species", which once sounded like a solution, has been shown to be a flawed concept, if not meaningless. We hold: we must manage for the wild animal triad: (1) the common game and pest species, (2) for the perceived-to-be-threatened-and-endangered species, and (3) for species richness (another word for number of different species and probably the meaning within the laws of "manage for diversity") dependent upon varied types, site qualities, and ages. (Reasserting: we desire to manage for all species, have knowledge to do so within practical limits, but have not the educated staff or support resources to do so.)
Surely wild faunal populations are controlled by (at least arguably significantly influenced) by natural factors of the environment, but is there a significant counter force? (Some would call it an interaction.) Do wildlife control or significantly effect the characteristics of a region? Whether "significant" or not might be tested by
Would we name the community differently if there were no wildlife?
How would the communities now recognized and named differ with many fewer (or more) wildlife? What species are essential to produce the widely recognized structure and dynamics of an area that allows general argreement that some specific area is a community with a specific name? Giles in his PhD discussed an ecoectomy, the experimental removal of animals to discover their ecological function. We believe that animals play a significant role in watershed processes, primarily through activities in the upper soil layers and leaf litter but are convinced that beyond their evident roles in communities, the variations in vegetation and geologic/soil factors prevent a realistic model of this role for a species to ever be developed.
The resulting key phrase: Progressively improving work in managing rural fauna for people.
Age
The forester standing in the woods asks: what is the age of this stand ...in this acre. Many forested acres of the Jefferson Forests and the region are uneven aged forest. The low chances of sprout control, of renewed clearcutting, or using expensive replanting in the face of the current deer population seedling losses suggests that future forests will still tend to be uneven aged (unless new very-gross age classes (20 year intervals) are adopted. Assuming 5-year age-class intervals, there are 20 such units in a 100-year span. Since what is known about the trees, plants, and animals at and after 100 years in this region is so poorly known, it is reasonable to assume that they are about the same at and after 100 years. Reasonable planning suggests adopting a 100-year horizon, then moving forward a year, every year.
The forester in the woods knows that animals are tightly linked to these age classes. Almost every one knows about sparrows and bluebirds in the first 2 age classes. We know about the large pileated woodpeckers in the old stands. Almost all of the bird and animal species of the forests of Virginia can be assigned very precisely to 1 to 3 age classes. Some are not very particular and are found in many age classes. Others have very narrow limits, art pretty particular ...and wishing it were different does not help. To have the species, there must be the age class. A stand that is 55 years old was "started" by a logging operation or fire about 55 years ago. There is no doubt; it could not be otherwise. Back then it was good for quail, towhees, and field sparrows ...and we can make a pretty detailed list. We can call up the information for the exact area from the Game Department's computer data bank. We can see and count some of the birds and other creatures in the forest now but the same data bank gives the whole list, not just the few that we see on one particular day of the visit to the woods. The forester, well educated in the modern university with abundant and diverse classes in ecology and wild animal work, knows that stand age is one of the most important aspects of describing a forest and estimating its potentials. We use "equivalent stand age" to express a standardized means to express the age of uneven-aged forests. We hold: we must concentrate on knowing equivalent stand ages and their distributions within the Forest and using that knowledge.
Forest Type
The forester knows that the creatures of the white pine forest are different than those of the red oak stand! Why the emphasis on stand age? Isn't forest type important? Of course, but in the final overall analyses, age is more important than type. Any prolonged discussion of these differences would be as meaningless as discussing "what pound of flesh?" in Shakespeare. All is important, but just because we can see and readily map type, that does not mean it is the most important factor in the world of wild animals, watersheds, scenic analyses, pollution controls, and evidently ... no matter what the discussion ...for logs! (Even for logs, we see Big is beautiful; we ignore type and lump things as hardwoods and softwoods.)
The forester knows that with resources the right species (collectively the type) can be gotten to grow into the future forest on the right sites. By knowing slope steepness, aspect (the direction downhill), and landform, and soil characteristics, the forester can list the trees that will grow best and be less stressed (thus hit with fewer insect or disease problems). These four features determine the stand type for the future. (Fire and human actions can change things.) The forester acts today, and that act persists for 150 years and within the act there are assumptions about stable general conditions, stable interest rates, low incidence of fire and insects, no poaching, and stable gasoline supplies for logging and recreationists. The assumptions are enormous! but they must be made about the consequences of the tree harvest act that will last for 150 years. The forester determines the age (by the selected timing of logging and strategy). The age and type determine (within 75%) the likely wild animal and plant associates likely to be present.
The land determines the benefits that may be derived over the future; it is both the set of potentials as well as the constraints or limits to production of benefits.
The current planning work is bound up by outmoded "zoning is planning", an idea still taught in some places and used extravagantly in many places. Planning seems to be an extension of area-regulation, a forester's phrase. It has all the sophisticated meaning of: If you have 1000 acres and you cut 10 acres each year, at the end of 100 years you can start cutting again in the tract where the first cut was made since it will have been growing while you were away for 99 years This ignores the well-known differences in the production of each acre (or alpha unit) due to moisture, slope, aspect, etc. The alternative to area regulation, one that is important to mills, is volume regulation. After a survey, an equal volume is removed each year; the area involved is unimportant.
An alternative is to assess the benefits that are produced in each type and each age class, then regulate harvests (variable in specified harvest date, and type, age, and location) to assure a stable or increasing output of benefits. This was Waldon's demonstration and it has been described and computed by Giles (http://fwie.fe.vt.edu/forestfauna/index.htm).
Since court cases have challenged state and federal agency's management efforts to manage for diversity and given the unclear definitions of that policy or requirement, it now seems that the only way it can be argued as being assured for the long run is to achieve over the region an even distribution of age classes (meaning: equal proportions of areas within each 5-year age class) within each forest type.
There are practical limits and to such a policy and they include:
After this, if the apparent (but yet debated) intent of diversity laws is to be achieved, we hold: constrained age and type regulation within alpha units is needed. At least such regulation needs to be studied carefully as an alternative to current area-regulation manifest in policy issues that discuss percentages and proportions of the Forest needed to be in certain types. By constraining or limiting the areas where actions are possible, the remainder of the land becomes the place where yet-unspecified goals and objectives may be sought by the people of today and the future. It is not regulated nor does it have planned actions. It is subject to existing guidelines for good practices on the land.
The forester in the woods in the center of an acre wants to know what to do with the acre (or the alpha unit). He/she can, with hand-held computer, enter the approximate age and major ecological factors and estimate a potential type. It can be compared with what is evident (from past fires, high grading, clearcuts, etc.) If very steep( over 35%), the suggestion will be "walk away." In the office, before going to the field, the computer map would have said, "do not go to these acres because we have made a first estimate that this acre is inoperable (SMZ, slope, endangered species, special use permit, etc.)".
Well, the forester is in an acre, enters the age and type and can produce a list of all of the snakes, toads and frogs, lizards, birds, and mammals likely to be in the area based on all historical data collections in Virginia for the past century. More work is needed to build and confirm the database (but the question remains: what will be done with the answer if a new entry is made? Where are the economics, the rational allocation of scarce technical, financial, and staff resources for the good of all of the owners of these public lands?)
Depending on the type of "regulation" selected (of the above-discussed types), the acre is scheduled for a cut that will fit into the regulation and create an acre moving through desired age classes for 100 or more years. It is an acre, playing its role, part of a team of acres producting benefits, not too many, not too few, over a planning period (within which changes and adjustments can be made (i.e., "adaptive management" of widespread Forest Service appeal).)
The marked wood to be cut must be bought. The benefits to the logger must equal the costs. The roads must be paid for by the removed wood. In some cases, the wood sale may not net a profit for the Forest. The once controversial "below value" sale must be re-engaged because the wood must be cut to achieve the desired age class within types (especially those sites with low value such as scarlet oak).
The forester doesn't really do much; he/she is not the logger. He/she is the diagnostician and "prescriber" taking the responsibility and making the profound prescription that will shape the forest for 100 years and its flow of benefits. He/she can explain what will be coming in terms of animals and plants, trees, deer harvests, (because of tree harvests) and explain why they will not be the same as in the past in areas (e.g., there being advanced ages and little browse ...but by plan ...and then when the next cuts will be made that will produce more forage ...and other desired products and services). Explaining and predicting well is part of the management process for the public, an act that helps match expectations with achievements.
On the acre, the forester will do as in the past: decide on road locations, protect the stream, note special areas for protection, mark trees to become snags for wild birds and small mammals; mark den trees; mark genetically superior trees; mark trees to be taken to clear a vista; survey dead and down wood and score watershed condition; mark around seeps for their protection; relate the acre to the touching tracts; note air pollution; note dens (bear); note trespass and fire potentials; do fire suppression planning; notify Game Department staff of potentials for violations; relate the acre to regional and local recreational trails; and note steps needed for avoiding erosion and for erosion control. There is plenty to do! Given the present and prospective staff and the few working days in a 5-year planning period, it is impossible for a forester to visit every stand for even one hour to do minimum analyses and prescriptions similar to the above. To plan and act as if this is possible (even tolerable, not to agree on "desirable") is irrational. The plan must be reasonable and match with conservative assumptions and a very careful, cost-effective strategy then developed to get professional out on the land armed with the resources they need for decisions.
The Natural Pathway to Production
Environmental factors determine site quality (site index) for trees and wild animal foods. The above managerial observations and actions, when implemented, are equivalent to the environmental factors of "site" when it comes to influencing the quality of the alpha unit in its potential for producing benefits. Foresters need a decision support system (Rauscher - USFS, Ashville), one that is small, practical, pointed at the age, type, and landform decisions they must reach to achieve the full range of benefits from each alpha unit for the future.
On an alpha unit, trees may be cut, say within groups as in "group selection", and the consequences from the land volume, the alpha unit, can be estimated for 100 years (in 5-year age-class responses) as to:
USFS staff members Hof and Bevers have a new book on spatial optimization that may influence the distribution of harvests within the broad ranges suggested above. This spatial optimization is essential for the future, but the above work needs to be adopted and implemented first. There will be time, based on past trends, for other improvements while the above is put in place. Later, some minor tradeoffs may be made to achieve a vastly increased present-discounted probable return from wood removed (well within the confidence limits imposed by any of the above and surely must be taken on the grounds of socioeconomic benefits).
Based on the assumptions and premises above, it seems like an alternative strategy for the future might be considered. It starts with the premise that we do not know what people need and we do not have a full inventory of all resources but that we do have the Forest and we know it well and we have laws, rules, guidelines and policies that are in effect now. These have been developed over the past by different people with very different needs and knowledge, and perhaps we could study the consequences of simply following them and seeing what might result ... and being willing to "go along", adjusting where any absolutely evident flaw in our logic or rules and assumptions failed us.
Ownership
Suppose we map only the land actually owned and that under option or easement ("our land", that of the Forest and that which is likely to be a part of the Forest within a year when the plan is approved). Call it Map 1.
Reserves
Next we make a map of all special use areas (picnic areas etc), equipment areas, bridge sites, borrow pits, mines, powerline rights of way, and similar diverse and relatively single use areas. W also make a separate map of designated wilderness, and non-motorized reserve areas. These are presently designated areas and in the Rare analyses. Yes, there are other uses for these areas (such as powerlines for songbirds) but we are trying to be practical, reasonable, and we know that all aspects of all properties will not be accounted. Gains are likely to balance out losses when dealing with items in this category at the scale of the Jefferson Forest. We call these reserves or reserved land, and not part of the major issues and problems of fairly intensive natural resource and land management. We assume that each of these will be important to staff of some state or federal office and will be properly managed, treated, fertilized, erosion controlled, aesthetically tended, etc. Citizen exceptions can be easily noted and implemented and do not have to be part of the planning process. The shaded map is Map 2. This is combined into one map ...with a boundary, one color representing all of the above, and white area meaning lands not in reserves. Call it Map 3.
Lands Inoperable
A map of areas within the Forest that cannot be operated on is made. These are swampy areas, cliffs, rock layer barriers, rivers, totally inaccessible areas and lands blocked by ownerships that are unlikely to change soon or to ever be presented for sale. Very steep lands will be addressed in a later section. It is Map 4, and must be developed with staff consultations
Steep Areas Watersheds include the channel, the channel edge or riparian zone, and the slopes. All land is eroding or moving to the ocean (of course there is uplift and subsidence, volcanism, and wind deposted soil). Gravity rules. Lands that are too steep for any operations and usually highly erosive or having rock that make costs very high are mapped. The criterion of 35% or greater is used. These areas are mapped and "laid aside" as if they were placed in the reserve areas. They remain for certain types of recreation. They continue to provide wild plants, small mammals, watershed percolation, nesting and den sites, mast for game animals, and esthetic values that change with the seasons. They produce different types, depending on their aspect and landform. Maybe they can or need to be used or investigated for use in the future but they are high cost and low priority-for-development lands.
The typical manager of watersheds is in a battle, a losing one, with gravity. Some erosion is normal and part of land form development. To most, costs to society can be ascribed. Gravity is a force that moves watewr by infiltration, percolation and flow through soil or across the surface. The Trevey seeks to get land into a condition so that soil erosion is minimum immediately after an above- average or extreme event (like a storm). Streams will tend to move horizontally across flood plains and will be fairly stable vertically. The stream channel, always changing, does so slowly, and cuts tend to equal gains. Sediment supplied to the stream channel is moved through the system by available water. Most watersheds have problems - the gravity battles - due to natural phenomena (like steep eroding soils in wilderness areas), lightning fires, tornadoes) or land use and development. "Non-point&qiot; pollution is mostly sediment from erosion, but it can include fertilizers, toxicants, and road salts ( and even poisons from natural geological deposits (e.g., arsenic). "Point" pollution is that out of a pipe as from a factory or road culvert. How to understand, analyze, and fix these problems (those natural or caused by people) is the intent of this unit.
Water, Wet Areas, and Their Zones
Next, we map (1) the boundaries of all ponds and lakes, (2) all streams (only second order or greater), (3) all "wildlife water holes" as points, and (4) seeps (where known; no new surveys) as points. This is our blue line and point map. Lines on maps can represent enormous acreages. These blue lines and dots are assumed to be without dimension.
Next, we shade in an area around each of these, at probably 100 feet or 30 meter intervals (because of computer limits). These areas represent a reasonable approximation of the minimum streamside protection zone or the riparian volume. The computer map can give the total acreage within this one-chain zone. (Tally it as a percentage if necessary, but (no matter what) it needs to be counted as outside of active, typical management and only subject to forester-regulated single-tree selection harvests. This blue-shaded area is the water zone that we protect at high cost. Wood can be removed but only in some areas and with great care and great risk to the decision-maker (on behalf of future citizens) if environmental impacts occur. (For example, there may be requirements to leave at least 85 percent of the forest canopy up to 75 feet from the edge of streams that have fish in them (third order or higher streams). From 75 feet to 150 feet from the edge of the stream, about two-thirds of the canopy would have to be retained. In addition, loggers would have to leave at least five large trees every 350 feet on both sides of the stream. These stream zones are not "waste" areas or reserves and out of management but they produce many recreational, esthetic, wildlife, risk reducing (wildfire-blocking), endangered-species sites, groundwater recharge, and fishery benefits. If the ground water table remains high, the nearby site index may remain high. (There are abundant situations in which lowering the table has reduced the site index and thus profitable production over large areas.) Half of the wild animal species of the Forest depend upon water in at least one of their life stages (other than for drinking water). These streams are important for wild animals and plants alone. The total acres in this 100-foot zone are important. They are placed under special management. A map is made. That map is called Map 5. It is combined with the above maps and is called Map 6.
Roads
Next we map roads. The classes of roads are readily available and mapped. Assuming average widths, we can estimate the total area within the boundary utilized by roads. We shade in a zone of 0.7-mile (straight-line distance) on all sides. This is the zone in which most hunting occurs and the only areas in which intensive work for game species (all species) will be recommended or supported since there will be few if any returns for investments made. We call this Map 7, the hunter's zone map.
The maintained trail zone map here
The Appalachian Trail and other recognized major trails are mapped and a 100-foot zone on each side is created. This is Map 8. It is subtracted from the following mapped area. Additional use will be made of the Trails map in mapping scenic vistas.
The potential logging zone map
Next we map a distance of 1.5 miles from all existing roads. There are many studies of cost-effective log-haul-distances and an alternative distance for the region may be substituted for this figure but this seems maximum. We subtract the water zones from this broad zone. We subtract the trails zone, map 8.
Using a slope map we subtract all areas within the above zone that have slopes greater than 35% (too steep for roads, and where runoff is excessive and erosion potentials high. We also subtract all areas with slopes greater than 15% that also have a southwest aspect (because of poor site and low reforestation potentials.) We also subtract the wilderness areas, known T and E species areas, etc. (discussed for Map 1).
Map 9 is from Morton and later work on the forested areas. Map 9 is a forest and shrubland map developed from Landsat (the latter class being so-called "early succession" stages since, except on Mt. Rodgers, there are no known permanent grasslands on the forest.
Scenic Vistas
From every 500-foot interval along all roads and mapped trails the computer will draw a circular zone of potential viewing area. Blocking agents will be included. All areas inside the logging zone seen from many such viewing points will be mapped (typically more than 5). In a heavily roaded area it is impossible to avoid a logging area being seen. This scenic vista map marks the areas where any cut will very likely be very conspicuous. The map does not prohibit cutting in such areas, only marks special management needs. It also marks where special attention may be given to harvests to enhance autumn leaf coloration.
Appraising the Progress
Before discussing other maps and mapping, is may become evident that the remaining area within this last shaded road zone is all of the area within which it is reasonable to consider any type of logging for any purposes. This is the area within which it is legal, matches policy and guidelines, and begins to be able to achieve socioeconomic objectives (i.e., allowing private loggers to profit from removing wood and mills to gain pulpwood). We have not yet mentioned a single forest type, a single wild animal or plant, or a proposed new reservation. It is all of the land within the region where logging can possibly be used to achieve the objectives of the system. (Further refinements may be made based on soil, geology, moisture, value of the wood, proximities, and available equipment and other conditions.) Given the total area of the ownership, the area for active, intensive ecosystem management is small.
Within this area we may map the forest types (using classifications of the national Society of American Foresters or those slightly revised based on Landsat and field analyses). The next maps are slope, aspect, and landform. We use these and Landsat to determine forest type for each acre. There are about 20 well-recognized types. We make a table of the acreages within each type and estimate the percentages (for general interest). We isolate a type such as Table Mountain Pine, make a map of only this type, and then ask: given that there are plant and animal assemblages associated with this type, can we somehow over the next 20 years create a Forest that has 20 different age classes of this particular type? It is likely that there are less than 100 such sites within the potential logging zone, but for illustration, we can assume that there are 100 sites of a few acres each. To achieve the objective (argued as appropriate in general, above) we would have to cut or girdle 5 sites and burn them (to get the re-generation needed). Because of the extreme conditions, costs, and low value of such trees and sites, and the unlikelihood of a bidder on a logging chance we may decide not to do this. This decision would reduce the score for the Forest in achieving the desired mixture of age classes within each type. The importance of such a high diversity score will only become evident to the forester in the future.
Elsewhere we may get excellent distributions of age classes of white oaks (within that type, meaning that we have the same proportion of acres within each age class, old trees being harvested and that site becoming the 0-5 year class .... area-regulated harvests by age and type to achieve diversity timber yields, watershed protection, deer and turkey forage, and other Forest benefits.
What of the region outside of the mapped zones and logging zone? Nothing! It is there for beauty, recreation of all types, and especially for watershed protection and ground water re-charge, and site restoration (after years of high-grading, etc.). All benefits from each alpha unit are computed. The dynamics of the forest are within the potentially logged zones and other areas experiencing wildfires and the well-known and profoundly important gap-dynamics of the hardwood forests of the Appalachians.
Other potential management strategies include: extensive diverse trail networks; road recovery and stabilization; type replacements within the potential logging zone; energy- wood plantations on computer-selected sites; dedicated wildlife viewing areas; boardwalks in inoperable areas; extensive road turnoffs for viewing and logging safety; etc. There is much to be done. A well-regulated forest can be created, a demonstration of complex, management of many resources, all concentrated on achieving a diversity of poorly specified but heartfelt objectives of many citizens. The resulting benefits are potential and achieved or achievable over the longrun -- here being 100 years as the horizon but sliding forward a year, every year.
We progressively attempt to understand the volume of water likely to occur in each month of the year at points (designated W) throughout each ownership and the region answering "Who or what is affecting my land?", and below the land, the citizen's question: " What are the effects of of my land use practices below my land?"
The analyses are of :
"Producing benefits from a fishery" may be a "process" but it is treated as a separate system. It has to be actively included because half of the large wild animals species of the area have one or more life phases directly related to water (waterfowl, fish, furbearers, many birds, amphibians, uncounted insect species).
Using the old-age class or ancient forests as a basis for comparing channel flow is bothersome for many people. In getting 5000 acres of scarlet oak within the mapped logging zone to the desired age distribution, it may take many years, but the objective and progress will be known and observations possible . Many species do not replace themselves. It will take the best knowledge of silvics and silviculture to achieve the desired reproduction after logging. It may be necessary to get the desired type in another area (other than the one harvested, because it cannot be done by currently known techniques.). Some forests are a result of unusual fires and the type is inappropriate for the species now growing there. Baseline comparisons will be needed.A patchwork of group-selection, patch cuts, and (where demonstrated essential for Type restoration), some modern clearcuts will be required. Intensive deer harvests and even fencing will be needed in cooperation with the Game Department and others to reduce deer pressure and allow necessary regeneration and plant replacement. Where volunteers are available, understory plants may be gleaned from harvest areas and re-planted within the type. The Trevey will one day show an estimate of the current condition but also show extreme values, high (as if a bulldozed land surface) and low (as if a dense 200-year old forest), as context and basis for deciding on the direction, rate, and expenditures for improving and fixing the area.
A Watershed Score
We have created a scoring technique for answering how would we know we have restored the watershed, when it is "healthy", and when can we allocate our limited resources elsewhere?
The score, called W*, is computed as:
W* = (1.0 - (
| rm - rm*| / rm*)) x 100
where rm* is the runoff in a month at the wilderness or 80%-of-wilderness runoff level (a zone of performance). The absolute value (within the vertical bars, plus or minus) allows for both excessive runoff as well as deficits to be counted. The score may reach zero in a month. It is a cumulative, total-year score (summed over all months of the hydrologic year.) W** is used expressing a sliding mean of W* and under management the trend will show a stable high or increasing value. To achieve a high W* score, watersheds should now ...or be changed, then maintained in
In most cases, work on a degraded stream channel starts at a point in the stream and works upward. Work on vegetating slopes operates in the opposite direction. Prevent, reduce, or restore decisions need to be debated. The needs are to fix the watersheds. People know an enormous amount about land and water after having spent millions of dollars on research. Now it is time to sort and synthesize that work and bring it to bear in a practical way through computer systems on separate areas of a vast region of Virginia.
No one knows the region well enough to be able to sketch the maps that will result from use of the above computer maps. Until the maps are available (and they can now be done at low cost), guess work on artificial boundaries, appeals to "diversify", and over-emphasis on watershed boundaries, need to give way to careful attention to the areas where active logging is possible as a means to achieve other objectives. Many other objectives of many people with diverse interests can probably be satisfied from the other acres of the region. Describing them and enumerating them may be what is needed to suggest a level of satisfaction not yet perceived.
In the last of the 1970s we did watershed analyses and made workshop presentations related to their role in mining for the US groundwater agency in Virginia. Our tables contained the following parameters, under the premise that when a manager or analysis has all of the information likely to be available about an entity, then analyses become relatively easy, differences conspicuous, hypotheses and questions jump out of the numbers because there is a possibility of testing them, and tests of hypotheses readily run (rather than ignored or added to a "wish-list" or a "to-do" list). Those computer programs have been lost, but perhaps the concept will last, the variables refined(
Martin, S. M. 1988. Select geomorphological components of wildlife habitat in the Ridge and Valley Province of Virginia. Unpub. M.S. Thesis, Va. Poly. Inst. and State Univ., Blacksburg, Va. 203 pp.) and the work can be re-done with new technology for more widespread applications.
| Representative Drainage Density Table | ||||
| Stream Order | Feet / Acre | Miles / Sq. Mi. | Meters / Hectare | Kilometers/sq.km. |
| 1 - 6 | 58.83 | 7.13 | 44.29 | 4.42 |
| 2 - 6 | 57.49 | 6.97 | 43.30 | 4.33 |
| 3 - 6 | 47.89 | 5.80 | 36.07 | 3.60 |
| 4 - 6 | 27.21 | 3.29 | 20.49 | 2.05 |
| 5 - 6 | 11.74 | 1.42 | 8.84 | 0.88 |
| 6 | 2.64 | 0.32 | 1.98 | 0.19 |
Energy Areas
Having only mildly suffered the energy shortages of the 1970s, those people do not want a recurrence of that condition or anything worse. Experts agree on the coming crisis in fossil energy shortages and energy availablity. When this occurs, there will be major administrative and other upheavals so profound that we can only now guess at their effects. We propose, in the spirit of planning as risk taking for the future, the creation of a energy area on the forest to include preparation of coal extraction (not now feasible but which will be come so in the energy-short, high-price-of-coal environment of the US) . We propose well roaded areas where coal rights exist, firewood areas, collection and storage of natural gas from Forest wells, and intensive energy-wood areas (e.g., sycamore and hybrid poplar). These practices may be combined, with enforcement overview, with other Forest objectives.
Elsewhere within the road zone, energy forests, intensive management on superior sites may receive harvests at 20-30 year intervals, providing early succession age classes as well as meeting the socioeconomic and energetic needs of the region.
References
Harlin, J.M. 1982. Isolating the random rainstorm component from basin respoonse factors in rainfall-runoff data, Water resources Bulletin, (Amer. Water Resources Assoc.), 18 (4): 649-653.
See:The Shenandoah Watershed Study group published a report (2004) titled: Effects of Acidic Deposition on Aquatic Resources in the Central Appalachian Mountains. It's a fairly comprehensive overview of the situation in our region.
See
See Watershed Information Network of the EPA.
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Last revisions Sept, 2001, December 23, 2002, September, 2004