FOREST AND FOREST RANGE RESEARCH IN SOUTH FLORIDA

By Karl F. Wenger
Southeastern Forest Experiment Station
Forest Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture
November 23, 1959


Since activities of the Federal Forest Service are rather limited in south Florida it probably isn’t well known to you. So I want to describe briefly what its functions are. The Forest Service is one of the agencies of the U. S. Department of Agriculture. It has four major responsibilities. The first of these is to exercise national leadership in forest and forest range conservation, development, and use. It discharges this responsibility by the periodic determination of nationwide forest conditions and requirements, and formulates policies and programs needed to keep the nation’s forest lands fully productive.

A second responsibility is the administration of the national forests. The national forests consist of 180 million acres of federally owned land. Most of these are in the West and were established by withdrawals from the public domain. However, in 1924 the Congress authorized the Federal government to purchase lands for watershed protection. As a result some national forests were established in the eastern part of the United States. In 1905 the Secretary of Agriculture, James Wilson, gave Chief Forester Gifford Pinchot this guiding policy for the administration of the national forests: “Where conflicting interests must be reconciled, the question will always be decided from the standpoint of the greatest good of the greatest number in the long run.” Since that time the national forests have been managed for the production of five major commodities: timber, water, grazing, wildlife, and recreation.

Its third major responsibility is state and private forestry cooperation. This activity consists of aid and guidance to the states in the conduct of federal-state cooperative programs; in protection from fire, insects, and disease; reforestation; advice and assistance in timber management and utilization practices; forestry aspects of the soil bank; flood control and cooperation with the Soil Conservation Service. These programs usually are conducted by the State Forester or comparable state official, but some are conducted as direct federal projects.

The fourth major responsibility is research. The Forest Service is assigned responsibility for developing programs of fundamental and applied research in forest and related range management; watershed management; fire, insect, and disease protection; conversion and utilization of wood and other forest products; and forest economics and marketing.

The Forest Service carries on all of these activities in Florida. The Federal government assists Florida in fire control, forest management assistance. reforestation, the soil bank, and farm forestry extension work . Over 1 million acres of national forests are located in Florida. They are the Apalachicola south and west of Tallahassee, the Osceola near Lake City, Florida, and the Ocala near Ocala, Florida. Two field research centers are located in Florida. West of the Apalachicola River we have the Marianna Research Center which is concerned primarily with planting problems in the scrub oak sand hills country and with the management of longleaf pine. The Lake City Research Center at Lake City, Florida is concerned with the forestry problems in the remainder of the State.

Here we have research in the management of slash pine, tree improvement through the application of the principles of genetics, physiology of forest trees, naval stores production, seed production, forest diseases, forest insects, work in site preparation and planting, and miscellaneous studies. We have two branches, one at Tifton, Georgia where we are working on forest range problems of south Georgia, and one here in Ft. Myers. We ca1l this our South Florida Branch and it is about the work of this project that I would like to tell you today.

Our staff here consists of four professional men, with Bob Rummell in charge. While the work is conducted and directed by the Forest Service, we are able to maintain this project only because of the help of a number of other organizations. The State of Florida, through the Florida Board of Forestry; contributes about 35 percent of the annual cost of the project. We have two experimental areas which are made available to us by private landowners. The Caloosa Experimental Range, a 1600-acre tract is on lands of the Babcock-Florida Company. They also furnish the cattle used in the research work and provide for their care. This area is located about 25 miles northeast of Ft. Myers. The Corkscrew Experimental Forest is a 4000-acre tract which was recently made available to us by the Atlantic Land and Improvement Company. You may recently have seen a news item about its dedication to forest research on November 4. The Corkscrew is located about 20 miles east of Ft. Myers on State Highway No. 82. The Collier Company and the American Agricultural Chemical Company have also made tracts available for individual studies. In addition we get help from the Florida Agricultural Experiment Station at Ona, the Agricultural Research Service and the Soil Conservation Service of the Department of Agriculture. You can see that this amounts to a sizeable effort in forest and forest range research. But why is this necessary? What is the justification for this research effort?

In 1958 the U. S. Forest Service published “Timber Resources for America’s Future,” the latest reappraisal of where we stand on a national basis with respect to timber supplies and timber consumption, and of future needs to the year 2000. The primary basis for estimates of future needs was the future population. The population of the United States is expected to increase to 215 million people by 1975 and to 360 million people by the year 2000. These estimates already seem conservative. With this rise in number of people, the demand for timber products is also expected to increase. Past total and per capita consumption and changing uses indicate that demand for wood will rise to about 16-2/10 billion cubic feet in 1975 and to 22-4/10 billion cubic feet in the year 2000, from the present level of about 13 billion cubic feet. 2000 may seem a long time ahead, but 40 years isn’t long with respect to tree growth. At the present time our total timber resources are about the same as they were in 1945. Total annual growth of our forest is increasing somewhat but timber quality is declining. A small group of species supply most of the demand. For example, Douglas-fir and southern pines together constitute nearly half of the 1umber cut. These trends show that future demand can be met only by deliberate action. What measures are needed to meet this demand? An increase in the area of land devoted to forests is not feasible. Any change in forest acreage is likely to be in the other direction. Increased production must come through improved stocking of present forest acreage by natural seeding and accelerated planting; by the control of destructive agents, such as fire, insects, and disease, and by better utilization of the wood that is grown.

Now where does south Florida fit into this national picture? Florida is already an important wood-producing state. It ranks second in the nation in paper and paperboard manufacture and third in pulp production. In 1957 the wholesale value of manufactured forest products was $454 million dollars in contrast to $89 million in 1938. But even more important is the fact that Florida has a great potential for expanded production. While this potential is statewide the greatest room for expansion is in south Florida. In our terminology south Florida means the 30 southern counties. Total land area is 17 million acres, of which 53 percent, or 9-3/10 million acres is classed as forest land. Of this total forest acreage 7-8/10 million acres are classed as productive or land that can produce wood in profitable quantities. But this forest land is in poor condition. On 5-7/10 million acres of pine land, present stands average less than 400 board feet per acre. To be fully productive this land should be carrying 10 times as much wood in growing trees. These are average figures for millions of acres. Actually much of this land is very nearly bare of trees and 3-8/10 million acres need p1anting to raise stocking of trees to desirable levels. With over one-third of the forest land in the state, south Florida produces less than 10 percent of the wood cut in the state.

These classifications of forest land, nonproductive forest land, plantable land and so on, are based on the condition of the land itself and do not reflect the owners’ intentions or plans for its use. Consequently, the acreages devoted to various uses will probably change in the future since the decision of what to do with the land is entirely up to the owner. Certainly we can expect substantial acreages to go into other uses. With the rapidly increasing population of south Florida we can expect an appreciable acreage to go into residential developments. Additional land will be cleared for farming and improved pasture. But expert estimates indicate that no more than about 1-1/2 million acres will be involved in these shifts by 1975, which means that the bulk of the land presently classified as forest land will remain so.

Much of this land is presently also used for grazing. The number of beef cattle has increased sharply in recent years and this increase is expected to continue. Ten and two-tenths million acres of native range in south Florida support about 1-2/10 million cattle. These animals obtain about 73 percent of their total forage consump­tion from the native range . Of the 10-2/10 million acres of native range 8-2/l0 million is forest land. With the expected increase in number of cattle, the use of improved pasture apparently will not take much pressure off the native range, so it is evident that forest land will continue to be used for grazing . We consider this a healthy situation because population increase and pressure for other uses has and probably will continue to push land values up, which means that the greatest possible return must be realized from all lands. The need to develop ways of combining these uses led to the initiation of our research program.

Landowners who are trying to combine these uses find that it isn’t a simple task. In order to combine grazing and timber growing, they need to know how to manage each individually. Now the pine growing here in south Florida is a distinctly different variety and has different requirements for establishment and growth than the pine of north Florida. Moreover, the climate and soils of south Florida are also quite different. With the large acreages of poorly stocked land, the first job in growing timber is to establish a stand of trees. But initial attempts at planting by local landowners about 10 years ago failed. The planting methods used, which worked with other species farther north, were not suited to south Florida slash pine.

Because of these disappointing results, these people called on the Forest Service for help in conducting research to develop planting methods that would assure reasonable success. We were able to start work in 1952. So far our research has been directed mainly at the two uses separately. Although forest and range research takes time measured in many years our work has already produced some useful information. While we know that it must be further improved the survival of planted seedlings is now substantially higher than it was in 1948 by use of improved nursery practices and planting methods. Further work is being done to find out the best methods of preparing land to assure high survival of planted seedlings . The establishment of pine stands by broadcast seeding also shows considerable promise. Volume tables for South Florida slash pine timber have been developed and published and we recently completed growth and yield tables. These tables provide some of the basic information needed by forest landowners to evaluate the timber-growing potential of their land and to manage existing stands. Studies have been started to determine the best stocking of pine to carry at various ages and on the different soils of South Florida.

In forest grazing research we presently arc engaged in a major study to determine the optimum rate to stock cattle on the range. After 2 years we are finding trends suggesting that our best calves will come from ranges stocked at low or medium rates. In this study we are greatly interested in the effect of grazing at different rates on the kinds and amounts of range plants. We have accumulated a wealth of knowledge on more than 350 different plants grazed by cattle. Recently we began work on the life history of sawpalmetto. This information will be the basis for studies of ways to replace this undesirable plant with more useful vegetation. We have also made studies of the nutritive quality of range vegetation which have shown how this quality varies from adequate shortly after range burning to highly inadequate to maintain cattle health 3 or 4 months later.

We have made a beginning on studies of combined use and hope to expand this work in the future as we learn more about the individual uses. The problem is complicated because of a number of conflicting requirements for each use. For example, cattle damage newly planted pine seedlings to a greater or lesser degree depending on the grazing pressure and the amount of other forage available. As the trees grow larger and the crowns expand and meet the quality of forage is affected because of reduced light intensity. In order to maintain forage nutritive quality the range must be burned periodically but planted stand s cannot be burned for several years. These are just a few examples of some of the conflicts which must be resolved in order to combine timber growing and grazing successfully.

I also want to mention a third use which may soon become quite important. This is wildlife management. Among the large number of people coming to south Florida to live and to play an appreciable proportion may often rather hunt than fish or swim so wildlife can become a good source of additional income for landowners. We will have to know to what degree and in what way forest and range management affect suitability for game animals and what can be done to realize maximum wildlife values without impairing or seriously re­ducing returns from the other uses. Our part would be development of methods to manage the habitat and game experts would be needed to study the effects on the animals themselves.

I hope that I have given you some idea of why we are here, what we are doing, and what we are trying to accomplish. In closing I would like to quote a statement made by Dr. Richard E. McArdle, Chief of the Forest Service, in connection with a publication I mentioned earlier, “Timber Resources For America’s Future.” He said, and I quote, “To meet future timber demands will take earnest effort. Meeting those needs will require not only early action but an intensity of forestry practices that will startle many of us. There are no grounds for complacency. What we do in the next 10 or 20 years will determine whether we shall grow enough timber to enable our children and their children to enjoy the timber abundance that we ourselves know."

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