Abstract
Forest land covers 19.6 million acres in Mississippi, or about 65 percent of the land area. The majority of forests are classed as timberland. One hundred and thirty-seven tree species were measured on Mississippi forests in the 2006 inventory. Thirty six percent of Mississippi's forest land is classified as loblolly-shortleaf pine forest, 27 percent is classified as upland oak-hickory forest, and 19 percent is composed of bottomland hardwoods. Weather-related events were the largest component of average annual disturbance (204,000 acres yearly) on Mississippi forest land since the previous inventory. About 4 percent of live trees on Mississippi's forest land experienced some degree of damage due to Hurricane Katrina.
Keywords
Annual forest inventory,
FIA,
forest health indicators,
forest ownership,
Hurricane Katrina,
Mississippi,
timber volume
Citation
Oswalt, Sonja N.; Johnson, Tony G.; Coulston, John W.; Oswalt, Christopher M. 2009. Mississippi's forests, 2006. Mississippi's forests, 2006. Resource Bulletin SRS–147. Asheville, NC: U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service, Southern Research Station. 78 p.