Search this site:

Introduction

Any assessment of the region’s forests would be incomplete without an evaluation of forest health. In this chapter, we provide such an evaluation for the forests of the South. We have restricted our discussion of forests to areas regenerated either naturally or through the intervention of land managers (fig. 17.1). We have excluded from our discussion specialized, small areas of forestry-related lands such as seed tree orchards or forest tree nurseries. While they are important to forestry, these areas are essentially intensively managed single species, juvenile forest stands. While no further specific mention is made of seed orchards and nurseries, it must be remembered that they are the primary production points for the genetically improved, pest-resistant plants discussed in Genetics. We have also restricted the discussion in this chapter to insect and disease pests that affect the overall health of the southern forests. Nonnative invasive plants that are major pests in the southern forest ecosystem and that have serious potential to disturb the overall health of those forests are discussed in the chapter on vegetation of the forests—chapter 2. All discussion of this extremely serious problem is found in that chapter.

“Forest health” is a concept that became popular in the 1990s and remains popular even though its precise meaning is open to debate. Often, damaging populations of forest pests are indicators of other predisposing factors such as overcrowding, over maturity, floods, drought, fire, or off-site plantings. Any analysis of the health of the forest reflects not only the well being of the ecosystem, but also the human expectations for that forest.

A healthy forest has the capacity to vigorously renew itself and to recover from a wide range of disturbances, while meeting current and future human needs for desired levels of values, uses, products, and services.