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Discussion and Conclusions

Timber management in the South has changed substantially over the past few decades, and current trends indicate that change will continue. As some forest owners adopt more intensive forest management, the production potential of forests increases accordingly. Genetic improvement of trees and intensified application of fertilizer, herbicide, and thinning will rapidly increase growth and yield of southern pines as well as shorten rotations. These benefits have important implications for long-term timber supply.

The South will increase softwood production using existing management technologies. By applying known technologies on a large scale, the South can almost double softwood growth rates. These higher management intensities are projected to be widely applied on FI and TIMOS land and even NIPF land. As a result, the South may be able to better meet increasing harvest demands than previously thought. Effects depend on the number of acres devoted to intensive management and on economic feasibility of intensive management. The economic analysis indicates that intensive forest management offers attractive returns.

These results, however, must be interpreted cautiously. It will be necessary to accurately model market adjustments to such changes. Higher growth rates will moderate price increases and thus reduce returns on investments in timber growing. Future supply increases could, therefore, be reduced. Furthermore, rapidly growing pine plantations can provide wood fiber, but quality and grade questions still must be considered. Questions about lumber quality, needs for pruning, ability to make reconstituted fiber products, and other factors still need to be addressed. And the technical properties of fast-grown planted pine need to be determined and milling and marketing adjustments made.

Finally, the results presented here apply mostly to southern pines. At present, it is not really known to what extent southern hardwood production might be increased through intensive management. In comparison with planted pine management, intensive hardwood management in the South has been neglected. Vast and available hardwood resources of lower value than pine have discouraged investments in intensive hardwood management. Further, most hardwood forests belong to NIPF owners, who do not generally support the development of industry-like approaches. Furthermore, with more than 40 commercial species in southern hardwood forests, silviculture there is complex. To date, active hardwood management has yielded only small increases in natural stand productivity and mixed results in plantations. Recent hardwood research results suggest, however, that substantial productivity increases are possible in both natural and planted stands. But they rely on progress in silviculture, genetic improvement, and clonal forestry. While these results are promising, much effort is still required to develop effective and widely applicable hardwood technology that is comparable with southern pines technology. Dwindling hardwood resources and changing market conditions may provide the required stimuli.