Aldo Leopold, Selective Cutting, and Forest Stewardship Planning
Roger Monthey
Forest Stewardship Program Representative
USDA Forest Service, State and Private Forestry
Durham, New Hampshire
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Aldo Leopold, Selective Cutting, and Forest Stewardship Planning Roger Monthey Forest Stewardship Program Representative USDA Forest Service, State and Private Forestry Durham, New Hampshire |
Aldo Leopold laid the foundations for the land ethic philosophy in his classic book, A Sand County Almanac (Leopold 1949). The current concept of forest stewardship and the related activity of developing forest stewardship plans for landowners are essentially a more specific application of the land ethic as applied to forests. Forest stewardship is widely recognized and practiced by conservationists today, especially on private nonindustrial forest lands in the East. Leopold worked on an early example of a "land plan" (1939 Report on Huron Mountain Club) and proposed a land and timber policy for a group of nature lovers and sportsmen who owned a 15,000-acre tract of virgin maple-hemlock forest on Lake Superior in Michigan's Upper Peninsula (Leopold 1938). (A subsequent, more detailed forest management plan incorporating Leopold's proposed land and timber policy for the property was written by the USDA Forest Service in 1940.) Leopold's plan and associated policy addressed nontimber values such as wildlife, scientific (maintenance of undisturbed maple-hemlock forest), and recreation values in addition to timber values. As such, it resembles, in part, the content of modern forest stewardship plans currently required by the Forest Service. In his report to the Huron Mountain Club, Leopold brought together state-of-the-art research and concepts from both the wildlife and forestry professions, befitting his background in both of those schools. It is the purpose of this paper to describe (1) Leopold's relationship to and his ability to combine the latest thinking from the wildlife and forestry professions in the development of this early "stewardship" plan, (2) Leopold's adoption of "selective cutting" in the plan, which, at that time in the Lake States, was viewed as a sustainable alternative to previous clearcutting or high grading of the choicest timber (Eyre and Zillgitt 1953, Zon and Garver 1930), and (3) the connection between Leopold and the Forest Service. The Forest Service's State & Private Forestry Division currently administers the Cooperative Forest Assistance Act of 1978 (may be cited as the Forest Stewardship Act of 1990, 16 U.S.C. 2101 et seq.). This act, among other things, authorizes the Forest Service, in consultation with State foresters or equivalent State officials, to "establish a Forest Stewardship Program to encourage the long-term stewardship of nonindustrial private forest lands by assisting owners of such lands to more actively manage their forest and related resources by utilizing existing State, Federal, and private sector resource management expertise and assistance programs." A major goal of the act is to enter forest land into the Forest Stewardship Program by encouraging landowners to "prepare and submit to the State forester or equivalent State official a forest stewardship plan." It must be pointed out that there is currently much confusion over the meaning of the term "selective cutting" (John Brissette, USDA Forest Service, personal communication). In 1940, selective cutting was defined by the Forest Service as, "The partial cutting of a timbered area, removing the overmature and partially defective trees. The cutting is so designed to result in a uniform forest canopy, which will permit optimum growth and maintain natural conditions following cutting" (USDA Forest Service 1940). However, the term selective cutting today has a negative connotation and implies "high-grading" or selective removal of only the economically valuable trees, while leaving the poorer quality trees. In contrast, the "selection harvest system" as understood and practiced today requires a set of goals that defines how much wood is cut and in what diameter classes. This system is what Leopold was referring to in his report to the Huron Mountain Club when he used the term selective cutting. This is clearly indicated in the subsequent Forest Service forest management plan for the Huron Mountain Club property, which specifies cutting by diameter classes (USDA Forest Service 1940). For purposes of retaining historical accuracy of terminology, the term selective cutting (as used by Leopold) will be retained in this paper where appropriate. The term selection harvest system is also used in this paper with the understanding that its meaning is considered synonymous with Leopold's selective cutting terminology. The term partial cutting is included in the 1940 Forest Service's definition for selective cutting and is also synonymous with the selective cutting terminology in this paper. In a recent article in Forest History Today, Susan Flader described Aldo Leopold's legacy to the forestry profession (Flader 1998). In a nutshell (using a Leopold vernacular), Flader explained that Leopold began his career as a forester. He entered Yale University in 1906 and graduated with a master's of forestry degree in 1909. He began work with the newly established USDA Forest Service and was assigned to map and cruise timber in the Arizona Territory. According to Flader, Leopold "from the start was deeply imbued with the utilitarian conservation philosophy espoused by the service's first chief, Gifford Pinchot. But also from the start he pushed foresters toward a broader definition of their responsibilities and more thoughtful consideration of the objectives of forest management." By 1912, Leopold was already the Supervisor of the Carson National
Forest in northern New Mexico (Flader 1974), and by 1915 was assigned almost full time to organize game and fish work in the Southwestern District (District 3 which included Arizona and New Mexico territories). Flader (1998) pointed out that Leopold began game management programs in New Mexico based on principles of forest management and pointed out implications of ecological interpretation with respect to the interactions of grass, brush, timber, and fire on Southwestern watersheds. During 1916-1917, Leopold wrote articles on game conservation, forest policy, and ornithological observations (Flader 1974). While in New Mexico, Leopold described to co-workers at the Carson National Forest the wide range of purposes of national forest lands including "timber, water, forage, farm, recreative, game, fish, and esthetic resources". These, according to Flader (1998) were later codified in the Multiple Use Sustained Yield Act of 1960. Leopold moved to Madison, Wisconsin, in 1924 to become assistant director of the agency's Forest Products Laboratory, but resigned from the Forest Service in 1928 to "lay the groundwork for the new profession of game management" (Flader 1998). As a result of his previous wildlife work in New Mexico and his continuing efforts in Wisconsin, Leopold became a recognized game management expert. He wrote Report on a Game Survey of the North Central States in 1931 and Game Management in 1933, and assumed the position of chair of game management at the University of Wisconsin in 1939.
Following Leopold's resignation from the Forest Service, he continued to identify himself as a forester and worked to integrate game management and forestry by "modeling the techniques and standards of game management on those of forestry" (Flader 1998). This identification is clearly recognizable in his work with the Huron Mountain Club. Leopold twice visited club lands in the summer of 1938, writing a report in which he noted that the property would soon be one of the few large, relatively undisturbed areas of maple-hemlock forest remaining. According to Leopold, the land had outstanding value for wilderness recreation, scientific study, wildlife conservation, and timber (Flader 1974). Leopold also noted that the deer carrying capacity for club lands was low due to their heavily shaded condition (Leopold 1938). The Huron Mountain Club property was soon to be impacted by clearcutting in adjacent lands. According to Leopold, this would produce "appreciable scars" and unduly increase deer carrying capacity and deer populations. After a few years, this high deer population would be left without food (Leopold 1938). (Although Leopold did not clarify the reasons for subsequent reductions in food following clearcutting, his reasoning may have included deterioration of fresh tops in slash piles and/or browse growing out of reach of deer over time. In addition, deer are limited by the amount of available winter food, and browse in clearcuts is often unavailable to deer in winter as a result of deep snows.) Leopold urged the club to reserve a large natural area in the center of their property for scientific and aesthetic purposes, surrounded by a buffer zone of "light selective cutting" to create limited browse reproduction for deer and habitat for wildflowers and songbirds (Flader 1974). Leopold felt that this cutting would gradually raise deer carrying capacity on club property by producing palatable browse plants (Leopold 1938). This light cutting rather than large, sudden cuttings (as planned in the adjacent lands) would better preserve a safe margin between carrying capacity and deer populations, and thus prevent "a calamity to the timber, the flora, the birds, and the deer themselves" (Leopold 1938). At the time that Leopold made his recommendations to the Huron Mountain Club, selective cutting in the Lake State's northern hardwoods had only been recently developed by Raphael Zon and R.D. Graves at the Forest Service's Lakes States Forest Experiment Station in Saint Paul, Minnesota (Zon and Garver 1930). Leopold himself mentioned that "only up to a few years ago," clearcutting was the only known method of forest harvesting (Leopold 1938). However, the selection system was first studied by the French forester Francois de Lallement de Liocourt in 1898 (Meyer and others 1952). In 1905, Gifford Pinchot defined a "pure selection system" in his Primer of Forestry (USDA Division of Forestry, Bulletin 24). In 1911, the American forester H.S. Graves discussed the selection system in a chapter of his book, Principles of Handling Woodlands (Graves 1911). So Leopold was certainly not the first to recommend the selection system, but was "right there" in recommending the most up-to-date forestry research information for northern hardwoods in his advices on game management to the Huron Mountain Club. Leopold enlisted the Forest Service's State & Private Forestry Division to coordinate buffer zones with club lands in a survey they did on adjacent lands in the summer of 1939. Forest Service foresters subsequently visited Huron Mountain Club lands and the chairman of their Lands Committee, Daniel Hebard. This visit, along with favorable opinions of Leopold's background, apparently convinced Hebard to become a supporter of selective cutting, to which he had heretofore been opposed (Flader 1974). The Forest Service went ahead with a detailed plan for club lands that was closely based on Leopold's report (USDA Forest Service 1940). The goals for the club property as listed in the Forest Service plan included the following:
The Forest Service discussed the advantages of light selective cutting for club lands in the plan: (1) it would not destroy the natural appearance of the area; (2) it would result in small openings well distributed over the whole area and permit the establishment of a low, brush cover such as that recommended by Leopold, as well as increase the available amount of food, which should help to relieve the pressure in the over-grazed areas; (3) it would provide winter food requirements for deer more adequately than in areas that have been clearcut, which are less accessible to deer because of deep snow accumulations; (4) the retention of poorer, decay-ridden trees would benefit wildlife (to cut them would, in fact, be a monetary loss to the club); (5) it would not impair the influence of forests on stream flow, because selective cutting does not destroy the water-absorbing capacity of the soil; and (6) it would establish a buffer zone of selectively cut lands that would protect the reserved natural area from the pronounced influences of the clearcut lands adjacent to club lands (USDA Forest Service 1940). The background of the development of selective cutting in the Lake States was addressed by Raphael Zon and R.D. Garver in 1930. They stated, "The lumbermen in the Lake States can no longer move on to virgin hardwoods after having cut out their holdings." They have two options: "to sell their equipment in a short time and go out of business" or "to perpetuate their timber supply by practicing forestry on their holdings." Assuming that lumbermen wanted to stay in business, they needed information on two major problems: "how to restock cut-over lands" and "how to manage the remaining stands in order to make them go as far as possible in providing a continuous supply of timber." In the foreword to Zon and Garver's article, forester R.Y. Stuart described selective cutting as "fundamental to industrial forestry in the northern hardwood forests of the Lake States." Furthermore, as contrasted with the "usual" clearcutting of northern hardwoods or "high grading" of the choicest timber, selective cutting is a "distinctly constructive, perpetuating measure which leaves the forest in a healthy, thrifty, and vigorous growing condition." He also stated, "Selective logging is a cutting method particularly suited to saw-timber operations in mixed uneven-aged forests, such as the northern hardwoods. Moreover it conforms closely with the general economic requirements of the Lake States in that it offers a method of keeping forested areas in crop production and prevents further increase in the deforested area. Viewed broadly, the facts brought out in this publication should serve in establishing a forest plan which not only results in successive crops of valuable saw timber but establishes a system of stable land ownership and land use that contributes substantially to the economic welfare of the region" (Zon and Garver 1930). Therefore, public foresters in the 1920's and 1930's were already urging hardwood owners to adopt a system of partial or selective cutting, looking ultimately towards sustained-yield forestry in which growth balances cut. Clearcutting had been the practice for generations, although a surprising amount of partial cutting had occurred previously in the Lake States. Reliable information on many aspects of partial cutting was lacking, and there was an obvious need for research on ways of handling northern hardwoods (Eyre and Zillgitt 1953). Selective logging in northern hardwoods was the subject of Forest Service research commencing in 1926, first planned by Raphael Zon at the Lake States Forest Experiment Station. These studies continued through the 1930's and 1940's and were subsequently summarized by Eyre and Zillgitt in their 1953 publication. The important technical features of the recommended plan for selective cutting at the Huron Mountan Club were as follows:
As early as 1898, Forest Service founder Gifford Pinchot encouraged cooperative activities with non-Federal landowners by offering technical advice to landowners. At that time, though, the Forest Service had no lands to manage because Federal lands were administered by the Department of the Interior (Frome 1984). Section 2 of the Weeks Law (1911) first codified the concept of cooperation with state and private forestry organizations by providing Federal matching funding of non-Federal programs to boost local incentive (Steen 1976). Leopold's collaboration with the Huron Mountain Club and the Forest Service-State & Private Forestry pre-dated the passing of the Cooperative Forestry Assistance Act of 1978 and the 1990 Farm Bill (Title XII of the Food, Agriculture, Conservation, and Trade Act of 1990). The Cooperative Forestry Act recodified authority for 10 existing programs for cooperative forestry assistance to states and private forest landowners (USDA Forest Service 1993). This act was amended by the 1990 Farm Bill which, among other things, increased education, technical, and financial assistance for nonindustrial private forest landowners under the Forest Stewardship Program. Leopold's collaboration with the Huron Mountain Club and the Forest Service-State & Private Forestry exemplified in convincing fashion Leopold's commitment to stewardship and to push foresters toward "a broader definition of forestry"; or, in this case, to move from the notion of less sustainable to more sustainable forestry and game management. Susan Flader observed that in the early 1990's the Society of American Foresters had engaged in development of a land ethic canon inspired by Leopold's writings (Flader 1998). In addition, the chief of the Forest Service promulgated a new philosophy of ecosystem management in 1992. Leopold's ideas remain at the heart of the continuing debate over ecosystem management (Flader 1998). Leopold's close linkage with conservation (or stewardship) and forestry may be most eloquently summed up in the following passage from A Sand County Almanac, "I have read many definitions of what is a conservationist, and written not a few myself, but I suspect that the best one is written not with a pen, but with an axe. It is a matter of what a man thinks about while chopping, or while deciding what to chop. A conservationist is one who is humbly aware that with each stroke he is writing his signature on the land" (Leopold 1949). As Michael Snyder, Vermont forester and author, recently observed, "Aldo Leopold's career began when conservation itself began. But although his writings were timely, they are also timeless. As a forester, scientist, and sportsman, he was uniquely suited to speak to a broad audience. As a true visionary, he had much to say. And his remarkable talents for expressing himself ensure that he will continue to be heard" (Snyder 1997). Currently, the USDA Forest Service, Division of State & Private Forestry, does not normally write stewardship plans as it did in 1940. Rather, this is accomplished by private-sector foresters and other resource specialists such as wildlife biologists, or public-sector foresters of state forestry agencies. USDA Forest Service provides funds annually to the state forestry agencies to develop stewardship plans for non-industrial private lands in their respective states. I would like to thank John Brissette, Lloyd Casey, Bill Leak, and Arlyn Perkey of the USDA Forest Service, and Steve Anderson of the Forest History Society for their helpful reviews of this paper. Literature Cited Eyre F.H.and Zillgitt W.M. 1953. Partial Cuttings in Northern Hardwoods of the Lake States: Twenty-year Experimental Results Tech. Bull. No. 1076. Washington, DC. U.S. Department of Agriculture. 124 p. Flader, Susan L. 1974. Thinking Like a Mountain: Aldo Leopold and the Evolution of an Ecological Attitude toward Deer,Wolves and Forests. Madison, WI. The University of Wisconsin Press. 284 p. Flader, Susan L. 1974. Thinking Like a Mountain: Aldo Leopold and the Evolution of an Ecological Attitude toward Deer,Wolves and Forests. Madison, WI. The University of Wisconsin Press. 284 p. Flader, Susan L. 1998. Aldo Leopold's Legacy to Forestry. Forest History Today. 2-5. Frome, Michael. 1984. The Forest Service. 2nd ed. Boulder, CO. Westview Press, Inc. 348 p. Graves, H.S. 1911. The Principles of Handling Woodlands. New York. John Wiley & Sons. 325 p. Leopold, Aldo. 1931. Report on a Game Survey of the North Central States. Sporting Arms and Ammunition Leopold, Aldo. 1933. Game Management. Charles Scribner's Sons. New York, London. 481 p. Leopold, Aldo. 1938. Report on Huron Mountain Club. [Iowa City, IA]: University of Iowa Libraries, Iowa Authors Collection. 18 p. Leopold, Aldo. 1949. A Sand County Almanac. New York. Ballantine Books. 295 p. Manufacturers' Institute under direction of its Committee on Restoration and Protection of Game. American Game Association, Wash. D.C. 299 p. Meyer, H.Arthur, Recknagel, Arthur B., and Stevenson, Donald D. 1952. Forest Management. New York. The Ronald Press Company. 290 p. Pinchot, Gifford. 1905. Primer of Forestry. USDA Division of Forestry. Bulletin 24. 64 p. Snyder, Michael. 1997. The Timeless Voice of Aldo Leopold. Vermont Woodlands. Summer: 23-25. Steen, Harold K. 1974. The U.S. Forest Service: a History. Seattle, WA and London. University of Washington Press. 356 p. U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service. 1940. Possibilities of Coordinated Forest Land Management for the Huron Mountain Club. Madison, WI: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, State and Private Forestry, North Central Region, in cooperation with the Huron Mountain Club. 21 p. + app. [Copy available from the University of Wisconsin, Department of Wildlife Ecology.] U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service. 1993. The Principal Laws Relating to Forest Service Activities. Washington, DC. 1163 p. Zon, Raphael and Garver, R.D. 1930. Selective Logging in the Northern Hardwoods of the Lake States. Tech. Bull. No. 164. Washington, DC. U.S. Department of Agriculture. 47 p.
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