Increasing concern over the management and harvest of special forest products (SFP) from national forest lands has led to the development of new Forest Service policy directives.

Woody biomass can be used for the generation of heat, electricity, and biofuels. In many cases, the technology for converting woody biomass into energy has been established for decades, but because the price of woody biomass energy has not been competitive with traditional fossil fuels, bioenergy production from woody biomass has not been widely adopted. However, current projections of future energy use and renewable energy and climate change legislation under consideration suggest increased use of both forest and agriculture biomass energy in the coming decades.

Goal three of the current U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service strategy for improving the use of woody biomass is to help develop and expand markets for woody biomass products. This report is concerned with the existing volumes of renewable wood energy products (RWEP) that are currently used in Alaska and the potential demand for RWEP for residential and community heating projects in the state.

Forest managers are seeking practical guidance on how to adapt their current practices and, if necessary, their management goals, in response to climate change. Science-management collaboration was initiated on national forests in eastern Washington where resource managers showed a keen interest in science-based options for adapting to climate change at a 2-day workshop. Scientists and managers reviewed current climate change science and identified resources vulnerable to expected climate change. Vulnerabilities related to vegetation and habitat management included potential reductions in forest biodiversity and low forest resilience to changing disturbance regimes. The vulnerabilities related to aquatic and infrastructure resources included changing water quality and quantity, the risk to roads and other facilities from changes to hydrologic regimes, and the potential loss of at-risk aquatic species and habitats. Managers then worked in facilitated groups to identify adaptations that could be implemented through management and planning to reduce the vulnerability of key resources to climate change. The identified adaptations were grouped under two major headings: Increasing Ecological Resiliency to Climate Change, and Increasing Social and Economic Resiliency to Climate Change. The information generated from the science-management collaborative represents an initial and important step in identifying and prioritizing tangible steps to address climate change in forest management. Next would be the development of detailed implementation strategies that address the identified management adaptations..

Divi’s new scroll effects are made for you to easily take your web design experience to the next level. Of course, you can apply it to elements within your section directly, but you can choose to add motion to underlying elements too. Going for an underlying approach allows you to keep content static while having […]

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So you’ve discovered Divi and went on a quest of creating a website. But as the website went live, you discovered that although it looks great, you’re not hitting the conversion targets you had in mind. This doesn’t mean you should abandon your efforts. Even though Divi lets you skip all the learning you have […]

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Hey Divi Nation! Thanks for joining us for the next installment of our weekly Divi Design Initiative where each week, we give away brand new freebies. This Monday, we shared a brand new Winery Layout Pack. To help you get your website up and running as soon as possible, we’re sharing a brand new blog […]

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One of the most frustrating aspects of running a website is having to troubleshoot an error when you don’t know why it’s happening. Some issues, such as the 502 bad gateway error, have many potential causes. This means you may need to try multiple solutions before you land on the right one. In this post […]

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October 2012—When you hear the word “ecosystem,” what comes to mind? A forest? A river, maybe? Well, how about a city? It turns out, the green spaces in our urban areas can offer a range of ecosystem services, just like forests and rivers. Station scientists are working to better understand cities as ecosystems and demonstrate how nearby nature provides important benefits and services. (4:19)

April 2012—To anticipate how a changing climate might impact future forest fires, scientists need to understand the past. But how can you tell the frequency and severity of wildfires that occurred hundreds—or, even, thousands—of years ago? Part of the answer lies in tree rings (6:09)

In forest reserves of the U.S. Pacific Northwest, management objectives include protecting late-seral habitat structure by reducing the threat of large-scale disturbances like wildfire. We simulated how altering within and among-stand structure with silvicultural treatments of differing intensity affected late-seral forest (LSF) structure and fire threat (FT) reduction over 30 years in a 6070-ha reserve. We then evaluated how different financial requirements influenced the treatment mix selected for each decade, the associated effects on FT reduction and LSF structure in the reserve, and treatment costs. Requirements for treatments to earn money (NPV+), break even (NPVO), or to not meet any financial goal at the scale of the entire reserve (landscape) affected the predicted reduction of FT and the total area of LSF structure in different ways. With or without a requirement to break even, treatments accomplished about the same landscape level of FT reduction and LSF structure. Although treatment effects were similar, their associated net revenues ranged from negative $1 million to positive $3000 over 30 years. In contrast, a requirement for landscape treatments to earn money ($0.5 to $1.5 million NPV) over the same period had a negative effect on FT reduction and carried a cost in terms of both FT reduction and LSF structure. Results suggest that the spatial scale at which silvicultural treatments were evaluated was influential because the lowest cost to the reserve objectives was accomplished by a mix of treatments that earned or lost money at the stand level but that collectivel broke even at the landscape scale. Results also indicate that the timeframe over which treatments were evaluated was important because if breaking even was required within each decade instead of cumulatively over all three, the cost in terms of FT reduction and LSF structure was similar to requiring landscape treatments to earn $0.5 million NPV.

This publication provides estimates of total softwood and hardwood harvests by region and owner for the United States from 1950 to 2002. These data are generally not available in a consistent fashion and have to be estimated from state-level data, forest resource inventory statistics, and production of forest products. This publication describes the estimation process and documents the various assumptions. These estimates have been used for the past three decades in the periodic USDA Forest Service timber assessments.

Millions of miles of highway crisscross the United States. Highways fragment the landscape, affecting the distribution of animal populations and limiting the ability of individuals to disperse between those populations. Moreover, animal-vehicle collisions are a serious hazard to wildlife, not to mention people.

A century of effective fire suppression has radically transformed many forested landscapes on the east side of the Cascades. Managers of dry forests critically need information to help plan for and implement forest restoration. Management priorities include the stabilization of fire regimes and the maintenance of habitat for the northern spotted owl and other old-forest associates.

In the mid-1990s, forest managers on the Malheur National Forest were concerned about their prescribed fire program. Although they have only a few weeks of acceptable conditions available in the spring and fall, they were worried that spring-season prescribed burning might be exacerbating black stain root disease and having negative effects on understory plants.

New equipment, technology, and marketing efforts have allowed Alaska's wood products producers to consider opportunities previously unavailable to them. Until recently, the primary product produced by Alaska firms was rough, unseasoned lumber sold primarily within local markets. Given the purchase and installation of new drying and planing equipment, Alaska producers can now enter domestic and export markets for a variety of secondary wood products. Previously underutilized species, such as red alder (Alnus rubra Bong.), paper birch (Betula papyrifera Marsh.), and Alaska yellow-cedar (Chamaecyparis nootkatensis (D. Don) Spach) are also gaining in popularity and market potential. A detailed knowledge of species preferences for Alaska lumber, across business types and geographic regions, will be essential if Alaska producers are to be competitive.

The Pacific Northwest Research Station launched a Biodiversity Initiative to assist natural resource professionals in integrating complex biodiversity concepts into natural resource management processes. We canvassed clients from various affiliations to determine the main challenges they face in biodiversity management, to define their information needs, and to understand how best to deliver biodiversity information within a collaborative framework. The biodiversity management challenges that emerged included (1) the lack of well-defined biodiversity management policies, (2) understanding and quantifying the interaction effects between a number of factors (e.g., disturbance types, management practices) and biodiversity, (3) the lack of applied biodiversity monitoring strategies, (4) difficulty in locating and accessing biodiversity information, and (5) balancing conflicting values relating to biodiversity. We also list the biodiversity information product needs of clients, as well as preferred technology transfer methods, and we discuss the future direction of the Biodiversity Initiative.

A century of fire suppression has resulted in dense fuel loads within the dry pine forests of eastern Oregon . To alleviate the risk of stand-replacing wildfire, forest managers are using prescribed fire and thinning treatments. Until recently, the impact of these fuel treatments on soil productivity has been largely unknown. Such information is essential for making sound management decisions about the successful reintroduction of fire to the ecosystem to retain biodiversity of soil fungi and achieve the desired future condition of large ponderosa pines with low fuel loads. In a recent pair of studies, led by researchers at the PNW Forestry Sciences Laboratory in Corvallis, Oregon, novel molecular techniques were utilized to investigate the response of soil ecosystems to prescribed burning and thinning. The research compared impacts of the season of burn and various combinations of fuel-reducing treatments. Results suggest that overly severe fires can damage soil productivity and that less intense fires can be used to gradually reduce accumulations of fuel. The findings are currently being implemented in decisions about forest management and contribute important new information to the science.

Nontimber forest products from southern Alaska (also called special forest products) have been used for millennia as resources vital to the livelihoods and culture of Alaska Natives and, more recently, as subsistence resources for the welfare of all citizens. Many of these products are now being sold, and Alaskans seek additional income opportunities through sustainable harvest and manufacture of such forest resources. We discuss the unique legal, regulatory, land tenure, geographic, vegetation, and climatic context that southern Alaska presents for marketing nontimber forest products; summarize the various species and types of products being harvested; and consider the marketing challenges and opportunities new entrepreneurs will encounter. The information and resources we provide are intended to enhance income opportunities for all Alaskans, while sustaining the organisms harvested, respecting traditional activities, and ensuring equitable access to resources.

The Pacific Northwest is one of the world's major timber-producing regions, and its capacity to produce wood on a sustained-yield basis is widely recognized. Nonetheless, there has been increasing public interest in assuring that forests are being sustainably managed, as well as a desire by landowners to demonstrate their commitment to responsible stewardship.

The Community Socioeconomic Information System (CSIS) is a tool that allows users to retrieve 1990 and 2000 U.S. census data to examine conditions and trends for communities in western Washington, western Oregon, and northern California. The tool includes socioeconomic data for 1,314 communities in the entire region, including incorporated and unincorporated places. The tool delivers socioeconomic data using mapping and database features. In addition to providing data for one community, the tool produces community-level data at a variety of scales, including communities in areas surrounding Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management lands, all communities in the Northwest Forest Plan (NWFP) region, and communities within planning provinces within the NWFP region. One feature allows users to customize community data by creating boundaries and socioeconomic data for group of selected communities. The CSIS tool was designated to increase the usefulness of socioeconomic information at the small scale. Typically community socioeconomic assessments use U.S. census designations called census places. However, census places only represent a portion of the rural population. The CSIS uses a smaller unit of analysis (block groups) that we have aggregated to represent contiguous communities across the landscape, thereby representing the entire population. Community data can be printed as reports with graphs and tables, queried within an Access database, mapped and queried as geographic information system (GIS) data within ArcExplorer (a free GIS software included), exported as a table for use in Excel, or exported as GIS data for use in ArcGIS. The tool has features that allow users to locate communities by county or state and become familiar with local geography. The CSIS includes GIS data, such as major land ownerships, political boundaries, and physical landscape features. Applications produce maps that can be printed for specific communities showing community boundaries, water features, roads, metropolitan areas, community population centers, public land ownership, census places, planning provinces, counties, and state boundaries. Or, using the spatial data provided on the CD and ArcExplorer, users can produce custom maps.

The Northwest Forest Plan (the Plan) is a large-scale ecosystem management plan for federal land in the Pacific Northwest. Marbled murrelet (Brachyramphus marmoratus) populations and habitat were monitored to evaluate effectiveness of the Plan. The chapters in this volume summarize information on marbled murrelet ecology and present the monitoring results for marbled murrelets over the first 10 years of the Plan, 1994 to 2003.

This problem analysis describes a variety of human-resource interaction issues and identifies related social science research and development needs that serve as the foundation for the Alaska Communities and Forest Environments Team within the Pacific Northwest Research Station. The document lays out a research agenda that focuses on understanding relations between human communities and natural resources.

Some federal forest managers working in late-successional reserves find themselves in a potential no-win situation. The Northwest Forest Plan requires that the reserves be protected from large-scale natural and human disturbances while simultaneously maintaining older forest habitat.

Currently, all treated lumber used in Alaska is imported from the 48 contiguous states and Canada because there are no wood-treating facilities in Alaska. This report explores conventional and alternative wood-treating methods and reviews previous studies and laboratory tests on treated wood. In investigating wood treatment as a possible processing option for Alaska forest products manufacturers, the double-diffusion method of using sodium fluoride followed by a copper sulfate appeared to be the most advantageous approach. This method of treating wood was identified because it can be used to treat freshly cut or green wood. This was an important factor to consider, owing to the limited drying capacity in Alaska. Little information was available as to the chemical retention after treating and its resistance to leaching.

Integrated research is about achieving holistic understanding of complex biophysical and social issues and problems. It is driven by the need to improve understanding about such systems and to improve resource management by using the results of integrated research processes. Traditional research tends to fragment complex problems, focusing more on the pieces of problems rather than the whole that comprises multiple interrelationships and interactions. The outcome is that a lot is known about the parts (e.g., recreation, fish, and wildlife) but relatively little about how they are interrelated. There seems to be general agreement that integrated questions must drive the search for integrated understanding, but tradition, inertia, institutional culture,budgets, training, and lack of effective leadership foster reductionism (at worst) or minimal degrees of integration (at best) rather than any substantial, sustainable effort toward integrated research. In this paper, a phased approach to framing integrated research questions and addressing the substantial barriers that impede integrated efforts are discussed. A key conclusion is that to make any significant progress toward comprehensive integrated research will require more than rhetoric. Progress must begin with more effective leadership throughout various levels of research organizations.

This case study examines the socioeconomic changes that took place between 1990 and 2000 in and around lands managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Coos Bay District in southwestern Oregon for purposes of assessing the effects of the Northwest Forest Plan (the Plan) on rural economies and communities in the Coos Bay region.

Projections of Alaska timber products output, the derived demand for logs and chips, and timber harvest by owner are developed by using a trend-based analysis.

In spring 2004 and 2005, sawmill capacity and wood utilization information was collected for selected mills in southeast Alaska. The collected information is required to prepare information for compliance with Section 705(a) of the Tongass Timber Reform Act. The total capacity in the region (active and inactive mills) was 370,350 thousand board feet (mbf) Scribner log scale during both calendar (CYs) 2003 and 2004. The capacity of active mills for the same periods was 255,350 mbf. This is a 7.4-percent increase in active capacity from CY 2002 (237,850 mbf) to CY 2004. The actual volume of material processed during CY 2004 was 31,027 mbf Scribner log scale. This is a 21.9-percent reduction over CY 2002 (39,702 mbf Scribner log scale).

This report traces the flow of Oregon's 2003 timber harvest through the primary timber-processing industry and describes its structure, operations, and condition. Pulp and board, lumber, and plywood and veneer sectors accounted for 96 percent of total industry sales of $6.7 billion. Oregon's 2003 timber harvest of just over 4 billion board feet was 95 percent softwood species; 65 percent of the total was Douglas-fir. As a result of improved technology, lumber overrun increased 32 percent since 1988 to 2.07 board feet lumber tally per board foot Scribner of timber input. Despite decreases in amount of timber harvested, the industry has remained important to Oregon's workforce: average earnings for a worker in Oregon forest products industry was about $50,200; Oregon's average for all industries was $32,400.

A survey determined that installed dry kiln capacity in Alaska more than doubled to an estimated 220 thousand board feet (mbf) within 4 years (2000-2004). This increased ability to produce dry lumber and value-added products resulted from industry efforts to obtain federal funding to support a dry kiln grant program. This report reviews grantees' progress in implementing grantsupported projects and their impact on the production capabilities of the Alaska lumber drying industry. Data were collected in early 2005 by using a standard set of questions asked of 19 dry kiln owners. Much of the growth in drying and value-added processing capacity has been concentrated in southeast Alaska where there has been the greatest dry kiln investment. During 2004, the estimated volume of lumber dried in Alaska was 813 mbf, whereas potential annual capacity was estimated to be almost 6,600 mbf. This indicates that Alaska producers are drying just over 12 percent of their potential capacity. Factors that will increase the future production of value-added forest products in Alaska include a continuing supply of economically priced timber, the ability of the industry to support a reasonably priced grading service, and the ability of producers to move value-added products to domestic and export markets.

Conservation measures for aquatic species throughout the Pacific Northwest rely heavily on maintaining forested riparian zones. A key rationale for this strategy is that the presence of standing and downed trees next to streams will provide a continuous source of wood, which is an important structural component of aquatic habitat.

Participatory (collaborative, multiparty, citizen, volunteer) monitoring is a process that has been increasing in popularity and use in both developing and industrialized societies over the last several decades. It reflects the understanding that natural resource decisions are more effective and less controversial when stakeholders who have an interest in the results are involved in the process. An adequate number of such projects have now been organized, tried, and evaluated such that sufficient information exists to recommend a comprehensive approach to implementing such processes. This handbook was written for managers and scientists in the United States who are contemplating a participatory approach to monitoring biological resources, especially biodiversity. It is designed as a how-to manual with discussions of relevant topics, checklists of important considerations to address, and resources for further information. Worksheets for developing, implementing, and evaluating a monitoring plan are posted on a companion Web site. The subject matter is divided into 3 stages of a monitoring project encompassing a total of 22 topical modules. These modules can be used in any sequence on an ongoing basis. Stages and modules include (1) planning-documentation, goals, indicators, collaboration, decisions, context, organization, participants, communication, incentives, design, and resources; (2) implementation-training, safety, fieldwork, sampling, data, and quality; and (3) followthrough-analysis, reporting, evaluation, and celebrations. Collaboration always involves colearning, so documenting choices, plans, and activities with the Web site worksheets is integral to the manual's effectiveness.

Cost of private timber management practices in the United States are identified, and their relationship to timber production in general is highlighted. Costs across timber-producing regions and forest types are identified by forest type and timber management practices historically applied in each region. This includes cost estimates for activities such as forest establishment practices such as reforestation and afforestation on crop and pastureland. Establishment costs for reforestation in the Southern United States are less than in other regions, although regional differences in establishment costs are less evident in hardwood than in softwood stands. Also, included in the list of timber management costs ate the intermediate management treatments of precommercial thinning, herbicide, and fertilizer application. Intermediate management treatments are less costly in the southern United States than in other regions. Trends in timber management costs reported as part of the management costs reporting.

Over the last several decades, the overall air quality goal in the United States has been to protect public health and clear skies by reducing emissions. At the same time, however, the risk of catastrophic fire has been rising in forests around the country as overly dense trees and understory brush crowd the stands.

The distribution of a forest decline of yellow-cedar (Callitropsis nootkatensis (D. Don) Orsted) has been documented in southeast Alaska, but its occurrence in British Columbia was previously unknown. We conducted an aerial survey in the Prince Rupert area in September 2004 to determine if yellow-cedar forests in the North Coast Forest District of British Columbia were experiencing a similar fate as in nearby Alaska. Numerous large areas of concentrated yellow-cedar mortality were found, extending the known distribution of the decline problem 150 km south of the Alaska-British Columbia border. The forests with the most concentrated tree death occurred at 300 to 400 m elevation, frequently on south aspects. The appearance of these forests including proximity to bogs; mixtures of dying, recently killed, and long-dead trees; and crown and bole symptoms of dying trees were all consistent with the phenomenon in southeast Alaska.

This guidebook describes the High Peak/Moon Creek Research Natural Area, a 617.5-ha (1,526-ac) tract of coniferous forest containing stands dominated by 100- to 150-year-old Douglas-fir, a small old-growth (500+ years) Douglas-fir stand, and riparian vegetation within the western hemlock zone of the Coast Range in western Oregon.

This report summarizes timber resource statistics for the 20 counties in eastern Washington. The inventory sampled all private and public lands except those administered by the National Forest System in 2001, and those that were reserved from management for wood products.

Change is the only constant in forest ecosystems. Quantifying regional-scale forest change is increasingly done with remote sensing, which relies on data sent from digital camera-like sensors mounted to Earth-orbiting satellites. Through remote sensing, changes in forests can be studied comprehensively and uniformly across time and space.

Roger Lake Research Natural Area (RNA), a 174.7-ha reserve in north-central Washington, contains a rich diversity of landforms, plant communities, and wildlife habitats. Spreading outward from the lake itself, sedge and sphagnum fens give way to upland coniferous forest, granitic cliffs, and a relictual, high-altitude big sagebrush-whitebark pine (Artemisia tridentata-Pinus albicaulis) meadow. Five sensitive plant species and several vertebrate species that are rare in the region occur in the RNA. Dynamic ecological processes in action in the RNA are revealed in the paludification of the forest edge; aging, broken beaver dams; and widespread bark beetle-induced conifer mortality.

The importance to society of environmental services, provided by forest ecosystems, has significantly increased during the last few decades. A growing global concern with the deterioration of forests, beginning perhaps most noticeably in the 1980s, has led to an increasing public awareness of the environmental, cultural, economic, and social values that forests provide. Around the world, ideas of sustainable, close-to-nature, and multi-functional forestry have progressively replaced the older perception of forests as only a source for timber. The international impetus to protect and sustainably manage forests has come from global initiatives at management, conservation, and sustainable development related to all types of forests and forestry. A few of the more notable initiatives include: the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, UNCED); regional follow-ups to the Earth Summit such as the Montreal Process and Helsinki Accords; the forest elements of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD); and the Framework Convention on Climate Change (FCCC).

Incidence and effects of tree damage by black bear (Ursus americanus altifrontalis) in a 50-year-old, coast Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii (Mirb.) Franco var. menziesii) plantation are described. Bears girdled or partially girdled 35 dominant or codominant Douglas-fir trees per acre, but only in that portion of the plantation that had been interplanted at age 4 with red alder (Alnus rubra Bong). No red alder were damaged. Bears damaged Douglas-fir in this stand on at least four occasions between 1929 (planting) and 1991. Fully girdled Douglas-fir (six per acre in 1976) died within 2 to 14 years. Of the 29 per acre partially girdled trees, 17 percent died in the 16 years of observation, compared to 9 percent of nondamaged trees. Crosssectional growth of surviving damaged trees exceeded that of matched, nondamaged trees by about 30 percent at three heights on the bole: 6 ft, 4.5 ft, and immediately above the damaged area. Death of six large Douglas-fir trees per acre reduced live stand volume of this species for about 6 years after bear damage until growth of the remaining trees compensated for the volume lost to mortality. Confirmation of the stimulating effects of bear damage on subsequent tree growth is needed at other locations.

The Fall River research site in coastal Washington is an affiliate installation of the North American Long-Term Soil Productivity (LTSP) network, which constitutes one of the world's largest coordinated research programs addressing forest management impacts on sustained productivity. Overall goals of the Fall River study are to assess effects of biomass removals, soil compaction, tillage, and vegetation control on site properties and growth of planted Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii (Mirb.) Franco). Biomass-removal treatments included removal of commercial bole (BO), bole to 5-cm top diameter (BO5), total tree (TT), and total tree plus all legacy woody debris (TT+). Vegetation control (VC) effects were tested in BO, while soil compaction and compaction plus tillage were imposed in BO+VC treatment. All treatments were imposed in 1999. The preharvest stand contained similar amounts of carbon (C) above the mineral soil (292 Mg/ha) as within the mineral soil to 80- cm depth including roots (298 Mg/ha). Carbon stores above the mineral soil ordered by size were live trees (193 Mg/ha), old-growth logs (37 Mg/ha), forest floor (27 Mg/ha), old-growth stumps and snags (17 Mg/ha), coarse woody debris (11 Mg/ha), dead trees/snags (7 Mg/ha), and understory vegetation (0.1 Mg/ha). The mineral soil to 80-cm depth contained 248 Mg C/ha, and roots added 41 Mg/ha. Total nitrogen (N) in mineral soil and roots (13 349 kg/ha) was more than 10 times the N store above the mineral soil (1323 kg/ha). Postharvest C above mineral soil decreased to 129, 120, 63, and 50 Mg/ha in BO, BO5, TT, and TT+, respectively. Total N above the mineral soil decreased to 722, 747, 414, and 353 Mg/ha in BO, BO5, TT, and TT+, respectively. The ratio of total C above the mineral soil to total C within the mineral soil was markedly altered by biomass removal, but proportions of total N stores were reduced only 3 to 6 percent owing to the large soil N reservoir on site.

On October 18, 2006, a workshop was held in Vancouver, WA, with the title "Managing for wildlife habitat in Westside production forests." The purpose of the workshop was to provide prescriptions and guidelines for people who manage Westside forests (those west of the Cascade Mountains' crest) primarily for wood production, but because of mandate or personal preference, want to integrate wildlife values. The audience included over 150 professionals from forest industry, consulting firms, and public and tribal forest and wildlife management agencies. This proceedings includes ten papers based on oral presentations at the workshop plus a synthesis paper summarizing workshop themes, discussions, and related information. Topics include a history of wildlife management research in the Pacific Northwest, elements of habitat and how to manage for them, the challenges of appropriately implementing ecosystem management, and economic implications to private forestland owners.

National forest lands encompass numerous rural and urban communities. Some national-forest-based communities lie embedded within national forests, and others reside just outside the official boundaries of national forests. The urban and rural communities within or near national forest lands include a wide variety of historical traditions and cultural values that affect their process of economic development. National-forest-based urban and rural communities participate in numerous economic sectors including nontraded industries, resource-dependent traded industries, and non-resource-dependent traded industries. These communities represent microeconomic environments. Cluster theory provides an explicit framework to examine the microeconomic relationships between national forests and their embedded and neighboring communities. Implementation of economic cluster initiatives in national-forest-based communities could improve their overall social well-being through increased competitive advantage based on innovation and higher productivity. This paper proposes establishing an Economic Clusters research team within the Forest Service. This team would dedicate its efforts to the analysis and improvement of the determinants of competitive advantage affecting national-forest-based communities.

The kitchen cabinet industry has shown significant growth recently, with expanding residential markets, new cabinet styles, and larger kitchens. This industry represents an opportunity for small Alaska wood producers to create high-value secondary products. In response to recent trends in kitchen cabinet manufacturing and the need to identify opportunities for underutilized species, the Alaska Wood Utilization Research and Development Center has conducted numerous studies evaluating consumer preferences for Alaska's primary hardwoods-Alaska birch (Betula papyrifera var. humilis )Reg.) Fern & Raup) and red alder (Alnus rubra Bong.). These studies explored consumer preferences under a range of marketing parameters, cabinet appearances, and regional market locations. This paper summarizes these studies and offers insights into the potential market for Alaska's hardwoods as secondary wood products such as kitchen cabinets.

This update reports changes in the Nation's timber resource since the Analysis of the Timber Situation in the United States was completed in 2003. Prospective trends in demands for and supplies of timber, and the factors that affect these trends are examined. These trends include changes in the U.S. economy, increased salvage of British Columbia beetle-killed timber, and a stronger U.S. dollar. Other prospective trends that might alter the future timber situation are discussed including changes in U.S. timberland area, reductions in southern pine plantation establishment, impacts of climate change on forest productivity, increased restoration thinning on Western public lands, and the impact of programs to increase carbon sequestration through afforestation. Various management implications such as the influence of prices on forest management, concerns about changes in forest area, the emerging open space issue, forests as a set of commons, seeking to find greater compatibility in forest management, and the stewardship agenda are discussed.

Public land managers are confronted with an ever-growing and diversifying set of demands for providing recreation opportunities. Coupled with a variety of trends (devolution of governance and decisionmaking, population growth, technological innovation, shifts in public values, economic restructuring) and reduced organizational capacity, these demands represent a significant and complex challenge to public land management. One way of dealing with this situation is to use a framework to assist in working through this complexity. A framework, for the purpose of this report, is a process using a set of steps, based on sound science, that assists managers in framing a particular problem, working through it, and arriving at a set of defendable decisions. Several such frameworks exist for providing recreation opportunities on public lands. These include the Recreation Opportunity Spectrum, Limits of Acceptable Change, Visitor Experience and Resource Protection, Visitor Impact Management, and Benefits-Based Management. The report traces the development of each of these frameworks, describes the fundamental premises and concepts used within them, and provides an assessment of the experience with their use. Each of the frameworks has been used with varying success, depending on the organization's will, its technical capacity, the extent to which the process is inclusive of varying value systems, how open and deliberative the process is, the extent to which the organization is concerned with effectiveness, and the extent to which issues are confronted at the systems level.

The marbled murrelet (Brachyramphus marmoratus) ranges from Alaska to California and is listed under the Endangered Species Act as a threatened species in Washington, Oregon, and California. Marbled murrelet recovery depends, in large part, on conservation and restoration of breeding habitat on federally managed lands. A major objective of the Northwest Forest Plan (the Plan) is to conserve and restore nesting habitat that will sustain a viable marbled murrelet population. Under the Plan, monitoring is an essential component and is designed to help managers understand the degree to which the Plan is meeting this objective. This report describes methods used to assess the status and trend of marbled murrelet populations under the Plan.

This publication provides information about prescribed fire effects on habitats and populations of birds of the interior West and a synthesis of existing information on bird responses to fire across North America. Our literature synthesis indicated that aerial, ground, and bark insectivores favored recently burned habitats, whereas foliage gleaners preferred unburned habitats.