State Forest Management
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Pennsylvanians are fortunate in having a large amount of land in public ownership for the enhancement of our environment and communities. This includes land formally designated as state forests, state game lands and state park. These are public resources and can provide the opportunity to establish exemplary management for the public, which private forest resources, abundant in the state, cannot provide. Yet many of these opportunities are yet to be realized. Link to information about
Phase II of the campaign A century ago, the old forests of Pennsylvania were, for the most part destroyed. Most of the state's forests now are relatively young (most in the 70-80 year bracket); if the state is to experience old forests (variably defined between 200-400 years old) for scientific, educational, recreational and environmental purposes, action is required to create them. Only a few remnants of old growth forests remain from the logging era and today are protected as Natural Areas by the Bureau of Forestry (BOF). In our state forest system we do have fully protected ecosystems - our natural areas. However, our current state forest Natural Areas together amount to only 79,000 acres and each are simply too small (most just several hundred acres), scattered and disconnected from each other, to effectively and assuredly preserve forest biodiversity. Research studies have concluded that in order to preserve habitat for the majority of current communities of forest species, protected areas need to be in the order of thousands of acres. Some researches have placed that minimum threshold at 12 to 24,000 acres. If we are to preserve the intricate biodiversity that we have left today, we obviously need to preserve areas much larger than those protected under the Natural Area designations. Our already established Wild Areas, on the other hand, are much larger - all in the thousands of acres. Of the states 13 Wild Areas, the largest two and another potentially the third largest, lie within the large section of state forests in north-central Pennsylvania: The Quehanna Wild Areas is the largest at 48,000 acres, the Hammersley is second largest at 30,000 acres and the potential third largest area is the 17,000 acre "old growth area" proposed for Sproul District Forest. Old Growth Forests are a rare landform in Pennsylvania. These large Wild Areas generally are in proximity to the center portion of state forestlands. This and their relatively large parcel size (in the thousands of acres) make Wild Areas obvious choices for enhanced protection of wildlife habitat. State Forest Wild Areas are generally more mature interior forests than the balance of state forestlands. Therefore, protection of these areas along with an end of commercial timber harvesting within them will relatively quickly result in the formation and maintenance of old growth forests.Old Growth forests, by their very definition, harbor a diverse array of wildlife. Action to Create Old Forests:
What you can do:The Sierra Club asks that you help protect our wild places - for our families for our future. Let's work to protect our land, public lands. You can contact the Sierra Club and let us know you want to help.
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