White Pine Management With Prescribed Fire

Prescribed burning is an important tool throughout Southern forests, grasslands, and croplands. The need to control fire became evident to allow forests to regenerate. This manual is intended to help resource managers to plan and execute prescribed burns in Southern forests and grasslands. A new appreciation and interest has developed in recent years for using prescribed fire in grasslands, especially hardwood forests, and on steep mountain slopes. Proper planning and execution of prescribed fires are necessary to reduce detrimental effects, such as the impacts on air and downstream water quality. Check out these related products: Trees at Work: Economic Accounting for Forest Ecosystem Services in the U.S. South can be found here: https://bookstore.gpo.gov/products/trees-work-economic-accounting-forest-ecosystem-services-us-south Soil Survey Manual 2017 is available here: https://bookstore.gpo.gov/products/soil-survey-manual-march-2017 Quantifying the Role of the National Forest System Lands in Providing Surface Drinking Water Supply for the Southern United States is available here: https://bookstore.gpo.gov/products/quantifying-role-national-forest-system-lands-providing-surface-drinking-water-supply Fire Management Today print subscription is available here: https://bookstore.gpo.gov/products/fire-management-today Wildland Fire in Ecosystems: Fire and Nonnative Invasive Plants can be found here: https://bookstore.gpo.gov/products/wildland-fire-ecosystems-fire-and-nonnative-invasive-plants

After a brief review of research conducted at the Petawawa National Forestry Institute on the use of prescribed fire in pine management, this document outlines some of the Institute's research projects as visited on a field tour in 1993. For each project, information given includes type of forest stand, history of thinning and prescribed fire operations, extent of tree damage resulting from prescribed fire, current condition of stand, and possible future of the stand.

Interest in appropriate management approaches for sustaining longleaf pine (Pinus palustris Mill.) forests has increased substantially during the recent decade. Although long-leaf pine can be managed using even-aged techniques, interest in uneven-aged methods has grown significantly as a result of concern for sustaining the wide range of ecological values associated with maintaining continuous crown cover in these ecosystems. Indeed, land managers have recently sought to restore and sustain the many habitat attributes upon which numerous at-risk species depend, while simultaneously producing high-quality wood products from longleaf pine forest ecosystems. Although earlier research produced a substantial body of knowledge to guide even-aged management, less is known about application of uneven-aged management methods in longleaf pine forests. Much of this information is yet in the developmental staage. However, managers from the Florida Division of Forestry and Florida National Forests, having a keen interest in applying what is currently known, encouraged scientists of the U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service, Southern Research Station and faculty members from the School of Forest Resources and Conservation at the University of Florida to engage in a dialogue that focused on addressing 60 of their key questions concerning uneven-aged management of longleaf pine. This dialogue addresses issues related to (1) methods for converting even-aged to uneven-aged stands, (2) growth and yield, (3) selection harvest techniques, (4) optimum logging practices, (5) effects on red-cockaded woodpeckers (Picoides borealis), (6) prescribed burning approaches, (7) regeneration, (8) optimum stand structure, (9) competition tolerance and release of various seedling age classes, and (10) the viability of interplanting and underplanting.