Approaches to Ecologically Based Forest Management, Summary, Glossary, Acknowledgments, other pub. Traditional forest management is often limited to maintenance or perpetuation of existing forest cover types. This approach does not always meet landowners' or society's best interests. Landowners and society are better served if forest resource professionals understand ecological characteristics of individual species and forest dynamics in the context of site quality. This understanding enables resource managers to identify a wider range of alternatives for meeting landowners' goals.
Management based on ecological principles is also more likely to assure forest sustainability.
Each ecological opportunity unit offers certain management possibilities and is subject to certain limitations, due to combined factors of site quality and stand characteristics. A stand may loosely be defined as a contiguous group of trees sufficiently uniform in species composition, arrangement of age classes and general condition so as to be considered a homogeneous and distinguishable unit. A stand is usually treated as a basic silvicultural unit, but it seldom represents a natural ecological unit. Its composition and structure are most strongly affected by management, other disturbances and chance factors affecting seed distribution, germination and seedling survival. For example, maintenance of continuous forest cover may be the only objective if watershed protection is the primary goal.