Resolving the pulpwood canvass with inventory harvest information

Abstract

The Resource Use section of the Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) Program has done a canvas of wood processing mills for timber product output (TPO) throughout the southern United States. Pulpmills in the South are canvassed on an annual basis, while all other mills (e.g., sawmills, veneer mills, etc.) are canvassed every two years. Attempts have been made to graph and map the amount of pulpwood harvested compared to the acres of forest treated (cut) in order to provide more information on harvesting rate or intensity (i.e., volume harvested per acre). It appears that one county’s worth of plots is not enough data to accurately estimate the cutting rate in a county. The authors advocate smoothing the apparent cutting rate, with one suggested model being logistic regression based on forest density and ownership patterns in a county.

Parent Publication

• Monitoring Across Borders: 2010 Joint Meeting of the Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) Symposium and the Southern Mensurationists

Citation

McCollum, Joseph M.; Johnson, Tony G. 2012. Resolving the pulpwood canvass with inventory harvest information. In: McWilliams, Will; Roesch, Francis A. eds. 2012. Monitoring Across Borders: 2010 Joint Meeting of the Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) Symposium and the Southern Mensurationists. e-Gen. Tech. Rep. SRS-157. Asheville, NC: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Southern Research Station. 147-153.