• In addition to Registered Professional Foresters, ecological plans for harvesting and growing trees often require the involvement of other scientific professionals including wildlife and fisheries biologists, hydrologists, geologists, archaeologists and historians!
• Forest scientists use computers to help sustain forests. Sophisticated programs grow trees to show how different management techniques affect a forests future.
• Nothing goes to waste in the forest. Sawdust and wood generate electricity to power sawmills. Wood chips and bark supply energy for paper manufacturing.
• Trees are the only 100% renewable and recyclable resource we have, and much more energy and resource efficient than steel, plastic and aluminum.
• In most California sawmills, laser-guided saws are linked to computers that maximize the utilization of the log. These technologies have resulted in almost no waste and more useable wood for the consumer.
• Today, the average Californian consumes the equivalent of a 100-foot tree every year. By 2020, its estimated the demand for wood products will increase by 50%.
• California foresters plant an average of 7 new trees for every one harvested. For at least 25 years, growth has exceeded harvest in California forests.
• California has nearly 37 million acres of forests in private and public ownerships, more than 1/3 of the state's entire land base.
• New tree rings are formed each year, a light one in spring and a dark one in summer. Count the dark rings and you can approximate a trees age.
• Much of California's land has been cleared for housing and agriculture. But because of reforestation practices, our forests are nearly as large as 100 years ago.
• 95% of all the old growth redwood trees in California are on publicly owned state and national park land, much of it donated by private timber companies.
• California forests are home to more than 4,000 native plants and 600 wildlife species. Biologists use satellites to help study their habitats.
• Foresters use a densitometer to tell them if a forest is overcrowded. If they can't see enough sky in the instrument's concave mirror, there are too many trees in the area.
• Geneticists are unlocking the secrets to improving tree growth and immunity to disease. What they've learned helps trees mature 35% faster than just a few years ago.
• On publicly owned lands, some forests are so overcrowded that 500 or more trees compete for light and nutrients in areas that historically supported only 50.
• Foresters designate protection zones alongside streams and rivers to protect the quality of the water and to improve habitat for fish.
• Before harvesting, a Registered Professional Forester must complete a watershed-wide cumulative effects analysis that includes the evaluation of past and future activities that may effect water quality as well as a host of other concerns.
• Fire is part of the forest cycle. Native Americans set them to clear the forest floor for planting and hunting. Today we use controlled burns and mechanical thinning to help prevent damaging wildfires and maintain the historical cycle of forest succession.
• The natural cycle of plants and animals in a forest depends on disturbances like forest fires. Harvesting techniques are often designed to mimic these disturbances.
• Insects do more damage to the forest than fires and disease combined. Bark beetles eat a circle around the trunk, preventing nutrients from reaching leaves and roots.
• Wildlife researchers have found old growth forests are not the spotted owls' preferred habitat. They like younger, open forests that attract wood rats, their favorite food.
• With proper application of forest harvesting techniques, water yields from upstream sources can be controlled to create optimum water flows for fish and human needs.
• The largest black bear ever found in the wild weighed 902 pounds.
• Trout have good eyesight. Because of the way water refracts light, the deeper the trout is, the more it can see above the surface of the water.
• California's private forests are the most protected forests in the world. In most cases, foresters can't harvest a single tree without a comprehensive ecological plan.
• In order to ensure productivity, the California Forest Practice Act requires that harvested areas which are understocked, must be replanted within five years. Since 1952, California's total net annual forest growth for all ownerships has doubled.
• The Sustained Yield Act requires forest product companies to develop a plan that spells out how their forest ecosystems will be sustained for the next 100 years.
• The forest products industry is one of the most regulated industries in the state. Regulations are designed to protect soils, fish and wildlife habitat, rare plants, air and water quality, recreation opportunities and designated parks and wilderness areas.
• The California Forest Practice Act requires that a certain number of dead trees be left in harvest areas for birds and animals that need them.
• Scientists now know that a certain amount of erosion is necessary to create gravel beds where fish spawn. Woody debris in streams helps form pools and gravel beds and promotes nutrient recycling important to the aquatic food chain.
• One of the latest weapons to help prevent forest fires is goats. They eat the underbrush between trees that would provide fuel if a fire started.
• Forest products companies have fishery programs that have released hundreds of thousands of salmon and steelhead into northern California streams.