Trees, trees, and more trees!

Excerpt

MORE than 2.5 million acres were reforested in the United States during 1984. That was a third consecutive record-breaking year, and the acreage reforested was five times that reforested annually 35 years ago (2).

Eighty-five percent of these acres were on private land. Nonindustrial private forest owners planted 731,000 acres, their biggest total since 1961. Industry planted 1.4 million acres on company land. The remaining 15 percent involved federal and other public forest land.

While industry planted more acres, non-industrial private forest owners have shown the largest percentage increase in acreage planted over the past 10 years. During this decade nonindustrial private forest owners doubled the acres planted on their land. This compares to a 30 percent increase by industry.

Eighty percent of the industrial and nonindustrial private forest planting took place in 13 southern states. Georgia was the leading state, and 8 of the top 10 states were in the South.

A historical perspective

Major tree planting efforts of yester year pale in comparison to the record-breaking pace of today. The Civilian Conservation Corps, for example, planted 2.3 million acres to forest trees over a nine-year period in the 1930s …