Future of nation’s private forests might hinge on families talking

By Glenn Rosenholm
U.S. Forest Service
grosenholm@fs.fed.us

Recent surveys indicate the fate of much of the nation’s privately owned forests might hinge on something as basic as communication between millions of family forest owners and their adult heirs.

The stakes are huge, as roughly one sixth of America’s privately owned acres of forests are expected to change hands in the next five years.

“It concerns me that fewer and fewer families are able to keep their forest lands,” said USDA Forest Service Chief Gail Kimbell. Kimbell oversees National Forests and conservation stewardship programs for private forest owners.

 “Private forests provide significant public benefits and family forest owners are the key to maintaining these benefits for future generations. Clean water and clean air are just two of the ways we all benefit from forests. The almost 400 million acres of private forestland acres across the country should be of interest to all Americans, today and well into this century.”

“For environmental reasons, for social reasons, and for heritage and economic values, keeping family lands intact benefits us all,” added Kimbell.

About half of America’s roughly 800 million acres of forests are privately owned with the rest comprised of federal, state and tribal lands. Most of the privately owned forests lie within the Eastern United States, while the publicly owned forests are more common in the West.
 
The nation’s 393 million acres of privately owned forests total an area about one fifth of the Lower 48 States and are divided not so equally among an estimated 10.5 million private owners. These land holdings are varied and diverse, with some people owning less than 10 acres and others owning up to 5,000 or more. Many of these forests have ownership legacies dating back generations.

Privately owned forests provide a wide array of public benefits, including:
·          Helping to clean drinking water by filtering impurities
·          Reducing air pollution by removing carbon dioxide and producing oxygen
·          Protecting against flooding by absorbing excess moisture
·          Providing critical habitats for rare and endangered species
·          Serving as a sources of domestic timber and other forest products
·          And providing places of recreation and natural beauty.
                                                      
About 9 in 10 forest landowners today are “non-joiners,” people who have no affiliation to any forest landowner groups. They are incommunicado and prefer it that way. What makes non-joiners significant, other than their shear numbers, is that they are the most likely of all forest landowners to sell, develop or subdivide their lands. So the forests most at risk in terms of continuity are those owned by non-joiners. About 85 percent of non-joiner forest owners have children, most of whom are adults.

Current forest landowners as a group are aging. People age 70 or older own about a fifth of all privately owned forestlands. More than 60 percent of current forestland owners are age 55 or older and about half of them have already retired. Inevitably they will soon divest their forestland holdings to their heirs. As a result, baby boomers will determine the next course for the landscape.

The Forest Service and partner organizations periodically conduct studies to gauge current and predict future trends in forest ownership and attitudes. Forest Service Researcher Brett Butler, Ph.D., coordinates the National Woodland Owners Survey conducted each year.

 “All too often we hear about family members who just aren’t talking to each other,” he said. Some of the latest research indicates the current owners are managing their forests, but they are not passing on their forest management skills or values to their heirs. As this generation passes on their lands to their heirs, we know the next generation will live farther away, have fewer emotional ties to the land and will be less prepared to manage them, said Butler.

What makes the impending transition of forestland such a nail-biting scenario is a lack of communication and stark differences in values between the two generations as recently measured. 

“Their values, expectations and demographics will be very different from the current generation,” Butler notes. “This will translate into large-scale differences in the forest landscape. One thing we’re very worried about: at the point of intergenerational transfer is when most land use changes will occur.”

The outcome is often subdivision of large or contiguous forested tracts, which breaks up the landscape. This is known as parcelization. While trees remain, the social, environmental, and economic value as forestland declines.

The current generation of owners tends to value their forestland for its aesthetics: beauty, biodiversity, nature and a feeling of ownership. They often manage their lands independently. They rarely ask for outside help. Many of them have harvested timber in the last 5-10 years to generate income or improve the overall health and biodiversity of their forests. Their heirs, on the other hand, tend to view the family-owned forests more as land investments. 

“Without the same ties to the lands they will be more likely to sell or develop them,” said Butler.

One fellow researcher of Butler’s is Catherine Mater of the Pinchot Institute, a national conservation group. Mater led independent surveys funded by the Wood Education Research Center in recent years of the private forest owner offspring. One of the significant findings in her 2005 study, “The What Offspring of NIPFs Think: A National Perspective,” was that gender biases offspring values for owning the land and it serves to influence their behavior.

“For instance, women tend to view the forestland more as a family legacy, while men tend to view it more as a means of providing income. Women are also more likely to seek out assistance or join a group then men,” she said. “Some forest owner groups have started in beauty parlors, or through church groups or home health care networks.”

Two other differences between the current owners and their offspring involved taxes and medical costs. Though the current owners thought little of the issue of taxes as a driver for selling their land, their offspring felt otherwise. The upcoming generation responded that taxes were in fact a big issue for them.  Also, unforeseen medical expenses could potentially force them to sell their forestland holdings, if necessary.

“This marks the first tie between forest health and people health,” said Mater.

While there are no easy solutions, and few case studies describing model transfers of family forests, many agree a key is to look at one’s family in the way a forester looks at a forest. The forester sees 100 or more years into the future when thinking of the land. Families may find common ground by thinking on the same timeline with the forest aspect of estate planning, even past their children or grand children.

The following are several tips for elder owners to pass on their values and knowledge of their forests along with the land:
·          Talk with their children about why owning forestland is important
·          Invite them to visit and walk around their forest with them
·          Show them how they’ve improved the land and why
·          Share their forest management skills with them
·          Invite them to participate in the forest management decision making
·          Encourage them to join forest owner groups

If all else fails, or if landowners feel uncomfortable talking with their children about these matters, owners might consider passing on their values in an ethical will for the forest. The ethical will describes the reasons for owning the land and how it should be conserved for future generations.

To help sustain America’s family-owned forests the Forest Service is establishing the Family Forest Research Center in Amherst, Mass. The center will collect information on private forest landowner issues and trends.

Also, the Forest Stewardship Program is available to help forest landowners connect with the land. The program provides technical assistance, tips and guidance on a variety of forest management issues.

For more information on the Net visit:

http://www.na.fs.fed.us/stewardship/index.shtm

http://www.pinchot.org/policy_change/offspring_presentation_2005.pdf