**This project will begin in Fall 2008. We will post more detail then.**
Forestland ownership throughout Wisconsin is changing, but is probably most pronounced in the Northwoods where forests are critical to the economy and culture. Either through sale, inheritance, or other land deals, new landowners are bringing new values and motivations to the landscape. Moreover, parcel sizes are getting smaller, which may limit the economic viability of fiber production and challenge our ability to maintain some landscape functions (e.g., habitat, forest health, water quality). Taken together, these changes have created substantial uncertainty about forests and their continuing capacity to provide ecosystem services on which all depend (e.g., fiber, water quality, hunting). To effectively manage private forests in this new environment, resource managers and policymakers need new approaches to sustainably manage private forests at scales that are economically and ecologically viable.
Cross-boundary coordination, where forestry practices are coordinated across multiple ownerships, is an important approach toward achieving greater scales in forest management. Recent work suggests that landowners are amenable to cross-boundary coordination, but lack the financial incentives or requisite knowledge to implement it. However, this work also indicates that resources professionals (e.g., foresters, loggers, etc.) might benefit through such coordination both financially and through better client relations. Lastly, given their broader geographic perspective (i.e., they focused on more than one ownership), resource professionals are well-positioned to identify and implement cross-boundary coordination.
Purpose, Objectives, and Research QuestionsThe purpose of this study is to understand the social relationships (i.e., networks) among resource professionals and landowners toward maintaining opportunities to manage private forests for multiple ecosystem services—notably fiber and water quality. While significant effort has been expended on understanding landowners, very little is known about how resource professionals interact with landowners and each others in forest management. We will investigate two questions.
- How are relationships among resource professionals and landowners currently structured?
- How can these relationships be better structured to mitigate the effects of forest parcelization?
Key to the study will be the development of recommendation for resource professionals and others as to techniques in identifying and implementing cross-boundary coordination.
Approach
We will identify three study areas in Northern Wisconsin that represent the typical ecological, ownership, and market context. In each study area, we will interview professionals toward identifying the web of social relationships that allow forest practices to occur and to identify how information is and isn't exchanged among professionals. These relationships will be analyzed toward both scholarly and applied ends.
We will prepare research for publication. We will develop specific outreach programs that engage resource professionals in each study area, as well as across the state, to identify new approaches to implementing forest practices on parcelized forestlands that meet landowner needs and are operationally feasible.As these outcomes are realized, we will post results.
