Introduction: The Human-Forest Ecosystem

Deanna H. Olson, Beatrice Van Horne, Bernard T. Bormann, Paul D. Anderson, and Richard W. Haynes

Close your eyes while standing in a mature forest along the North Pacific coast of North America in spring and you will smell the wet moss and feel its softness beneath your feet. You might detect the scent of a nearby cedar or hear the long and trembling song of a wren. You would sense the presence of tall and stately conifers nearby, and perhaps the wind lifting and bouncing their rain-heavy branches. Coniferous forests of the North Pacific coast of North America have an air of permanence where they remain intact, although this book will explore their heterogeneity and the uncertainties in their future. Aesthetically they are unparalleled in grandeur, being graced with long days during the growing season, mild winter and summer temperatures, and abundant rainfall. An active geology has been favorable as well: as the Juan de Fuca plate dives under the North American plate, the products of mountain uplift and volcanoes often mix with rocks ground by glaciers to provide young, nutrient-rich substrates. This setting supports forests of extraordinary productivity and biodiversity from northwestern California to Southeast Alaska (fig. 1.1; plate 1; chap. 2) that are greatly valued by their human inhabitants. Abundant moist temperate plants and animals have nurtured some of the wealthiest nonagricultural Native cultures ever known from North America. Visions of this productive landscape drove many of the Europeans migrating along the Oregon Trail early in the nineteenth century, and the forests provided a strong economic engine for the growing region through the twentieth century.

These forests not only exert a strong influence on the local culture and sense of place in the Pacific Northwest, but continue to provide wood, water, and other forest products that support local communities and broader economies. People intimately tied to these forests include Native tribes, those employed in wood industries, anglers, recreationists, and anyone who values Northwest forests as a public commons. As old-growth forests diminish globally, their value for ecosystem services is increasingly recognized. Water, wood, rare species, and carbon are dominant flash points in debates about forest management for commodities and services, human stewardship of natural communities, and contributions to stabilizing the greenhouse gases that are affecting world climates. These topics are not restricted to forests and cultures in the Northwest; worldwide there is a new focus on providing forest resources for social and economic sustainability while maintaining ecological integrity.

Debates about forest management are made more challenging by the constant change forests undergo as a result of human activities and natural processes. Active forest management affects the mosaic of forest conditions and its trajectory through time and is itself changing rapidly in response to heightened socioeconomic considerations, altered forest conditions, scientific advances in understanding forest complexity and dynamics, and integration of adaptive management into decision making. Recognition of an accelerated pace of change from human factors as well as altered climate, fire, and pest and pathogen outbreaks triggers new understanding of the importance of human stewardship for retaining a balance among forest types, developmental stages, and resources.

The more we learn about the dynamics of these forests, the more complex and nuanced management guidance has become. Indeed, we are experiencing a paradigm shift in our understanding of the interrelationship of forests and people — people and their values and objectives are now recognized as an intimate component of these systems, the human-forest ecosystem. It is time to assess what new perspectives have emerged over the last few decades and how they can contribute to the long-term value of these forests. This book builds on past and current forest ecological, social, and economic contexts and their interplay to derive insights into the development of a new future for moist coniferous...