NCRS - The Changing Midwest Assessment

Although the practice of forest management - known as silviculture - is a complicated process, very often what the public is most interested in knowing is "How many big trees do we have?"

In the process of monitoring forests, the Forest Inventory and Analysis research unit records stand size class, which is a measure of the predominant diameter class of live trees that are present in an area.

This slide show consists of a series of maps that depict how the prevalence of large diameter stands on timberland changed between approximately 1980 and 2000. Data were retrieved from the Forest Inventory and Analysis data base.

Note: Links are also provided to maps that depict change in medium and small diameter stands.