Wind-firm tupelo at Tickfaw State Park survived Hurricane Katrina with little damage. (Photo by Jim L. Chambers)

Rainfall is a source of shallow flooding on some sites. (Photo by Jim L. Chambers)

Permanent deep water flooding prevents regeneration of baldcypress and tupelo. (Photo by Jim L. Chambers)

Flooding and salinity cause some coastal wetland forests to convert from wetland forests to marsh or open water. (Photo by Jim L. Chambers)

Seasonal flooding along small waterway formed by scarring from pull-boat logging during peak cypress and tupelo harvesting from the 1890s to the 1930s. (Photo by Jim L. Chambers)

The Science Working Group made recommendations to the governor’s office regarding actions that the state could take to conserve and protect these forests. The recommendations can be found at http://www.coastalforestswg.lsu.edu/. In general terms, the scientists recommended the following:

• Place priority on conserving, restoring and managing these coastal wetland forests.
• Recognize the set of condition classes that the Science Working Group outlined relative to the regeneration ability of specific sites.
• Place priority on maintaining the hydrological regime of the most productive sites and avoid loss of the more sensitive sites, including placement of a delay on harvesting those sites not likely to regenerate until conditions are changed.
• Ensure proper management and regeneration through recommendations on written forest management plans with specifics on regeneration.
• Develop spatially explicit database and long-term monitoring efforts with regular updating to guide management.
• Recognize an expanded area of coastal forests.
• Ensure that all agencies and organizations share and coordinate information, develop practices to prevent coastal forest loss, and actively pursue restoration of degraded forests.
• Enhance forest ecosystem functions through hydrological management decisions related to construction and other activities in wetland areas.

A team from the LSU AgCenter’s School of Renewable Natural Resources also conducted a field survey of 18 cypresstupelo dominated sites harvested 10 to 40 years ago to evaluate the potential of cypress-tupelo forests to regenerate and become established from the sprouts (new shoots arising from the stumps of recently cut trees) common after timber harvesting. The team concluded that stump sprouting was an unreliable means of regenerating baldcypress. Long-term survival of stump sprouts was very low on most sites, and stumps with living sprouts were not well distributed across harvested sites. While growth of surviving sprouts was sometimes good, large amounts of decay were often found within the sprout where the sprout connected to the stump. Further analysis and additional research are planned for stump sprouting as a means of baldcypress regeneration.

What can the people of Louisiana do to see that Louisiana’s coastal wetland forests are conserved and protected or used in a sustainable manner?

Professional Foresters
It is the inherent responsibility of all professional foresters to ensure forest sustainability and strive to meet the landowner’s objectives. Professional foresters can do much to conserve and protect Louisiana’s coastal wetland forests and act in the long-term best interest of landowners, including the following:

• Recommend harvesting of healthy forest areas only when the site can readily be regenerated and establish stands that will maintain sustainable productivity during the next generation of forests.
• Create written forest management plans that are explicit about how management will be sustainable and how regeneration and long-term wetland forest establishment will be guaranteed.
• Indicate what necessary and feasible alterations to site hydrological regime may help ensure future productivity.
• Explore alternative revenues or management options for sites not likely to regenerate and become established.
• Work with scientists to develop more reliable regeneration for a range of difficult site conditions.
• Apply the Sustainable Forestry Initiative to help to protect and conserve these unique and threatened forests for landowners, citizens and future generations.

Coastal Forest Landowners
Perhaps the most important and crucial key to protecting, conserving and continuing to use Louisiana’s coastal wetland forests lies with the landowners and their families. They have a great personal connection to these lands, and they hold the public’s many values of these lands in their hands. Coastal forest landowners can do a lot to see that these lands are protected and conserved through the following actions:

• Recognize the serious nature of the problems with coastal forest sustainability.
• Work to ensure that proper forest management techniques are used on lands that can be regenerated on a sustainable basis and that regeneration occurs.
• Demand to know the correct state of their lands and the condition they are in relative to regeneration.
• Work with the state and others to further restoration efforts and regain productivity on lands that remain flooded for long periods during the growing season.
• Be willing, if necessary, to temporarily forgo timber harvesting on those portions of their land that will not regenerate and become established under current conditions.
• Insist that professional foresters provide a written management plan that details how their lands will be regenerated after harvest and how a new forest of equal or better productivity will be established. Get a second, independent opinion when their lands are frequently flooded for long periods, especially during the growing season.
• Look for alternative income sources (instead of timber harvests in coastal forests).
• Consider placing lands in a “forest reserve” system or some other category of compensation developed by the state. The group recommended that the governor establish a Coastal Wetland Forest Reserve System.
• Consider donating their land to a conservation organization that will provide protection and allow them to reap tax benefits.

What Everyone Can Do

• Recognize the serious nature of the problem with Louisiana’s coastal wetland forests.
• Contact federal and state senators and representatives, as well as local officials about helping to save existing wetland forests and restore degraded coastal wetland forests in Louisiana.
• Recognize that we can continue to conserve and protect these resources only for those coastal forests that are sustainable.
• Voice support for efforts to conserve and protect these forests in surveys of opinion and to the news media, friends and those at work.

Jim L. Chambers, Weaver Brothers Professor of Forestry, School of Renewable Natural Resources, LSU AgCenter, Baton Rouge, La.

(This article was published in the spring 2006 issue of Louisiana Agriculture.)