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The Southern Forest
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The Southern United States consists of more than 214 million acres of forest land (15). Approximately 13 million of these acres are classified as “reserved and other forest land”, leaving 201 million acres in productive forest land. This number has remained relatively constant since the 1970s. Forest cover is depicted in green in the graphic of the United States, to the left. Timberland, defined as land capable of producing a commercial timber crop, makes up 93% of the South’s forest land. Over the past 20 years, increases in timberland, primarily from conversion of agriculture to timber, have occurred in Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Kentucky. Southern states losing timberland include Florida and Louisiana.

  • Landowners controlling timberland in the South include a diverse group of nonindustrial private forest landowners, forest industry, government, and other public agencies.

  • Nonindustrial private individuals own 69% of the timberland in the South.

   Forest Ownership

Forest Ownership

Source: Forest Inventory Analysis,
Copyright: U.S. Forest Service

  • Twenty percent of forest land is owned by forest industry.
  

 

  • Approximately 11% is held as public timberland (at right).

  • The public land is divided between 6% national forest and 5% other public lands. While each state differs in actual percentages, it is evident that most forestland is privately held (6).
     
Trends in the number of forest landowners indicate a 12% increase in landowners from 1978 to 1993. In 1993, there were 4.9 million forest landowners and a majority owned tracts smaller than 50 acres. Subsequently, there are more landowners owning smaller parcels of land in the South (6).

 
 

 

 ©2007 National Learning Center for Private Forest and Range Landowners
"A program of the Cooperative Extension Service funded by the Renewable Resources Extension Act"
Last Updated: June 2, 2008