A Burning Concern: Family Forest Owner Wildfire Concerns Across Regions, Scales, and Owner Characteristics

Abstract Family forest owners (FFOs) own the majority of US forests and 47% of forests in the Northeast. Over 90% of northeastern FFOs want their land to stay wooded. Maintaining forest-based ecosystem services necessitates finding ways to help FFOs achieve goals for keeping their land undeveloped. Conservation easements (CEs) prohibit residential and commercial development, typically in perpetuity, but are currently underused. Understanding what drives CE interest may help maximize their potential as a conservation tool. We explored northeastern FFOs’ likelihood of CE adoption through contingent behavior responses to permanent and temporary CE scenarios. For each commitment length, we tested a range of financial compensation amounts and FFO characteristics. Increased financial compensation did not increase CE adoption likelihood for either commitment length, whereas attitudinal variables strongly influenced intention for both. Respondents did not appear to prefer temporary to permanent easements but were equally likely to consider adoption, suggesting that providing both tools may be in order. Providing FFOs with more options to keep their land in forest use, especially when there is currently high interest in this goal but low participation, has the potential to attract new and different segments of FFOs, thereby sustaining the essential ecosystem services derived from forests. Study Implications Family forest owner interest in land protection in the northeastern US is high; over 90% owning four or more ha have indicated they want their land to stay wooded. Few, however, have taken advantage of conservation easements (CEs) to protect their land. Highly effective at ensuring the continual provision of forest benefits, CEs prohibit land uses such as residential and commercial development. Although research acknowledges CE interest, little is known about what characteristics of the tool are desirable. Gaining greater understanding of these characteristics can help expand the options FFOs have to achieve their goal of keeping their land in forest use.

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Foresters' Perceptions of Family Forest Owner Willingness to Participate in Forest Carbon Markets

Northern Journal of Applied Forestry ◽

10.1093/njaf/28.4.199 ◽

2011 ◽

Vol 28 (4) ◽

pp. 199-203 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

David Wade ◽

Cassandra Moseley

Keyword(s):

Carbon Sequestration ◽

Property Rights ◽

Low Cost ◽

Forest Owner ◽

Carbon Markets ◽

Willingness To Participate ◽

Family Forest ◽

Forest Stewardship ◽

Mitigate Climate Change ◽

Professional Foresters

Abstract Payment for forest-based carbon sequestration may be an emerging opportunity to help mitigate climate change while creating new income streams for forest landowners. It is important to understand families' willingness to participate in emerging carbon markets, as they own 35% of the nation's forestlands. Most family forest owners have not enrolled in forest stewardship programs, suggesting that it may be difficult for them to participate in emerging carbon offset markets. The pilot study reported in this article sought to understand family forest owner willingness to participate in carbon sequestration projects by asking professional foresters who are members of the Forest Guild what they believed would influence family forest owner willingness to participate in sequestration projects and how projects could be designed to foster participation. These foresters identified profitability, compliance difficulties, immaturity of carbon markets, property rights infringements, moral objections to carbon markets, and forester hesitation in recommending participation as the principal barriers to participation. They suggested that barriers could be overcome by increasing profitability, creating low cost and low hassle compliance systems, addressing landowner property rights concerns, and implementing education campaigns aimed at increasing forester knowledge of carbon markets and sequestration projects.

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Family forest owner preferences for biomass harvesting in Massachusetts

Forest Policy and Economics ◽

10.1016/j.forpol.2011.08.001 ◽

2012 ◽

Vol 14 (1) ◽

pp. 127-135 ◽

Cited By ~ 35

Author(s):

Marla Markowski-Lindsay ◽

Thomas Stevens ◽

David B. Kittredge ◽

Brett J. Butler ◽

Paul Catanzaro ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Forest Owner ◽

Family Forest ◽

Biomass Harvesting

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Northeastern Family Forest Owner Gender Differences in Land-Based Estate Planning and the Role of Self-Efficacy

Journal of Forestry ◽

10.1093/jofore/fvz058 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 118 (1) ◽

pp. 59-69 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Marla Markowski-Lindsay ◽

Paul Catanzaro ◽

Rebekah Zimmerer ◽

David Kittredge ◽

Ezra Markowitz ◽

...

Keyword(s):

United States ◽

Gender Differences ◽

Public Goods ◽

Self Efficacy ◽

Forest Owner ◽

Northeastern United States ◽

Estate Planning ◽

Family Forest ◽

The Future

Abstract Understanding family forest owner (FFO) estate planning decisionmaking is fundamental to ensuring the survival of landscapes that provide many public goods, but little is known about how land-based estate planning differs by gender. Analyses of a survey of FFOs in northeastern United States indicated that female FFOs rate themselves with lower levels of land-based estate planning self-efficacy—being less prepared, confident, and financially able to move forward with planning the future of their land than males. Of the FFOs who had positive levels of land-based estate planning self-efficacy, females were more likely to want to keep their land undeveloped than males. Our research suggests that increasing land-based estate planning self-efficacy of female FFOs may lead to higher rates of keeping land undeveloped for regions with FFOs similar to those of the northeast. We recommend ways in which foresters and programs could play an important role in increasing land-based estate planning self-efficacy.

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The PING Project: Using Ecological Momentary Assessments to Better Understand When and How Woodland Owner Group Members Engage with Their Woodlands

Forests ◽

10.3390/f11090944 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 11 (9) ◽

pp. 944

Author(s):

Emily S. Huff ◽

David B. Kittredge

Keyword(s):

Public Goods ◽

Real Time ◽

The United States ◽

Forest Owner ◽

Family Forest ◽

The Public ◽

Time Period ◽

Group Members ◽

Ecological Momentary Assessments ◽

Ecological Momentary

Research Highlights: Ecological momentary assessments (EMAs) are a fresh approach to measuring behavior by querying the subject in real time. Typical studies of FFO behavior use self-reported survey data. FFOs across the United States collectively own more forested land than any other ownership category, and their actions will impact the public goods these forests provide. Thus, better measures of FFO actions are critical to understanding how these public goods may be affected. Background and Objectives: In this pilot study, we evaluated the potential of ecological momentary assessments to understand family forest owner (FFO) engagement with their woods. We sought to test recruitment, attrition, and participant reaction to the method. Materials and Methods: FFOs belong to woodland owner associations were sent the same questions weekly for a month, asking about woodland engagement. Results: Nearly 90% of participants completed all four surveys and the majority found the method reasonable. Most participants thought about their woods weekly, but a longer time period is needed to measure temporal management trends. Conclusions: This approach may yield real-time and useful information about natural resource engagement to inform conservation-based programming and outreach.

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Private Forest Owner Characteristics Affect European Spruce Bark Beetle Management under an Extreme Weather Event and Host Tree Density

Forests ◽

10.3390/f12030346 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 12 (3) ◽

pp. 346

Author(s):

Maarten de Groot ◽

Jurij Diaci ◽

Kaja Kandare ◽

Nike Krajnc ◽

Rok Pisek ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Bark Beetle ◽

Bark Beetles ◽

Large Scale ◽

Forest Owner ◽

Private Forest ◽

Ice Storm ◽

Forest Owners ◽

Forest Ownership ◽

Private Owner ◽

Owner Characteristics

In the last few decades, an increasing number and intensity of bark beetle outbreaks have plagued the forests of Europe and North America. Bark beetle management is directly related to forest owner characteristics, although this relationship is not well understood. The purpose of the study was to investigate the influence of forest owner characteristics on the amount and timing of sanitary felling under different disturbance regimes and quantities of Norway spruce. We combined different databases on sanitary felling, the timing of sanitary felling, and forest owner characteristics for Slovenia from 2014 to 2018 and analyzed the amount and timing of sanitary felling in relation to forest owner characteristics. We found that the timing in winter and the amount of sanitary felling were positively associated with the distance of the owner’s residence to the forest parcel. Larger parcels were more affected by bark beetles but did not have later timing of cutting in the summer period as was hypothesized. The timing of sanitary felling decreased with property size, while with the probability of sanitary felling, the effect of property depended on the ice storm and the amount of spruce. The size of the settlement, the permanent address of the private owner, and timing of sanitary felling were positively associated but also depended on the amount of spruce. Gender and age did not have an important influence on the amount and timing of sanitary felling. Forest owners are an important factor in effective bark beetle management. This study highlights the private forest ownership characteristics that should be emphasized in order to fight bark beetle outbreaks in the event of large-scale disturbances. Governments should support forest owners who are at greater risk of bark beetle outbreaks and less efficient in managing outbreaks. Furthermore, landowner characteristics should be included when forecasting bark beetle outbreaks.

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