A woodlot is a parcel of a

woodland A woodland () is, in the broad sense, land covered with trees, or in a narrow sense, synonymous with wood (or in the U.S., the '' plurale tantum'' woods), a low-density forest forming open habitats with plenty of sunlight and limited shade (see ...

forest A forest is an area of land dominated by trees. Hundreds of definitions of forest are used throughout the world, incorporating factors such as tree density, tree height, land use, legal standing, and ecological function. The United Nations' ...

capable of small-scale production of

forest product A forest product is any material derived from forestry for direct consumption or commercial use, such as lumber, paper, or fodder for livestock. Wood, by far the dominant product of forests, is used for many purposes, such as wood fuel (e.g. ...

s (such as

wood fuel Wood fuel (or fuelwood) is a fuel such as firewood, charcoal, Woodchips, chips, sheets, wood pellets, pellets, and sawdust. The particular form used depends upon factors such as source, quantity, quality and application. In many areas, wood is ...

, sap for

maple syrup Maple syrup is a syrup made from the sap of maple trees. In cold climates, these trees store starch in their trunks and roots before winter; the starch is then converted to sugar that rises in the sap in late winter and early spring. Maple tr ...

, sawlogs, and

pulpwood Pulpwood is timber with the principal use of making wood pulp for paper production. Applications * Trees raised specifically for pulp production account for 15% of world pulp production, old growth forests 9% and second- and third- and more gene ...

) as well as

recreation Recreation is an activity of leisure, leisure being discretionary time. The "need to do something for recreation" is an essential element of human biology and psychology. Recreational activities are often done for enjoyment, amusement, or plea ...

al uses like bird watching, bushwalking, and

wildflower A wildflower (or wild flower) is a flower that grows in the wild, meaning it was not intentionally seeded or planted. The term implies that the plant probably is neither a hybrid nor a selected cultivar that is in any way different from the ...

appreciation. The term ''woodlot'' is chiefly

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and th ...

n; in Britain, a woodlot would be called a

wood Wood is a porous and fibrous structural tissue found in the stems and roots of trees and other woody plants. It is an organic materiala natural composite of cellulose fibers that are strong in tension and embedded in a matrix of lignin ...

, or

copse Coppicing is a traditional method of woodland management which exploits the capacity of many species of trees to put out new shoots from their stump or roots if cut down. In a coppiced wood, which is called a copse, young tree stems are repeate ...

. Many woodlots occur as part of a

farm A farm (also called an agricultural holding) is an area of land that is devoted primarily to agricultural processes with the primary objective of producing food and other crops; it is the basic facility in food production. The name is use ...

or as buffers and undevelopable land between these and other property types such as housing subdivisions, industrial forests, or public properties (highways,

park A park is an area of natural, semi-natural or planted space set aside for human enjoyment and recreation or for the protection of wildlife or natural habitats. Urban parks are green spaces set aside for recreation inside towns and cities. ...

watershed Watershed is a hydrological term, which has been adopted in other fields in a more or less figurative sense. It may refer to: Hydrology * Drainage divide, the line that separates neighbouring drainage basins * Drainage basin, called a "watershe ...

s, etc.). Very small woodlots can occur where a subdivision has not met its development potential, or where terrain does not easily permit other uses. Very large woodlots (hundreds of acres) might emerge where profitable wood species have been depleted by commercial

logging Logging is the process of cutting, processing, and moving trees to a location for transport. It may include skidding, on-site processing, and loading of trees or logs onto trucks or skeleton cars. Logging is the beginning of a supply cha ...

practices or compromised by diseases, leaving little choice but to divide and liquidate the real estate for other purposes. One distinguishing characteristic of a woodlot is that the parcel size or quality of wood on the parcel does not generally justify full-scale commercial harvesting, leaving many woodlots as private investments by individuals. On the other hand, good forest management practices, even on a small scale, may create a sustainable source of products, which can significantly contribute to the aggregate inventory available to forest-product consumers.

Woodlot economics

In the era when

family farm A family farm is generally understood to be a farm owned and/or operated by a family; it is sometimes considered to be an estate passed down by inheritance. Although a recurring conceptual and archetypal distinction is that of a family farm ...

ing employed a large percentage of the population in the United States and Canada, it was typical of prized parcels of farmland that they included a woodlot from which the family could harvest firewood, wood for buildings and wagons, and wood for repair work. On the

Great Plains The Great Plains (french: Grandes Plaines), sometimes simply "the Plains", is a broad expanse of flatland in North America. It is located west of the Mississippi River and east of the Rocky Mountains, much of it covered in prairie, steppe, a ...

woodlots were scarce, but not so elsewhere. In

New England New England is a region comprising six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York to the west and by the Canadian provinces ...

and

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...

especially, making sugar from sugar maple sap was an important part of farm life. Today, a woodlot of a generally noncommercial nature may make it difficult to justify the expense of ownership, capital equipment, management, and harvesting, unless some revenue can be added to the intangible benefits. Some jurisdictions encourage woodlots (over subdivisions) by providing

property tax A property tax or millage rate is an ad valorem tax on the value of a property.In the OECD classification scheme, tax on property includes "taxes on immovable property or net wealth, taxes on the change of ownership of property through inher ...

reductions (''see, e.g.,

Current use Current use is a phrase used to describe the present condition of land use and the corresponding scheme for property tax incentives for qualifying land owners (typically rural) who wish to preserve open space and avoid having their property asse ...

'') or by subsidized consulting and management plans. For example, a state or provincial government may recognize the important contributions that small, non-industrial land owners make to conservation of natural resources, and provide administrative tools, information and even funding. There may also be

income tax An income tax is a tax imposed on individuals or entities (taxpayers) in respect of the income or profits earned by them (commonly called taxable income). Income tax generally is computed as the product of a tax rate times the taxable income. Ta ...

advantages for those who are able to operate their woodlot as a small business, or even as a passive investment (e.g., capital equipment depreciation, inventory depletion and operating expense deductions). Depending on

soil Soil, also commonly referred to as earth or dirt, is a mixture of organic matter, minerals, gases, liquids, and organisms that together support life. Some scientific definitions distinguish ''dirt'' from ''soil'' by restricting the former ...

s, aspect, parcel size and plant species and age, a properly managed woodlot might provide sufficient firewood annually for heating a number of local homes, as well as sawlogs and poles for periodic construction or repair of out-buildings. In fact, some states (including

New Hampshire New Hampshire is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Gulf of Maine to the east, and the Canadian province of Quebec t ...

) grant woodlot owners an exemption from harvest "yield taxes" otherwise payable on limited quantities taken for personal use. A suitably capable and equipped woodlot owner may enjoy doing the work himself (simple forestry, road-building, selective logging, firewood processing, etc.). Others might prefer sharing the costs with similarly situated neighbors to have several adjacent parcels managed simultaneously by local loggers. Otherwise, hiring professionals to reap small quantities of firewood may be too expensive to be cost-effective. With the relatively high cost of

fossil fuels A fossil fuel is a hydrocarbon-containing material formed naturally in the Earth's crust from the remains of dead plants and animals that is extracted and burned as a fuel. The main fossil fuels are coal, oil, and natural gas. Fossil fuels ma ...

for heating, a personal woodlot may be held as a

biomass Biomass is plant-based material used as a fuel for heat or electricity production. It can be in the form of wood, wood residues, energy crops, agricultural residues, and waste from industry, farms, and households. Some people use the terms bio ...

energy "savings account". When fuel prices go up, the woodlot pays for itself by providing firewood. When fuel prices go down, the woodlot can be left to mature, or managed for improved output of other products with an eventual higher profit. However, because of the slow nature of tree growth (for most valuable firewood trees), the profitability of many woodlots must be viewed as a long-term investment, with 20 to 50 years of management necessary before harvesting at a profit. Furthermore, in areas undergoing development, market pressures may ultimately result in poorly managed woodlots being sold and subdivided, often merely because property taxes become unbearable.

References

{{Reflist Forest management

Woodlot economics

See also

References