Today’s focus on ecosystem management New program at Penn State aims to open the use of prescribed fire to private forest landowners across Pennsylvania. Penn State Extension - Forest Resources. Audubon Pennsylvania’s Healthy Forest Program is setting out to do just that. In Pennsylvania, there are two major forest-type groups: Oak/hickory (47% of the forests, mainly in the central and southern areas) Northern Hardwoods (38% of the forests, mainly in the north and northwest), including birch, sugar maple, and black cherry The Pennsylvania Game Commission, as an independent agency of the Commonwealth, has jurisdiction over and management responsibility for all wildlife in Pennsylvania. Forest Types in Pennsylvania Understanding a forest ecosystem means understanding all the many biotic (liv-ing) and abiotic (non-living) compo-nents of that ecosystem and how they are related. A forest ecosystem includes all of the organisms in the forest environment as well as the chemical and physical elements of that environment that influence them. Recently, Audubon received over $183,000 in grant funding from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) to to create healthy forest habitats for birds and sequester carbon through partnerships with private landowners in the Appalachian Mountains of Pennsylvania. Ecoregions in Pennsylvania Central Appalachian Forest Ecoregion The Central Appalachian Forest ecoregion includes the Blue Ridge Mountains from Virginia to southern Pennsylvania, the historic Great Valley, and the dramatic ridges and valleys of the Allegheny Mountains that stretch south to north. Forests provide economically important products, such as lumber, ginseng and maple syrup. Forest canopy and subcanopy does not contain sweet-bay magnolia (Magnolia virginiana) or sweetgum (Liquidambar styraciflua). 10. Relative cover for combined canopy and subcanopy is dominated by red maple (Acer rubrum) and/or blackgum/sourgum (Nyssa sylvatica). Forest ecosystems supply fresh water, provide oxygen, control erosion, and remove carbon from the atmosphere. Biodiversity, by helping maintain healthy ecosystems, plays a major role in the economy of Pennsylvania and, particularly, its outdoor recreation industry: The forest products industry in Pennsylvania provides 90,000 jobs in 2,500 firms and The Pennsylvania State University ... 205 Forest Resources Building University Park, PA 16802 Phone: (814) 865-0679 Email: cdr14@psu.edu. Pennsylvania’s 17 million acres of forest provide a vast array of values, including clean air and water, recreation opportunities, wood products, and habitats for thousands of plants and animals. Pennsylvania Wild Bird & Mammal Lists. Community is not limited to the Coastal Plain and Piedmont within Pennsylvania. Achieving long-term forest sustainability Pennsylvania, or Penn’s Woods, provides countless benefits and services to its citizens. ... opportunity to restore important ecosystems here such as the oak forest… Forest ecology is the study of such ecosystems, which tend to be both structurally and biologically complex and diverse. State Agencies. Pennsylvania forests provide habitats for most of the state's wildlife. Forest ecosystems are com-plex and the relationships within them are difficult to describe and to qualify. All three Collins forests—Pennsylvania, Almanor, and Lakeview—have been independently certified by SCS Global Services in accordance with the standards and policies of the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC). For 41 years, James Finley has kept an eye on Pennsylvania's forests as a professor of forest resources, as the Ibberson Chair of Forest Resource Management, as an extension forester, and now as the first director of the Center for Private Forests at Penn State. 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