Assignment : Forest Management Plan. Social Sciences Essay

The task is to write a forest management plan，but you only need to write the feed-forward outline. The attachment will give detailed requirements, scoring standards, and some materials and courseware and the example of the feed-forward outline, please check it carefully.

Assignment : Forest Management Plan 
The task
You are the estate manager (or in Scotland, the factor) for a (fictional) billionaire Scottish philanthropist called Angus McTavish. Angus is passionate about trees and woods and wants to help increase Scotland’s woodland cover. He enjoys conserving Scotland’s natural heritage but he is also interested in growing trees for productive purposes. He is equally happy walking through a modern Sitka plantation in the Borders as he is in an Atlantic oak woodland on the west coast. However, it is not just about trees; he wants to encourage sustainable, thriving, local, rural communities and people are just as important to him as the environment.  
Angus has spent a lot of time and money buying land for conservation, forestry and sustainable agriculture but he is always on the lookout for new land and intends to buy a recently listed forest called Dunmore Woods. He has asked you to assess the wood and write a management plan for him (I will attach the Land Agent’s sale brochure in Learn). 
Angus is open-minded (but pragmatic) about the objectives for his new acquisitions – he is interested in conservation but also understands the importance of the rural economy, community participation, education, climate change mitigation and adaptation and improving other local ecosystem services. However, although Angus is a billionaire, he is not simply going to throw endless amounts of money at his projects and ultimately expects all his land to be financially self-sufficient.
Details
Based on the sale information given and any other pertinent data you can find, draw up a 50-year management plan for Dunmore wood with clearly stated and justified objectives. You will have to research specific issues relevant to this woodland and identify realistic management choices. Your plan should:
1. Be no more than 3000 words (including tables and figure legends, but excluding references). 
2. Include details on: 
• The basic ecology of this woodland type.
• Current and future issues, threats and opportunities associated with this woodland/forest type.
• A defence of your chosen mix of management objectives in the context of both current/future issues in forest management.
• Scottish forest and land use policies.
• Detailed management prescriptions for each compartment. 
• Any assumptions you made and why. 
• The repeat check rate below 10%
Learning outcomes
This assignment has the highest weighting in your course grade because the aim is to integrate core knowledge from across the whole course. You will need to be aware of physical forest science and ecology, you will need to understand forest management and objectives, show an awareness of current forest issues, human interactions with forests, and key policies relating to forest environments. Although many management plans you may find online are quite traditional and purely silvicultural-focused, the objective here is to be forward thinking and demonstrate that you are aware of the current role of forests in the physical, economic and human environments. 
Advice
You may find the Forestry Commission’s guidance on producing management plans a useful reference (see below).
• https://scotland.forestry.gov.uk/supporting/grants-and-regulations/forestry-grants/forest-plan-resources 
Note that most forest management plans include an initial survey – you obviously cannot survey this woodland but you should be able to find enough information to provide Angus with a coherent and useful plan. Based on what you know about Angus, you can make realistic assumptions to fill out your plan (but justify them). 
Your management objectives should be SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time limited).  In other words, to state your objective as “manage for biodiversity” is not enough, you would have to state “Maintain current (2013) levels of biodiversity over the next 15 years as monitored by annual surveys” or something similar. 
There are management plans available online for many woodlands but he object of this assignment is not to reproduce an existing plan. Of course, it is fine to use them as guidance and a useful reference, but be creative! Pick a smaller or larger part of the woodland, plan to change the use of the whole woodland or part of it – maybe there’s a forestry plantation that you want to manage as a research site or recreation area (Mountain biking? Aerial assault course?).  
The best way to use references in this situation is likely to use Footnote style (like Nature), linking non-intrusive numbers in the text to a reference list at the end
Formatting the whole thing as text, or as a table, is fine. Or a mix in between the two.Figures and maps can be inset within the report, no need to be at the end in an appendixNo need for a full financial or timber yield model. But I would like to see evidence you've thought about the finances (and ideally had a go at estimating the cash flows in and out), so your plan has a realistic chance of being self-financing. It doesn't need to make a profit, but shouldn't make a loss for the owner.
Marking
The work will be graded on the following criteria:
Overall, to what extent does the work demonstrate:
• a clear understanding of forest ecology and management
• thorough research 
• an awareness of current issues related to forests and the environment
The management plan:
• is unambiguous
• fits within the stated length restrictions
• is realistic
• follows a normal woodland management plan structure
• is well presented
Any supporting document(s):
• covers all the additional information Angus would require
• is correctly referenced and well presented
• does not duplicate information from other management plans
Example of Feedforward sheet.pdf. (attachment)
A student was asking about what you need to do for your feed-forward plan. Attached is an example of one from a few years ago which is essentially a fuller version of their contents page. However, you can uses this plan as you wish - a list of questions for me, structure of the plan, what to leave in/out, how to format, etc. 
Your plan should be as realistic as possible (but you also have constraints a forester wouldn't have including access to the wood!); there are lots of great examples for management plans out there to help you.
Resource.
Dunmore Wood Sale Brochure.pdf (attachment)
Bellassen and Luyssaert (2014) (attachment)
Forest Management and Planning is very detailed, technical and comprehensive but a few chapters should be useful (1 and 15 at least) (attachment)
Other (generic) woodland/forest management plan links:
https://www.forestry.gov.uk/england-managementplan 
http://scotland.forestry.gov.uk/supporting/grants-and-regulations/forestry-grants/forest-plan-resources (important)
http://perrywood.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Management-Plan-Text.pdf 
https://davies-barnard.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/fc-guidancemanagementplan.pdf 
http://scotland.forestry.gov.uk/images/corporate/pdf/design-techniques-fmp.pdf 
http://www.fao.org/docrep/w8212e/w8212e07.htm 
http://www.nrcan.gc.ca/forests/canada/planning/17493 
http://www.forestguild.org/ecological_forestry/mp_jakelands_farm.pdf  
Some additional resources:
• The NVC is a useful approach to classification of semi-natural woodlands in the UK. There is a reference to the Rodwell book in the handbook but some of the online-resources should be sufficient for you -
o Field Guide to Woodland
o JNCC webpage
Course reading and other useful material 
(You don’t need to read all of them, it just as a potential reference maybe useful)
Core Text
This excellent little book will provide you with a condensed overview of much of what we will discuss in this course; it’s short and sweet, well-written and also good value.  
Ghazoul, J. 2015. Forests: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford. Oxford University Press. 
Other useful reading
The following texts, available in the library, are also useful.  Please don’t panic - these are not prescribed course reading, just pointers to useful references you may find interesting. Many sections within these books complement the course content well and where they are directly relevant to lecture content, specific sections or chapters will be highlighted in the lectures.
Key Forest Ecology textsBarnes, B.V., Zak, D.R., Denton, S.R. & Spurr, S.H. 1998. Forest Ecology. 4th ed. New York: John Wiley & Sons. Old but still a very good text book. Comprehensive but US bias. Kimmins, J.P. 2003. Forest Ecology: a foundation for sustainable forest management and environmental ethics in forestry. Benjamin Cummings. As above. Peh, K.S.H., Corlett, R. T., Bergeron, Y. 2015. Routledge Handbook of Forest Ecology. Abingdon: Routledge. Perry, D. A., R. Oren, et al. 2008. Forest Ecosystems. The John Hopkins University Press, 2nd editionMensurationKershaw, J. A., Ducey, M. J., Beers, T. W & Husch, B. 2016. Forest Mensuration. 5th edition. Chichester: Wiley. Pretty much the longer standard text on mensuration. Newton, A. 2007. Forest Ecology and Conservation: A Handbook of Techniques. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Excellent book. Very comprehensive. Useful text if you plan doing some woodland-based fieldwork. Philip, M. 1994. Measuring trees and forests. Wallingford: CABI. Pretty much the shorter standard text on mensuration. Savill, P., Perrins, C.M., Kirby, K.J. & Fisher, N. 2011. Wytham Woods: Oxford's Ecological Laboratory. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Not a mensuration text but an interesting book reviewing a famous wood and its extensive links with various scientific disciplines.SilvicultureMatthews, J.D. 1997. Silvicultural systems. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Another very useful book if you are interested in forest production. Oliver, C. & Larson, B., C. 1996. Forest stand dynamics. Chichester: John Wiley & Sons. For the keen students only - a text for understanding forest growth: Yoda's -3/2 law of self-thinning and all that…. :)Ashton, M. S & Kelty, M. J. 2018. The Practice of Silviculture: Applied Forest Ecology. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell. Superb and extremely comprehensive book. Despite the narrow focus, surprisingly accessible and a worthy update to Matthews. Puettmann, K.J., Messier, C. & Coates, K.D. 2008. A Critique of Silviculture: Managing for Complexity. Washington, D.C: Island Press. Fascinating read that challenges the ‘old school’ approaches to forest management. Savill, P. 2013. The silviculture of Trees used in British Forestry. 2nd ed. Wallingford: CABI. Standard text on species selection for the UK. Conservation management of forestsHunter, M.L. ed. 1999. Maintaining Biodiversity in Forest Ecosystems. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Lots of useful chapters that are still relevant now. Lindenmayer, D.B. 2009. Forest wildlife management and conservation. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences. 1162: 284-310. Great overview of threats to forest biodiversity and mitigation measures.Peterken, G.F. 1993. Woodland conservation and management. London: Chapman & Hall. Old but a definitive overview of British woodlands and their management for conservation.Peterken, G.F. 1996. Natural woodland: ecology and conservation in northern temperate regions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Similar to above but explores Europe and North American conservation management too. Rackham, O. 2008. Ancient woodlands: modern threats. New Phytologist. 180(3): 571-86 Readable paper with a good overview of the main issues that British woodland conservationists are facing. Forest history (UK/Europe-bias)Rackham, O. 2003. Ancient Woodland: its history, vegetation and uses in England. New ed. Balbeattie: Castlepoint. Huge book by the late Dr Rackham, full of detail on management, use, conservation etc. Rackham, O. 2006. Woodlands. London: Collins. Shorter version of above.Vera, F. 2000. Grazing ecology and forest history. Wallingford: CABI. Caused a stir when it came out: interesting theories backed up with extensive palaeoecological data. It is a major influence on the management of the famous Dutch rewilding experiment “Oostvaardersplassen” (which links to the original meaning of ‘forest’) and the author has become a doyen of the rewilding movement. British woodland classification Bunce, R.G.H. 1982. A field key for classifying British woodland vegetation. Part 2. London: HMSO. Short and sweet, but it’s functional. Peterken, G.F. 1993. Woodland conservation and management. London: Chapman & Hall. He sets out this own classification system. Rackham, O. 2003. Ancient Woodland: its history, vegetation and uses in England. New ed. Balbeattie: Castlepoint. As does Dr Rackham…Rodwell, J.S. 1991. British Plant Communities Volume 1: Woodlands and Scrub. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. A mainstay for British woodland ecologists, the NVC covers other habitats in different volumes. This book is also great in revealing the relationship between plant communities and soils.Tree autoecologyHirons, A & Thomas, P. A. 2018. Applied Tree Biology. Chichester: Wiley. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/9781118296387 Superb modern and much need text on tree biology. Well-written and excellent quality figures and photos. Destined to be the standard text I suspect. Thomas, P. 2000. Trees: their natural history. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Excellent little book, very readable and full of interesting facts (there are many other academic texts on tree/forest physiology, this one is just a nice quick intro to the subject). There’s a newer version available too. Tudge, C. 2006. The secret life of trees. London. Penguin. Another great little book, like the Thomas book, although with more ecology. Ecosystem servicesQuine, C., Cahalan, C., Hester, A., Humphrey, J., Kirby, K.J. & Moffat, A. 2010. UK NEA Chapter 7: Woodlands. In Brown, C., et al. eds. UK National Ecosystem Assessment: Technical Report. Cambridge: UNEP-WCMC. pp: 242-94. Comprehensive overview of the UK’s woodlands and their ecosystem services. The link. Quine, C.P., Bailey, S.A. & Watts, K. 2013. Sustainable forest management in a time of ecosystem services frameworks: common ground and consequences. Journal of Applied Ecology. 50: 863–867. An argument for applying the ecosystem services concept to forest management. Gamfeldt, L., Snall, T., Bagchi, R., Jonsson, M., Gustafsson, L., Kjellander, P., Ruiz-Jaen, M., Froberg, M., Stendahl, J., Philipson, C.D., Mikusinski, G., Andersson, E., Westerlund, B., Andren, H., Moberg, F., Moen, J. & Bengtsson, J. 2013. Higher levels of multiple ecosystem services are found in forests with more tree species. Nature Communications. 4: 1340-8. Neat little paper exploring relationship between biodiversity and ES. Morris, R.J. 2010. Anthropogenic impacts on tropical forest biodiversity: A network structure and ecosystem functioning perspective. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B-Biological Sciences. 365: 3709–3718. Nice review of impacts on tropical forest biodiversity and the consequences for ecosystem function & services.Climate changeLindner, M., Maroschek, M., Netherer, S., Kremer, A., Barbati, A., Garcia-Gonzalo, J., Seidl, R., Delzon, S., Corona, P., Kolström, M., Lexer, M. & Marchetti, M. 2010. Climate change impacts, adaptive capacity, and vulnerability of European forest ecosystems. Forest Ecology and Management. 259(4): 698-709. Neat overview of the current understanding of climate change impacts on European forests and the natural and socio-economic adaptation potential. Milad, M., Schaich, H., Bürgi, M. & Konold, W. 2011. Climate change and nature conservation in Central European forests: A review of consequences, concepts and challenges. Forest Ecology and Management. 261(4): 829-43. Focuses on different climate change impacts and conservation approaches. Pawson, S.M., Brin, A., Brockerhoff, E.G., Lamb, D., Payn, T.W., Paquette, A. & Parrotta, J.A. 2013. Plantation forests, climate change and biodiversity. Biodiversity and Conservation. 22(5):1203-1227. As above but a focus on plantation forests; useful contrast to the Milad paper. Quine, C.P. & Humphrey, J.W. 2010. Plantations of exotic tree species in Britain: Irrelevant for biodiversity or novel habitat for native species? Biodiversity & Conservation. 19: 1503–1512. One for students to think about - challenges the theory that non-native forests can be poor for biodiversity. Certification and plantations Auld G., Gulbrandsen L.H., & McDermott C.L. 2008. Certification Schemes and the Impacts on Forests and Forestry. Annual Review of Environment and Resources. 33: 187–211. Cashore B., Auld G., & Newsom D. 2004. Governing through markets: Forest certification and the emergence of non-state authority. MacDicken K.G., Sola P., Hall J.E., Sabogal C., Tadoum M., & de Wasseige C. 2015. Global progress toward sustainable forest management. Forest Ecology and Management. 352: 47–56. Miteva D.A., Loucks C.J., & Pattanayak S.K. 2015. Social and environmental impacts of forest management certification in Indonesia. PLoS ONE. 10(7): e0129675Rametsteiner E. & Simula M. 2003. Forest certification - An instrument to promote sustainable forest management? Journal of Environmental Management. 67 (1): 87–98. Savilaakso S., Garcia C., Garcia-Ulloa J., Ghazoul J., Groom M., Guariguata M.R., Laumonier Y., Nasi R., Petrokofsky G., Snaddon J., & Zrust M. 2014. Systematic review of effects on biodiversity from oil palm production. Environmental Evidence. 3(1): 1-20.Savill, P., Evans, J., Auclair, D. & Falck, J. 1997. Plantation Silviculture in Europe. Oxford: Oxford University Press. A standard text for anyone wanting to get to grips with 20th century plantation forestry (nice contrast to Puettmann above too). UKWAS. 2018. UK Woodland Assurance Standard. Edinburgh. https://esrc.ukri.org/skills-and-careers/writing-competition/science-writing-for-a-general-audience/ Standard guidelines for UK foresters wanting certification for their woods.  Biofuels, oil palm & carbonCarley, R. H. V & Tinker, P. B. 2015. The Oil Palm. Chichester: Wiley https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/book/10.1002/9781118953297 Six-hundred+ pages on oil palm…  SixMalmsheimer, R.W., Bowyer, J.L., Fried, J.S., Gee, E., Izlar, R.L., Miner, R.A., Munn, I.A., O’Neil, E. & Stewart, W.C. 2011. Managing forests because carbon matters: Integrating energy, products, and land management policy. Journal of Forestry. 109(7 SUPPL.): S7-S51 A whole issue devoted to this topic; a long read but has some useful bits. Nave, L.E., Vance, E.D., Swanston, C.W. & Curtis, P.S. 2010. Harvest impacts on soil carbon storage in temperate forests. Forest Ecology and Management. 259(5): 857-66. Underscores the importance of carbon stocks in soils and how forestry can affect it. Policy and governance Agrawal, A., Chhatre, A. & Hardin, R. 2008. Changing governance of the world's forests. Science. 320(5882): 1460-2. Looks at the future of different types of governance and how to cope with challenges like climate change. Kanowski, P.J., McDermott, C.L. & Cashore, B.W. 2011. Implementing REDD+: Lessons from analysis of forest governance. Environmental Science and Policy. 14: 111–117.Malhi, Y., Adu-Bredu, S., Asare, R.A., Lewis, S.L. & Mayaux, P. 2013. African rainforests: past, present and future. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B-Biological Sciences. 368. Short intro to a PTRSB issue devoted to African rain forests that include several useful papers. Pistorius, T. 2012. From RED to REDD+: The evolution of a forest-based mitigation approach for developing countries. Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability. 4: 638–645. Good overview of RED/REDD+ stuff. Wright, S. 2005. Tropical forests in a changing environment. Trends in Ecology & Evolution. 20: 553–560. Depressing read, and a bit out of date, but good on the ecological response of human pressures. Urban trees and forestry Beckett, K.P., Freer-Smith, P.H. & Taylor, G. 1998. Urban woodlands: Their role in reducing the effects of particulate pollution. Environmental Pollution. 99: 347–360. Early paper but still a good overview and easy introduction to this topic.  Bowler, D.E., Buyung-Ali, L., Knight, T.M. & Pullin, A.S. 2010. Urban greening to cool towns and cities: A systematic review of the empirical evidence. Landscape Urban Plan. 97: 147–155. Trees really do cool urban areas… Dobbs, C., Escobedo, F.J. & Zipperer, W.C. 2011. A framework for developing urban forest ecosystem services and goods indicators. Landscape Urban Plan. 99: 196–206. Pesky ecosystem services again; this may be a framework, but it does provide a useful summary of the main ES derived from urban wooded areas. Escobedo, F.J., Kroeger, T. & Wagner, J.E. 2011. Urban forests and pollution mitigation: Analyzing ecosystem services and disservices. Environmental Pollution. 159: 2078–2087. Very good paper, also includes the potential disservices of urban trees.Helden, A.J., Stamp, G.C. & Leather, S.R. 2012. Urban biodiversity: Comparison of insect assemblages on native and non-native trees. Urban Ecosystems. 15: 611–624. In depth study of which tree species in an English town are better for invertebrate & bird biodiversity. Niemelä, J., Breuste, J. H., Guntenspergen, G.,  McIntyre, N. E., Elmqvist, T., & James, P. 2011. Urban Ecology: Patterns, Processes, and Applications. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Standard text; comprehensive and well written. Not specifically about trees or woods, but none the worse for that. AgroforestryBurgess P.J. 2017. Agroforestry in the UK. Quarterly Journal of Forestry. 111: 111–116.Fagerholm N., Torralba M., Burgess P.J., & Plieninger T. 2016. A systematic map of ecosystem services assessments around European agroforestry. Ecological Indicators. 62: 47–65.Herder den M., Moreno G., Mosquera-Losada R.M., Palma J.H.N., Sidiropoulou A., Freijanes J.J.S., Crous-Duran J., Paulo J.A., Tomé M., Pantera A., Papanastasis V.P., Mantzanas K., Pachana P., Papadopoulos A., Plieninger T., & Burgess P.J. 2017. Current extent and stratification of agroforestry in the European Union. Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment. 241: 121–132.Hernández-Morcillo M., Burgess P., Mirck J., Pantera A., & Plieninger T. 2018. Scanning agroforestry-based solutions for climate change mitigation and adaptation in Europe. Environmental Science and Policy 80: 44–52.Jose S. 2009. Agroforestry for ecosystem services and environmental benefits: An overview. Agroforestry Systems. 76: 1–10.Moreno G., Aviron S., Berg S., Crous-Duran J., Franca A., de Jalón S.G., Hartel T., Mirck J., Pantera A., Palma J.H.N., Paulo J.A., Re G.A., Sanna F., Thenail C., Varga A., Viaud V., & Burgess P.J. 2017. Agroforestry systems of high nature and cultural value in Europe: provision of commercial goods and other ecosystem services. Agroforestry Systems. 121: 62–15.Torralba M., Fagerholm N., Burgess P.J., Moreno G., & Plieninger T. 2016. Do European agroforestry systems enhance biodiversity and ecosystem services? A meta-analysis. Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment. 230: 150–161.The role of trees in natural flood management  Bhattacharjee K. & Behera B. 2018. Does forest cover help prevent flood damage? Empirical evidence from India. Global Environmental Change. 53: 78–89.Iacob O., Brown I., & Rowan J. 2017. Natural flood management, land use and climate change trade-offs: the case of Tarland catchment, Scotland. Hydrological Sciences Journal, 62, 1931–1948.For some forest–related viewingForests: A Convenient Truth This 17-minute video presentation, produced by FAO and the UK Forestry Commission shows how much forests can contribute to the mitigation of climate change, stressing the importance of reversing forest loss.  http://www.fao.org/forestry/52980/en/Planet Earth: Seasonal Forests Available on Box of Broadcasts:  http://bobnational.net/programme.php?archive=338&view=flash_playerThe ForestSeries revealing the hidden world of Galloway Forest, the country's largest afforested area.http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09m61c0