Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program Glossary

Collaboration or Collaborative Process - “a structured manner in which a collection of people with diverse interests share knowledge, ideas, and resources while working together in an inclusive and cooperative manner toward a common purpose.” (National Forest System Land Management Planning; 36 CFR § 219.19. p. 83.) Collaborative processes often include diverse entities working together to solve shared problems, develop projects, and/or achieve outcomes using open, transparency, and inclusive approaches and decision-making.

Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Fund - the established by section 4003(f) of Title IV of the Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009.

Collaborative Group - related to the terms above, collaborative groups are generally comprised of diverse interested and focused on funding common ground to achieve shared objectives or resolve perceived problems. They are not controlled or led by Forest Service employees.

Desired condition - the term "desired conditions" refers to landscape and resource conditions (as defined collaboratively by stakeholders and land managers) that you are seeking to achieve and maintain for your CFLRP landscape over the next 10+ years. Desired conditions are outcome-driven not output-driven, and should link to your project's CFLRP proposal restoration strategy while being measurable.

Note: The term “desired condition” is used somewhat differently in the Forest Service’s Land Management Planning Process. In that context, it is not time bound, and often represents long-term social, economic and ecological goals, while the term "objective" is used to represent specific, measurable and time-bound benchmarks to be achieved while working toward desired conditions in a forest plan area.

Ecological restoration - the process of assisting the recovery of an ecosystem that has been degraded, damaged, or destroyed.  Ecological restoration focuses on reestablishing the composition, structure, pattern, and ecological processes necessary to facilitate terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems sustainability, resilience, and health under current and future conditions (36 CFR 219.19).

Ecosystem services - benefits people obtain from ecosystems, including:

1. Provisioning services, such as clean air and fresh water, energy, food, fuel, forage, wood products or fiber, and minerals;
2. Regulating services, such as long-term storage of carbon; climate regulation; water filtration, purification, and storage; soil stabilization; flood and drought control; and disease regulation;
3. Supporting services, such as pollination, seed dispersal, soil formation, and nutrient cycling; and
4. Cultural services, such as educational, aesthetic, spiritual, and cultural heritage values, recreational experiences, and tourism opportunities.

(US Forest Service, National Forest System, Land Management Planning Directive FSH 1909.12, zero code, section 05)

Forest land - Forested National Forest System (NFS) land is at least 10 percent stocked by forest trees of any size, including lands that formerly had such cover and will be naturally or artificially reforested.

Forest restoration by-products - refers to forest products derived from active ecological restoration using tools such as commercial timber sales and permits, stewardship contracts, special forest products sales and permits. Forest restoration by-products refers to any woody material generated from restoration treatments volume that can be utilized, regardless of product class, such as sawtimber, pulpwood, post and poles, fuelwood, biomass sold for energy, etc.

Landscape - a defined area irrespective of ownership or other artificial boundaries, such as a spatial mosaic of terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems, landforms, and plant communities, repeated in similar form throughout such a defined area (36 CFR 219.19). (US Forest Service, National Forest System, Land Management Planning Directive FSH 1909.12, zero code, section 05)

Large Tree Retention – vegetation treatment methods applicable to areas outside of identified old-growth stands to maximize the retention of large trees in a manner that is appropriate for the forest type based on ecological characteristics and that will reduce uncharacteristically severe wildland fire effects with the treated area and reduce fire risk to communities, municipal water supplies, and at-risk Federal land (see also “Large Tree Retention” section of the HFRA/HFI Interim Guide).

Match - Non-Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program Federal, partner and other funds, in kind services, and the value of goods traded for services in stewardship contracts expended during the Fiscal Year to implement treatments and monitor a Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration project across all lands within the CFLRP landscape, as outlined in the project proposal.

Old growth forest structure - Standard definitions of old growth generally refer to a patch or stand condition, not individual trees. However, old trees can occur in smaller or larger spatial configurations, namely tree groups or patches, and forests or landscapes that may also be termed old growth. Although old trees must exist for the term “old growth” to be relevant at all, “old” is a relative term that varies greatly among species. There are varying definitions of old-growth forests because of differences in environment and influences of different disturbances (fire, wind, insects, disease, etc.). These disturbances determine the ecologically characteristic scale of old-growth forest patches. Two general types of forests reflect the role of disturbances:

1. Forests shaped by small-scale natural changes in structure and species composition. In these forests, plant succession processes are driven by competitive differences among species, individual trees, and by small-scale disturbances. These forests are typically structured as self-sustaining uneven-aged forest stands. Old-growth tree groups and patches are interspaced with canopy gaps and all ages of tree group patches, ranging from seedlings to mid-aged. Typically, these forests are maintained by high frequency, low intensity disturbance processes (ie: frequent fire dry forest types).
2. Forests where plant succession processes are disrupted by major physical/biological disturbances (fire, insects, wind, or disease) extending across larger areas. Forests in areas where climates are wet are typical examples of forests driven largely by natural plant succession and large-scale disturbances. Mature stages of such forests usually have an overstory dominated by large, old trees. Because these forests rarely become very dry and fire is unlikely for up to three or more centuries, there often is a large amount of decaying wood from fallen trees. Moderate to high-severity fire tends to structure these forests as even-aged landscapes or large-scale even-aged patches.

Resilience - the ability of an ecosystem and its component parts to absorb, or recover from the effects of disturbances through preservation, restoration, or improvement of its essential structures and functions and redundancy of ecological patterns across the landscape. (US Forest Service, National Forest System, Land Management Planning Directive FSH 1909.12, zero code, section 05)

Woody biomass - refers to the by-product of management, restoration, and hazardous fuel reduction treatments, including trees and woody plants (i.e., limbs, tops, needles, leaves, and other woody parts) grown in a forest, woodland, or rangeland environment. The term is used generally, recognizing that utilization standards for biomass will vary by Forest Service Region.