Ecoforestry has been defined as selection forestry or restoration forestry. The main idea of ecoforestry is to maintain or restore the forest to standards where the forest may still be harvested for products on a sustainable basis. [1] Ecoforestry is forestry that emphasizes holistic practices which strive to protect and restore ecosystems rather than maximize economic productivity. [2] Sustainability of the forest also comes with uncertainties. There are other factors that may affect the forest furthermore than that of the harvesting. There are internal conditions such as effects of soil compaction, tree damage, disease, fire, and blow down that also directly affect the ecosystem. [3] These factors have to be taken into account when determining the sustainability of a forest. If these factors are added to the harvesting and production that comes out of the forest, then the forest will become less likely to survive, and will then become less sustainable.[ citation needed ]
Since the forest is considered an ecosystem, it is dependent on all of the living and non-living factors within itself. This is a major part of why the forest needs to be sustainable before it is harvested. For example, a tree, by way of photosynthesis, converts sunlight to sugars for respiration to keep the tree alive. The remains of the converted sugars is left in roots for consumption by the organisms surrounding the tree in the habitat. This shows the productivity of an ecosystem with its inhabitants. [4] Productivity within the ecosystem cannot come to fruition unless the forest is sustainable enough to be harvested. If most individual organisms of the ecosystem vanish, the ecosystem itself is at risk. Once that happens, there is no longer any forest to harvest from. The overall productivity of a system can be found in an equation where the Net Primary Production, or NPP, is equal to the Gross Primary Production, or GPP, minus the Respiration, or R. The formula is the NPP = GPP - R. [4] The NPP is the overall efficiency of the plants in the ecosystem. Through having a constant efficiency in NPP, the ecosystem is then more sustainable. The GPP refers to the rate of energy stored by photosynthesis in plants. The R refers to the maintenance and reproduction of plants from the energy expended.[ citation needed ]
Ecoforestry has many principles within the existence of itself. It covers sustainable development and the fair harvesting of the organisms living within the forest ecosystem. There have been many proposals of principles outlined for ecoforestry. They are covered over books, articles, and environmental agencies. All of the principles relate to the idea that in ecoforestry, less should be harvested, and diversity must be managed. Through harvesting less, there is enough biomass left in the forest, so that the forest may stay healthy and still stay maintained. It will grow at a sustainable level annually, and thus it will be able to still be harvested the following year. Through management of the diversity, species may cohabitate in an ecosystem where the forest may feed off of other species in its growth and production. [1] The Principles of Ecoforestry may be found below.
The principles of ecoforestry are: [4]
| Number | Principle |
|---|---|
| 1 | One must consider retention. It must be the first consideration in any planned removal of trees from a stand. By placing retention at the beginning of a planned removal, one makes sure that they know what must be left to ensure the protection of such things as rare species, sites of native cultural significance, riparian zones. |
| 2 | Riparian zones should not be touched. It is a sensitive area, thus tree removal should not occur there. This protects the water quality. Water quality is protected by not altering the drainage pattern of the zones. No tree removal should take place in the most sensitive areas. |
| 3 | The composition and structures should be upheld so that forests may fully function. This may be subject to large old trees, snags, and large fallen trees. These pieces of the ecosystem are upheld through letting them grow and die out into a timber extraction area. |
| 4 | When removing trees, the lowest impact should be used. This means not compacting the soil in the forest and building small or no roads if at all possible. This takes away the disturbance that would be done to the foundation of the forest’s grounds. |
| 5 | Plan in terms of the needs of the larger watershed. The watershed zone plan designates areas where tree removal is not permitted. It also designates the areas where removal is possible, and the different types of removal available. |
| 6 | Prohibit clear cutting. Clear cutting is not ecologically correct. There are methods for cutting trees to maintain structure, and to allow the trees to cohabitate in a healthy ecosystem. |
| 7 | Select trees as candidates for removal by considering how abundant and redundant their structures and functions are to the rest of the forest as a whole, leaving potential wildlife trees (to become snags and coarse woody debris). |
| 8 | The forest should be allowed to regenerate trees through the seeds from the trees in the logged areas. This allows tree planting to be taken out of the ecoforestry principles, allowing a natural regeneration. |
| 9 | Ecological succession should be kept at all times. This will protect biological diversity. This even means eliminating the process of brush control. |
| 10 | No slash burning. Fire may be used as a tool in landscapes that have a history of naturally occurring fires. Although this may be true, fire should still be used with caution. |
| 11 | No pesticide use. The forest needs disease, insects, and shrub/herb vegetation. They are essential parts of a fully functioning forest, even though they involve the forest’s decay in some cases. They are natural parts that allow the ecosystem to operate as a whole. |
| 12 | Maintain and restore topsoil quality. This can be done through leaving sufficiently coarse and small debris on the forest grounds. |
| 13 | Maintain beauty and other natural aesthetic qualities in the visual, sound, and odor landscapes. This includes not taking away the wildlife, the plants, or structural layout of the ecosystem. |
| 14 | Always look at the forest as a whole. Each part of the forest contributes to its overall needs and health. That is how the forest would have survived without human interference. |
| 15 | Rely more on people and markets. Use accounting and budgeting as a solution to rely less on the destruction or harvesting from the forests. |
| 16 | Don’t do wrong. If it feels wrong, then it is probably wrong. Don’t allow ignorance to persevere. Recognize that the ecosystem needs tending to. If the forest is not preserved, then it cannot be harvested forever. |
An ecosystem consists of all the organisms and the physical environment with which they interact. These biotic and abiotic components are linked together through nutrient cycles and energy flows. Energy enters the system through photosynthesis and is incorporated into plant tissue. By feeding on plants and on one another, animals play an important role in the movement of matter and energy through the system. They also influence the quantity of plant and microbial biomass present. By breaking down dead organic matter, decomposers release carbon back to the atmosphere and facilitate nutrient cycling by converting nutrients stored in dead biomass back to a form that can be readily used by plants and microbes.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to agriculture:
In ecology, primary production is the synthesis of organic compounds from atmospheric or aqueous carbon dioxide. It principally occurs through the process of photosynthesis, which uses light as its source of energy, but it also occurs through chemosynthesis, which uses the oxidation or reduction of inorganic chemical compounds as its source of energy. Almost all life on Earth relies directly or indirectly on primary production. The organisms responsible for primary production are known as primary producers or autotrophs, and form the base of the food chain. In terrestrial ecoregions, these are mainly plants, while in aquatic ecoregions algae predominate in this role. Ecologists distinguish primary production as either net or gross, the former accounting for losses to processes such as cellular respiration, the latter not.
This glossary of ecology is a list of definitions of terms and concepts in ecology and related fields. For more specific definitions from other glossaries related to ecology, see Glossary of biology, Glossary of evolutionary biology, and Glossary of environmental science.
Energy flow is the flow of energy through living things within an ecosystem. All living organisms can be organized into producers and consumers, and those producers and consumers can further be organized into a food chain. Each of the levels within the food chain is a trophic level. In order to more efficiently show the quantity of organisms at each trophic level, these food chains are then organized into trophic pyramids. The arrows in the food chain show that the energy flow is unidirectional, with the head of an arrow indicating the direction of energy flow; energy is lost as heat at each step along the way.
Ecological yield is the harvestable population growth of an ecosystem. It is most commonly measured in forestry: sustainable forestry is defined as that which does not harvest more wood in a year than has grown in that year, within a given patch of forest.
Ecosystem ecology is the integrated study of living (biotic) and non-living (abiotic) components of ecosystems and their interactions within an ecosystem framework. This science examines how ecosystems work and relates this to their components such as chemicals, bedrock, soil, plants, and animals.
Forest ecology is the scientific study of the interrelated patterns, processes, flora, fauna and ecosystems in forests. The management of forests is known as forestry, silviculture, and forest management. A forest ecosystem is a natural woodland unit consisting of all plants, animals, and micro-organisms in that area functioning together with all of the non-living physical (abiotic) factors of the environment.
An ecological pyramid is a graphical representation designed to show the biomass or bioproductivity at each trophic level in an ecosystem.
Sustainable forest management (SFM) is the management of forests according to the principles of sustainable development. Sustainable forest management has to keep the balance between three main pillars: ecological, economic and socio-cultural. Sustainable forestry can seem contradicting to some individuals as the act of logging trees is not sustainable. However, the goal of sustainable forestry is to allow for a balance to be found between ethical forestry and maintaining biodiversity through the means of maintaining natural patterns of disturbance and regeneration. The forestry industry mitigates climate change by boosting carbon storage in growing trees and soils and improving the sustainable supply of renewable raw materials via sustainable forest management. Successfully achieving sustainable forest management will provide integrated benefits to all, ranging from safeguarding local livelihoods to protecting biodiversity and ecosystems provided by forests, reducing rural poverty and mitigating some of the effects of climate change. Forest conservation is essential to stop climate change.
Ecophysiology, environmental physiology or physiological ecology is a biological discipline that studies the response of an organism's physiology to environmental conditions. It is closely related to comparative physiology and evolutionary physiology. Ernst Haeckel's coinage bionomy is sometimes employed as a synonym.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and guide to forestry:
Variable retention is a relatively new silvicultural system that retains forest structural elements for at least one rotation in order to preserve environmental values associated with structurally complex forests.
This is a glossary of environmental science.
Ecological efficiency describes the efficiency with which energy is transferred from one trophic level to the next. It is determined by a combination of efficiencies relating to organismic resource acquisition and assimilation in an ecosystem.
Ecosystem respiration is the sum of all respiration occurring by the living organisms in a specific ecosystem. The two main processes that contribute to ecosystem respiration are photosynthesis and cellular respiration. Photosynthesis uses carbon-dioxide and water, in the presence of sunlight to produce glucose and oxygen whereas cellular respiration uses glucose and oxygen to produce carbon-dioxide, water, and energy. The coordination of inputs and outputs of these two processes creates a completely interconnected system, constituting the underlying functioning of the ecosystems overall respiration.
In ecology, the term productivity refers to the rate of generation of biomass in an ecosystem, usually expressed in units of mass per volume per unit of time, such as grams per square metre per day. The unit of mass can relate to dry matter or to the mass of generated carbon. The productivity of autotrophs, such as plants, is called primary productivity, while the productivity of heterotrophs, such as animals, is called secondary productivity.
The environmental impact of cocoa production includes deforestation, soil contamination, and herbicide resistance. The majority of cocoa farms are now located in Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana.
Lake metabolism represents a lake's balance between carbon fixation and biological carbon oxidation. Whole-lake metabolism includes the carbon fixation and oxidation from all organism within the lake, from bacteria to fishes, and is typically estimated by measuring changes in dissolved oxygen or carbon dioxide throughout the day.
Net ecosystem production (NEP) in ecology, limnology, and oceanography, is the difference between gross primary production (GPP) and net ecosystem respiration. Net ecosystem production represents all the carbon produced by plants in water through photosynthesis that does not get respired by animals, other heterotrophs, or the plants themselves.
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