Istanbulin's maps of deforestation are, of course, accurate. Note that the last map is dated 1920. The general trend in the US was to designate as "National Forest" areas that were nearly clear-cut, and of little use to the logging industry.
Virginia, for example, was nearly stripped bare. Mountain ridges that were denuded of trees were occupied by farmers who discovered that you can't profitably grow crops on mountain ridges (duh!). So they were abandoned.
I have hiked many hundreds of miles in the Appalachian Mountains, from Georgia, through Tennessee, North Carolina, Virginia, Pennsylvania and northern New Jersey. Large stretches of this are presently National Forest land. Its splendid stands of trees are in stark contrast to the surrounding agricultural, suburban and urban land.
However, if you actually look at the trees individually, you will discover that all of them are less than 100 years old, most are less than 50 years old, and many extensive stands are 20 to 30 year old trees. Large swaths of National Forest trees are of identical age and species--usually pine, meaning that the land was clear-cut, then purposely replanted. There are still some ridges that are host to mixed Chestnut, Chestnut Oak.
In a 50 mile radius surrounding Blacksburg, Virginia, which includes vast portions of National Forest land, I went on a search for truly large trees--those likely to be over 100 years old. With the exception of a small stand (~8 trees) of immense first-growth Eastern Hemlock that is a marked and protected remnant within the Jefferson National Forest (they were too inaccessible to be logged), I found only 5 very large trees.
What Istanbulin's maps fail to show is the clear increase in forested land within the extensive National Forest (and Park) boundaries over the past 80 years. So the lovely forests that we behold today (mostly young trees) are a relatively new thing. Gone are the breathtaking stands of 30 foot circumference yellow poplars that greeted the first Europeans. Gone are the "limitless" stands of gigantic live oak that were consumed in the manufacture of hulls of the great sailing ships. We cut them all down, and have replaced the mixed-species "first" growth giants with a simplified selection of rapidly growing species.
In the US, as you drive along any major highway, there seem to be trees everywhere. But in the winter, if you look beyond the immediate line of trees, there's nothing there. Most of the trees visible from roadways are only one or two trees deep. Many of these "stands" of trees are simply neglected fence rows separating vast expanses of cultivated land. It's an illusion.
So, yes, we cut them all down. And yes, we've planted something to replace some of it. In some parts of the country we are planting more than we're cutting. In other parts (the Rockies, the Northwest, southern Alaska) we are cutting more than planting.
If you want to see the reality of our forests, just look at the circumferences of the individual trees. They're babies.
Bob
For the curious:
- Silver T: A new Face on the Countryside: Indians, colonists, and slaves in South Atlantic forests, 1500-1800. Cambridge Univ. Press. 1990.
This is a treatment of period observations and impressions of the status of the land back then.
- Thomas WL, Sauer CO, Bates M, Mumford L: Man's Role in Changing the Face of the Earth. 2 vol., Univ. Chicago Press. 1956.
This remarkable book, which presents the content of a symposium held in Princeton, in 1955--way before the "ecology" movement, and back when the opinions of truly knowledgeable people were still respected--looked at how man had altered islands, shores, courses of rivers, topology, geography, soil, weather and habitability of nearly every region of Earth. And that was nearly 60 years ago.
- Fradkin PL: A River No More: The Colorado River and the West. Univ. Arizona Press. 1984.
I'll cut to the punchline on this one. The mighty Colorado River--one of North America's great river systems--has so much water diverted from it for urban and agricultural purposes that it no longer reaches the ocean. It runs dry before it gets there.