MAJOR INVENTORY FINDINGS 



The Timber Resource 



The total sampled area was 6.6 million acres of which 1.2 million acres 

 (18 percent) were classified as commercial timberland. About 70 percent of 

 the sampled timberland was owned by the other private ownership group, 16 

 percent was owned by forest industries, and 14 percent was state owned. 

 Douglas-fir was found to be the dominant forest type, covering 56 percent of 

 the commercial timberland. Growing stock net volume was estimated to be 1.7 

 billion cubic feet and sawtimber volume was estimated to be 4,7 billion board 

 feet Scribner. Annual growing stock net growth totaled 37.1 million cubic 

 feet and sawtimber totaled 107.2 million board feet. Annual mortality was 

 estimated to be 5.5 million cubic feet or 13.6 million board feet. The 

 average acre of commercial timberland had the potential to produce 5k cubic 

 feet per acre per year. About 54 percent of the timberland had the potential 

 to produce 50 or more cubic feet per acre per year. 



Area By Ownership Group 



Table 1 shows the acreage and percentage of land in Working Circle 3 

 owned or administered by the different owners. As this table shows, public 

 agencies owned or administered 58 percent of the land. The USDA Forest 

 Service administered the largest portion of this public land, as well as most 

 of the forested land in the working circle. 



The proportion of the sampled lands — private, state, county, munici- 

 pal, and miscellaneous federal — owned or administered by different owner- 

 ship groups is shown in Figure 3. The total sampled area was 6.6 million 

 acres which included nonforest land as well as forest. 



Of the commercial forest land sampled, about 61 percent, or 722,500 

 acres, was owned by farmers and ranchers (see Table 2). Another 16 per- 

 cent was owned by forest industries (see Figure 4). The State of Montana 

 owned an additional 14 percent of the commercial timberland sampled. 



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