And industrial foresters 

 deserve much credit for the 

 practical testing of new 

 ideas and alternative tech- 

 niques for protection, man- 

 agement, and utilization of 

 southern forests. 



With the substantial growth 

 in numbers of research 

 scientists and publications 

 over the past several 

 decades, the need for 

 coordination in research 

 planning and dissemination 

 of research findings has 

 grown accordingly (e.g., 

 USDA Forest Service 

 1982b). Both the Forest 

 Service and other agencies 

 have issued a wide variety 

 of research publications 

 ranging from brief notes to 

 comprehensive handbooks 

 and monographs. Many 

 scientists have published 



extensively in specialized 

 technical journals. And 

 numerous findings have 

 been reported in such 

 publications as the Southern 

 Lumberman, the Forest 

 Farmer, the Journal of 

 Forestry, and the Southern 

 Journal of Applied Forestry. 

 Another response to the 

 growth in programs and 

 publications has been the 

 increasing use of symposia, 

 workshops, conferences, 

 and working groups as 

 means of coordinating 

 research planning and 

 integrating the findings of 

 scientists in different organi- 

 zations. Participation of 

 members of action agencies 

 in these sessions has also 

 provided an effective means 

 of getting research results 

 into practice with minimum 

 delays. 



