Kentucky's forests are generally understocked. Con- 

 sidered from the standpoint of the capacity of the 

 land to grow timber, the stands probably should 

 support an average closer to 2,000 cubic feet per 

 acre although research has yet to determine the 

 optimum volume. More than 40 percent of the 

 cubic-foot volume is in pole trees— 6, 8, and 10 

 inches in diameter (fig. 24). About 25 percent is in 

 small sawtimber (12 and 14 inches d.b.h.), 17 percent 

 in 16- and 18-inch sawtimber, and 17 percent in 

 trees 20 inches and larger in diaineter. Since 65 per- 

 cent of the volume is in poles and young sawtimber, 

 the stands are in a condition to respond rapidly to 

 good manageinent. 



The large sawtimber stands, averaging about 

 1,000 cubic feet per acre, have the best stocking. 

 Seedling and sapling stands and nonstocked stands 

 average only about 65 cubic feet and 50 cubic feet 

 per acre, respectively. 



Timber Growth 



Sawtimber Growth 



The annual net growth of sawtimber in 1949 

 exceeded 1 billion board feet. About 45 percent of 

 this is ingrowth, i.e., the total volume of those trees 

 that grew into the sawtimber class during the year. 

 About 55 percent is growth of trees that were of 

 sawtimber size at the beginning of the growth year. 

 The annual net board-foot growth rate is 4.8 per- 

 cent of the inventory volume. Cottonwood, syca- 

 more, and the red oaks show the most rapid rates of 

 diameter growth. 



The net sawtimber growth per acre is about 100 

 board feet per year. Providing that drain does not 

 increase greatly, this growth could probably be 

 doubled or tripled in 30 to 40 years if the forests 

 were protected from fire and grazing, and were well 

 managed. Mortality could be reduced and the 

 growth rate increased by removing the slow-growing 

 and defective trees to make room for the faster grow- 

 ing ones. Furthermore, better protection would help 

 eliminate fire damage to trees and the resulting 

 retarding effect on growth. 



Approximately 15 percent (180 million board 

 feet) of the total board-foot growth is high-quality 

 material (log grades 1 and 2). There are two reasons 

 for this relatively low proportion of quality growth: 

 (1) About 70 percent of the board-foot growth is on 



Kentucky's Forest Resources and Industries 



























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D.B.H CLASS (Inches) 



Figure 24.— Distribution of growing-stock volume by tree- 

 diameter class. 



trees too small to contain high-quality logs, and (2) 

 most of the larger trees are too poor to put on qual- 

 ity giowth. Removal of low-qtiality trees and lighter 

 cutting of high-quality material over a period of 

 years will help improve the situation. 



Growtli of Grou'ing Stock 



The total growth of the growing stock is 267 

 million cubic feet per year. About 50 percent of 

 this is on poletimber trees, 15 percent is ingrowth, 

 and 35 percent is on sawtimber. Although pole trees 

 have only 40 percent of the cubic-foot volume of 

 growing stock, they are . producing most of the 

 growth. However, pole trees are growing an average 

 of only 1.66 inches in diameter in 10 years while 

 sawtimber trees are growing 2.12 inches. This ap- 

 parent inconsistency is explained by the greater 

 height growth and the denser stocking of pole trees. 



The net growth of the growing stock amounts to 

 23 cubic feet per acre annually— only 30 to 40 per- 

 cent of what it could be. This average growth is low 

 because the average stocking of desirable trees in 

 the forests is low. 



19 



