When making the decision to grow lodgepole pine the forest manager will be faced 

 with the choice of how much of a risk he is willing to accept. He may therefore decide 

 that a 64 percent survival of 16-inch trees in the Abies lasiocarpa/Vaccinium scoparium 

 habitat type is an acceptable risk, but the 25 percent expected survival in the Abies 

 lasiocarpa/Pachistima myrsinites habitat type may be judged as an unacceptable risk. 

 He could then consider other management alternatives for the Abies lasiocarpa/Pachistima 

 myrsinites habitat type. 



Management Practices 



If the risk of lodgepole pine management is too high there are a number of manage- 

 ment practices to be considered. Some of these are described below. 



Type Conversion • ' 



Some objectives of management may be met as well with one forest type as another. 

 For example, a subalpine f ir-Engelmann spruce or a Douglas-fir stand could serve water- 

 shed management, recreation, range, wildlife, and in some instances timber objectives 

 as well as a lodgepole pine stand. The type conversion can be accomplished naturally 

 through culturing the understory or artificially by a cutting that is followed by 

 planting or seeding. 



Rotation ' 



Another practice might be to select as an objective the smallest tree size that 

 will fulfill product requirements and to select the shortest rotation to grow trees 

 to this size. The size selection should be based upon the greatest beetle risk that 

 the manager is willing to accept. Thus, he would probably select a small size 

 objective of possibly 10, 12, or 14 inches and a short rotation for growing trees on 

 the high risk Abies lasiocarpa/Pachistima myrsinites type and, at the same time, set 

 a larger size objective with a longer rotation on the lower risk Abies lasiocarpa/ 

 Vaccinium scoparium type. 



Species and Age Class Mixtures 



A third practice could be to develop mixed stands including lodgepole pine. 

 Presumably, beetles will infest the mixed lodgepole pine stands as readily as the pure 

 stands (Flint 1924). However, some of the lodgepole pine will survive to 16-inch trees 

 even in mixtures, and the other species will help to maintain a higher stocking rate 

 than would be the case in pure decimated lodgepole pine stands. Overall production 

 would probably be higher in mixed than in pure stands. Such mixed stands would meet 

 the recreational, wildlife, and watershed objectives as well or better than pure lodge- 

 pole pine . • 



Achieving a desirable mix and juxtaposition of age classes provides yet another 

 practice but this plan also entails some risk of loss. This would require long-range 

 planning to avoid cuttings that would establish extensive areas of single age classes; 

 also, this practice would require the use of the best known beetle control measures in 

 reserved stands. Breaking up a stand into several age classes and separating similar 

 age classes by interspersing others would probably do two things: (1) it would 

 eventually place the minimum area in beetle-susceptible stands, making prompt removal 

 of these stands, or the application of control measures more feasible when such stands 

 become infested; and (2) it would limit the size of the areas and this separation of 

 stands might help to hold the beetle population at lower levels. This is an objective 

 which can only be met through long-range planning, good markets, adequate road systems, 

 and the passage of time. 



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