Recovery Plan for the Northern Spotted Owl - DRAFT

proceeds from sale of the timber removed cover the costs. Any surplus wouldbe bid away to the benefit of the government if such contracts were auctionedlike timber sales.Estimates of the costs and returns of various silvicultural practices in varioustypes of stands were developed by Chadwick Oliver of the University of Washington(Oliver 1991). The costs and returns per acre for various silviculturalsystems are in Table G. 1 of Appendix G. A typical regime is the low densitysystem for west side 30-year-old stands. This treatment calls for thinning to100 trees per acre at age 30 with subsequent removal of 20 trees per acre atage 50 and again at age 70. The total undiscounted costs with no removal oftimber are estimated to be about $340 per acre and the returns (above costs) ifall thinned threes are removed are estimated to be about $7,165 per acre.Although relatively few trees are removed in the second and third thinnings,most of the returns result from sale of that timber since the trees removed aremuch larger. If the costs and returns from thinning at ages 50 and 70 arediscounted to present value at the time of the first thinning using an 8 percentdiscount rate, the costs with no removal become $53 per acre and the returnswith full removal become $1,109 per acre. In addition, it was estimated thatimplementing this prescription uses, on average, about 3.64 person-years peracre and could produce a maximum of about 3,833 board feet per acre.For purposes of estimating the potential economic effects of silviculturalpractices within DCAs, the costs and returns for the low density system on 30-year-old stands shown in Table G. 1 of Appendix G were assumed to be the endpoints of a linear relationship starting at 0 percent and ending at 100 percent.It was assumed that 50 percent of the thinned trees would be removed onaverage.Estimates of the acreage in DCAs that would be an appropriate target for suchpractices were developed by using estimates of unsuitable habitat acres inDCAs from the Recovery Team's GIS (geographic information system). Unsuitablehabitat in the DCAs accounts for nearly 2.5 million acres. Since only* those stands of age 30 to 40 years or less than 11 inches dbh would makegood targets, information on the age and size distribution of stands in thenational forests and O&C lands was used to determine the percentage ofunsuitable habitat likely to be an appropriate age during the 1990s (USDA1991b,c,d, and USDI 1990). For purposes of estimating the economic effects ofsilvicultural treatments, it was assumed that 15 percent of unsuitable habitaton Forest Service lands and 30 percent on BLM lands would be appropriate forsilvicultural treatment. The resulting target acreage is about 450,000 acres.Implementation of silvicultural practices to promote development of suitableowl habitat will be the responsibility of the land management agencies, theBLM and Forest Service. The rate of treatment of the target acreage willdepend on administrative and budgetary factors that the Recovery Teamcannot accurately anticipate. To show the range of potential economic effectsfrom an aggressive program of silvicultural treatment to a go-slow approach,various assumptions were made regarding the percent of target acreage thatwould be treated in each year during the first decade of the recovery planimplementation.Estimates for the employment and economic gains from a program of silviculturaltreatment in DCAs are in Table H. 12. The economic gains are substantial.Even under the assumption that only 50 percent of the thinned trees willbe removed, a program treating 50,000 acres per year would yield about 100million board feet per year and create net benefits of more than $26 million peryear. The employment created by such a program also could be significant,about 600 jobs. It is important to note, however, that the wages for thinning579