Terms

D

Deciduous tree:  a tree that loses all of its leaves in fall or with leaves that die and stay on the tree until spring.  These are primarily hardwoods.

Defect:  any irregularity or imperfection in a tree, log or lumber that lowers its quality, strength or value.  Common defects include crooked trunks, forked limbs, heart rot, and stain.

Diameter Breast Height (DBH): outside bark diameter at 4.5 feet from the ground, measured in inches. 

E

Even-aged Stand: a group of trees having no or a small difference in ages; by convention, with a spread of ages not exceeding 20% of the rotation length. 

F

Fair Market Value: an estimate of the market value of a property, based on what a knowledgeable, willing, and unpressured buyer would probably pay to a knowledgeable, willing, and unpressured seller. 

Fixed Radius Plots: sample plots with a fixed area representative of the larger stand. For example, a fixed-radius plot with an area equal to 1/10th, or 4356 feet2, would have a radius of 37.2 feet. 

H

Hardwood: wood from broad-leaved or angiosperm trees that typically lose their leaves in the fall in temperate zones. Oak (Quercus), ash (Fraxinus), elm (Ulmus), and maple (Acer) are hardwoods. 

Herbaceous Control: chemical control of herbaceous plants. 

Housing Starts: the number of residential houses that undergo initial construction over some time period. A start in construction is the start of foundation excavation.

I

Income Approach: Method of arriving at the appraisal value of a property on the basis of its projected cashflows. 

Interspecies Competition: a form of competition in which individuals of different species compete for the same resource in an ecosystem. 

Intraspecies Competition: a form of competition in which individuals of the same species compete for the same resource in an ecosystem. 

L

Landing:  also called the brow or deck, the area close to a road where logs are brought during the harvesting operation for delimbing, bucking, and loading onto trucks.

Logging slash:  unwanted, generally unmarketable wood such as large limbs, tops, cull logs, and stumps that remain in the forest after timber harvesting.

Lumber: wood products sawn to a standard thickness by cutting a log on two or four sides. In North America, softwood lumber is classified as boards, dimension, or timbers based on thickness categories. Boards are lumber less than 2 inches in nominal thickness; dimension is material 2 to 5 inches thick, and timbers are pieces 5 inches or thicker. 

Lump sum sale:  a sale in which a specified volume of standing trees is sold for a cash price before harvesting begins.  The price is paid regardless of the volume of timber actually removed from the tract.  A timber deed is filed to transfer ownership of trees to buyer upon payment.

M

MDF, Medium Density Fiberboard: composite wood product made from wood waste fibers glued together by resin, heat, and pressure. MDF is used in furniture, cabinetry, moulding, and shelving.