Woodlands Provide Us Services!
- Protect Water Quality: Woodlands serve as natural filters by preventing pollutants from entering our streams, rivers and our drinking water supply.
- Control flooding: Woodlands act as "sponges" by capturing precipitation and slowing its flow, thereby reducing the volume of surface run-off entering the streams.
- Improve Air Quality: Trees help remove air pollutants in the atmosphere that are released by cars, industry, farming, construction, etc.
- Create Habitat for Fish and Wildlife: Woods provide food, shelter, nesting sites and safe migration paths for the both land and aquatic animals.
- Reduce Greenhouse Gases: Trees are very efficient in absorbing and storing carbon from the atmosphere.
- Improve quality of life and encourage recreation: Woods offer us places in which to reflect and experience natural beauty and provides outdoor recreation opportunities.
- Provide an Income: Wood can provide a continuous source of income through sustainable harvesting of timber and other forest products.
Did You Know?
- Water drains from 64,000 square miles of land in 6 states and flows through over 100,000 miles of streams and rivers before reaching the Chesapeake Bay.
- Woods historically covered 95% of this Chesapeake Bay watershed. Despite 400 years of harvesting for agriculture, fuel, timber and other uses, forest land still comprises 58% of the land in the watershed.
- Woodlands in the watershed have disappeared at 100 acres a day to development since the mid 1980's.
- There are currently 900,000 private family forest owners that own nearly 80% of the total Chesapeake forests. The majority of these landowners own less than 25 acres.
