In the present search for guidelines in sustainable forestry, existing models are of great interest. In this context, Central Europes Dauerwald or "perpetual forest", and the tribal forest of the Menominee Nation in Wisconsin. USA, may be instructive.
Despite great differences in the historic, cultural and geographic setting, both forests are being managed with similar, long-term goals of sustainability. The Dauerwald, such as begun over a century ago on a private forest estate in Beerenthoren, Germany, was the response to concerns arising from age-old mismanagement of the land, as reflected in low sites indices, soil degredation, species paucity in flora and fauna, and in landscape monotony. Results from Baerenthoren, probably Germany's longest and best researched single forest, bear out the promise of the Dauerwald as a more productive, profitable, environmentally healthy, and aesthetic forest, than the traditional age class forest. As a result, this model was recently mandated for public forests in several European states. As a long-term committment to natural forest management based on selective cutting for biologically rich forests, the Dauerwald amounts to a giant restoration project, undoing the liabilities of "traditional" forest management, and responsive to the needs of an increasingly nature-hungry, "green" public.
Menominee forest management dates back almost 150 years, when the tribe started a sustainable yeild program in a quasi natural forest. Managed as community-owned property, this forest now exemplifies natural forest management at its best. As it was proactive, it did not recessitate the painful transition considered inevitable in the implementation of the Dauerwald in Europe. After the extraction of more than 2 billion board feet of sawtimber through the years, the Menominee forest has largely retained its original volume, all-aged structure, mixed composition, and landscape appeal. Most of its flora and fauna are intact and balanced, the soils are healthy, timber quality has improved, and weather- or pest-related problems, with the exception of two exotic diseases, have been negligible. This forest has not only significantly contributed to the economic self-sufficiency of the tribe, but had a profound effect on its cultural and spiritual identity, by emphasizing community ownership, a land ethic, and intergenerational responsibility.
Both objectively and subjectively, the Menominee forest already is to a great extent, what the Dauerwald promises to become, namely and economically viable, environmentally healthy, and socially responsible form of sustainable forestry.
INTRODUCTION
Foresty worldwide presently undergoes unprecedented change. In this far-reaching transition, traditional forestry is being challenged by various, often controversial proposals for a "new forestry". By and large, the new models proposed envision shifts in emphasis from sustainable yield to sustainable forests in the broadest sense. The heated discussions have resulted in a blizzard of new vocabulary, including such terms as model forests, biospheres, ecosystem management, analog forestry, social and community forestry, adaptive management, multiple use forestry, ecological or sustainble forestry, among others. On closer scrutiny, all of these ultimately concern issues of sustainable development as defined in the Brundtland Report (World Commission on Environment and Develoment 1987), and as reaffirmed by the Rio Earth Summitt (Heissenbuttel et al. 1994?).
In concept and practice, "new" foestry is not entirely new, having long established precedents here and there, among them Central Europe's "Dauerwald" (DW) or "perpetual forest", and the forest on the Menominee Indian Reservation in Wisconsin/USA. In the present search for solutions in sustainable forest managment, existing models deserve scrutiny. This paper attempts to compare the DW and the Menominee Forest, which despite great differences in the cultural, historic and geographic setting, appear to share a similar long-term vision compatible with "new" forestry.
THE DAUERWALD
The DW concept constitutes a proposal for natural forest management, promising sustainably productive, profitable, environmentally stable, bioligically diverse, socially responsive forests, patterned after nature. Recently mandated for the management of public forests in several Central European states, this concept can only be interpreted in light of early forest history in that part of the world. It apparently consitutes the pinnabce of over 200 years of experience and expermentation with "traditional" forestry.
Scientific forestry as it evolved in Europe in the 17th Century (Leopold 1936a; Plochmann 1992) was a response to looming timber shortages. The challenge was to return understocked forests and degraded land to greater timber production in the shortest time possible. The answer was "pine and spruce mania", i.e. an enthusiastic reliance on the fast-growing, undermanding Norway spruce (Picea abies) and Scotch pine (Pinus silvestris), mostly grown plantation-style.
Concurrent with the rise of technology, and scientific methodology, early forest management systems were mechanical and systematic, generally meeting the challenge of the times to become widely emulated elsewhere, including North America. Disenchantment with the newly created "wood factories", however, started to be expressed in the mid-1800s, by the likes of Koenig (1849) who addressed issues of forest health and even aesthetics, and Gayer (1886), who demanded a return to mixed forests. At just about that time, a private landowner by the name of Friedrich von Kalitsch, without much fanfare, decided to deviate from the standard practices in attempts to improve his impoverished forests at Baerenthoren in Brandenburg, Germany. It is this forest, which may now be Germany's longest and best researched single forest (Bode 1992). It provided seminal ideas for the DW concept, as well as some evidence for its claims (Pietschmann 1984).
Influenced by several writers, by impressions gained Baerenthoren, as well as by personal acquaintance with natural forests of the Amazon and of North America, a certain professor Moeller, conceptualized the DW. His book (1922) unleashed a storm in the forest establishment, which precipitated a flood of other publications and heated discussions, As a result, during the 1920's and 1930's, virtually every academically trained German forester undertook a pilgrimage to Baerenthoren, the Mecca of the DW movement.
To defuse some of the criticism against the DW, Krutsch and Weck (1934) published the results of a second inventory of Baerenthoren, presenting early data in support of claims of the DW. and elaborating on some of the detail of its implementation. Despite continuing skepsis in circles of the forest establishment, the permanent forest was declared the guiding principles for German forestry in 1934.
Only three years later, under the leadership of a non-forester, influenced by the hunting establishment headed by Hermann Goering, Germany's deer-crazy Reichsjaegermeister (Imperial Hunting Master), and dictated by the pressures of an economy preparing for war, the DW policy was repealed. In the early 1950's, however, a "Working Group for Nature-friendly Forest Management" revived the DW movement. Main support for this group arose from a number of large private forest owners. For quite some time, however, the DW remained marginalized, until a green public, stirred by the dramatic effects of "Waldsterben", a complex forest disease triggered primarily by air pollution, and made significant by several stressors resulting from traditional forestry practices, rallied around "save the forests", "back to nature", biodiversity and sustanable forst themes in the 1980's(Plochmann 1987). In 1987 the German state of Saarland terminated clearcutting, followed shortly by several other states, to mandate the DW for public forests.
The DW idea approaches forests as organisms, which can express their inherent vigor and productivity only, if all of its parts are health (Moeller 1922). To assure permanence ("Steigkeit") of all product and service functions of forests, the DW emphasizes measures which improve the forest climate, forest soils, and the forest stands themselves (Moeller 1922; Krutzsch and Weck 1934). More specifically, the principles spelled out include abstention from clearcutting, reductions in chemical input, low impact technology, and the natural regeneration of mixed, unevenaged forests preferably composed of indigenous species and provenances (Bode 1992).
While being dogmatic in their demand for permanence, DW prescriptions are generally decentralized, i.e. flexible to account for local conditions. Most painful in the acceptance of the DW, are the lengthy transitions needed to convert a traditionally managed forest into a DW. During this adjustment period, economic sacrifice appears inevitable. The harvest of quality timber may need to be deferred, administrative and management procedures modified, and harvesting technology adjusted to the new realities. To recreat a semblance of the diversity of fauna and flora which may have been greatly altered in the traditional age class forest, reintroductions of non-comercial, "serving" species may be necessary. Some hunting interests may also be at least temporarily affected, especially where ungulate populations may need to be curtailed, as outlined for the DW by Aldo Leopold (1936a,b). To achieve and eventually maintain a DW, frequent silviculture interventions throughout the forest are called for, always in ways that eliminate the "lesser" tree to eventually provide permanence in stand, site and timber quality. In the long run, and considering all costs, including externalities, the DW claims higher profitability than the age class forest (Bode 1992).
THE MENOMINEE FOREST
While the DW, with few exceptions, has obviously been more discussed than practiced, the Menominee forest in Wisconsin, has been managed as a natural forest for over a century. The accomplishments of this forest, while always significant for the Menominee people, are now finding wider recognition, as it is considered rare and exemplary for the Lake States and beyond (Pecore 1992; Wendell 1995; Ode 1996). This is also fully reflected in the glowing report by a recent visitor to the USA, who apparently was greatly inspired by what he saw at Menominee (Elverfeldt 1995). He summarized his impressions as follows: "In comtemplating the landscapes of the eastern and Mid-western USA, I cannot help but imagine the beautiful and valuable forests which could exist here, if all Americans had concluded and intergenerational contract with their children, in the way the Menominee Indians...have done".
This forest is indeed unique in Wisconsin and the eastern USA, retaining the best stands of old growth white pine in the upper Midwest and probably all of the Eastern USA, while having met the needs of its indigenous owners for at least 150 years of recorded history. It stands as an island of managed natural forest acclaimed for its value, and volume, as well as its environmental and aesthetic quality, amidst a landscape shaped by wholesale exploitation and agricultual conversion of Lake States pineries about 100 years ago.
The Menominee Indian Reservation dates back to 1854, when the tribe was settled on a 240,000 acre remanant of its former territory in northeastern Wisconsin. Initially, small amount of timber were cut for Indian use only. After 1871, a maximum of 20 million board feet per year were also harvested for external sale. The tribe fully appreciated its timber wealth, and rejected attempts by lumber interests to gain access to Menominee resources through fraud, bribery and theft. The LaFollette Act of 1908, finally articulated policies to preserve and perpetuate the Menominee forest as a source of continuous income and employment for the tribe. The Act allowed a cut of 20 million board feet of mature timber per year, plus dead and down trees, under supervision of a professinal forester. Logging and sawing was restricted to Indian and their new mills. This act of Congress, intended to afford "a healthful and profitable occupation to the Indians and insure their receiving the full value of this rich inheritance", was one of the US government's first attempts to regulate timber cutting on a sustainable yield basis (Chapman 1957).
At first, in compliance with provisions of the Act, mature timber was cut on a selective basis, slash burnt, and fire protection instituted. Subsequently, under supervision of a sequence of agents of the Indian Service, however, "widespread clearcutting and destruction exactly paralleling the common practice of lumbermen in the Lake States pineries", took place for years on parts of the Reservation (Chapman 1957). In 1926, the then reservation forester, having observed unsatisfactory regeneration of commercial species on the clearcuts, submitted a memorandum on the benefits of selective logging. Despite opposition from the local mill management, selective cutting was reinstated and has been practiced ever since on about two thirds of the forest.
Attempts by the federal government to liquidate reservation policy in the 1950's (Chapman 1957), by allotting to each individual Indian their share or equity in the common property, were averted by the tribal leadership, through establishment of Menominee Enterprises, in conjunction with strict forest management by way of a "Continuous Forest Inventory" on 14 forest types. Thus, despite occassional difficulties, the Menominee Indian tribe, with the help of responsible foresters and sympathetic legislators, was able to hold in trust the common forest, their most valuable asset and important cultural symbol (Ourada 1979; Bieder 1995).
THE MENOMINEE FOREST AND THE DAUERWALD
Before comparing these two forests, the very different origin of both needs to be emphasized. When recorded utilization and management of the Menominee forest began almost 150 years ago, this area was quasi natural. The DW idea on the other hand germinated in degraded forests. In both cases, sustainability of land resources was at stake i.e. the maintenance therof at Menominee, and its restoration in the DW.
In measuring the experience of the Menominee forest against DW principles, remarkable agreements become evident. In many ways, the Menominee forest exemplifies the promise of the DW as an ecologically healthy, productive, profitable and aesthetic forest. Despite a harvest of more than 2 billion board feet of sawtimber since 1865, when annual cut was first recorded, the Menominee forest retains about 1.5 billion board feet of sawtimber growing stock, i.e. as much as is estimated to have existed in 1854, the birthyear of the Reservation. The average diameter of the trees is only half of an inch smaller now, resulting from early cutting of decay-prone hemlock (Tsuga canadensis), and the loss of many mature elms (Ulmus spp.) during a recent epidemic of the exotic Ducth elm disease (Ceratocystis ulmi). Despite this loss of elm, and previously of some white pine (Pinus Strobus) due to the introduced blister rust (Cronartium ribiocola), the contemporary composition of the Menominee forest largely reflects its original appearance as an all-aged mixed hardwood-pine-hemlock forest forest with most of its associated flora and fauna intant and in balance. Despite overpoplations of white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) throughout Wisconsin, this browser is kept at low densities at Menominee, assuring successful natural regeneration of all woody species. Pest insects and diseases likewise have generally remained at the endemic level, sparing the Menominee the numberous pest outbreaks which notoriously plagued many other Lake State forests, and still do. Only the two aforementioned exotic diseases, and a major windstorm early this century, accounted for some temporary destabilization of parts of this forest.
By consistently removing the worst and leaving of the best trees, the quality of the Menominee timber has gradually improved, just as the DW is promising to do. Most important, the low impactlogging by trained personnel in Menominee's mixed, all-aged forest, has not compromised the many service functions, to assure future generations of Menominee a healthy, vibrant resource.
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