According to the Fort Valley Environmental Assessment, the intended removal of trees 16 inches diameter and greater, but not accomplished due to the 16 inch cap, was to be documented for units 13, 14, 15, and 16 at Fort Valley. The prescriptions for units 13, 14, and 15 do not require the removal of trees larger than 16 inches dbh (even without a 16 inch cap).

For unit 16, the marking crew indicated (by a number one, or two, three, or four horizontal slashes of paint) at the time of marking the reason for wanting to remove a tree greater than 16 inches dbh, but having to retain it (under the cap) with a leave tree mark. Unit 16 is a presettlement (1.5/3) prescription. Data was gathered prior to thinning. The results are summarized below. Field forms are in the Fort Valley Project Record.

There were 212 trees in excess of 16 inches dbh retained, but would have been cut without a cap (2.5 trees per acre). Twenty of these were individually tallied with data according to the monitoring form. A total of 192 trees were tallied and data collected in summary format. The following table summarizes the data for both sets.

The following are some observations during this monitoring exercise:

• Unit 16 represents a range of conditions: heavily managed site, lightly managed (experimental forest), some pockets of dwarf mistletoe, few pockets of yellow pine.

• Approximately 50% of the trees monitored are between 16 and 18 inches dbh (about 1 tree per acre).

• About 25% of total trees (1 tree every other acre) are diseased, suppressed, or in poor vigor that precludes further significant growth (from both field indications and literature), and likely will result in death in the next 30 years. These trees are spread over the various diameter groups.

• Very few large trees are suppressed (about 1%); almost all are dominants or codominants.

• Where dwarf mistletoe occurs, it is in pockets up to several acres in size-rarely an individual or small group instance.

• Despite grouping strategies employed in Unit 16 for the presettlement model, 70% of the large trees intended for removal simply were too far (more than search radius) from evidences or excess to the evidences present (in other words, groups of 16 inch + trees).