A Note From The Editor

Forests of Illinois

Following is information published in Forests of Illinois, a cooperative endeavor of the Illinois Council on Forestry Development and the Illinois Natural History' Survey.

* According to estimates by the U. S. Forest Service, about 12 percent of Illinois (4.27 million acres) is forestland, particularly in the southern and western counties.

* Sixty-one percent of the flora native to Illinois and 75 percent of its wildlife habitat are found in forests, which occupy only 12 percent of the state.

* Illinois is responsible for 4 percent of the carbon dioxide contributed by humans to the earths atmosphere; yet our state accounts for only 0.2 percent of the world's population and 0.1 percent of its land surface. Illinois forests help to alleviate this disproportion.

* More than 90 percent of the forests in Illinois are privately owned. The remaining 10 percent is publicly owned, primarily by the federal government in the form of Shawnee National Forest.

* The U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates that approximately 169,000 Illinoisans own forestland and that each of them owns an average of 21 acres.

* Only 31 percent of the forests in existence in 1820 remain, and today' s forest is essentially secondary forester regrowth from cut-over timberland.

* Illinois forests provide habitat for more than half of the botanical species native to the state.

* Nearly all of Illinois forestland is capable of and potentially available to produce commercially valuable trees; only 235,600 acres have protected status.