Wisconsin

Forest Action Plan

Keeping forests a vital part of Wisconsin life

Wisconsin’s Forest Action Plan is a statement of intent by those most involved in the protection and sustainable management of Wisconsin’s forests regarding how to address opportunities for growth and challenges that have the potential to significantly impact Wisconsin’s forests over the next decade. It establishes goals and strategies that serve as guideposts and provides a long-term coordinated approach for investing resources to address the management and landscape priorities identified.

Conserving and managing of working forest landscapes for multiple values and uses

Wisconsin’s forests are unquestionably of tremendous environmental significance and partners are continually working to conserve biodiversity, help forests adapt to change and recover from disturbances. Our strategies seek to improve all forest communities, plan more at landscape scales, promote deer management that protects forest ecosystem functions, diversify urban tree species and increase canopy, and minimize ecosystem loss due to invasive species.

Protecting forests from threats from invasive and native insects, diseases and pests, and wildfire impacts

The amount of forest land in Wisconsin has increased, but the landscape patterns have changed due to fragmentation of forest patches, parcelization of forest ownerships, and urbanization. Our strategies seek to increase the amount of sustainably managed forest land, reduce parcelization, maintain and increase large blocks of forests, and manage at landscape scale levels.

Enhancing public benefits through community assistance and wildfire planning, biomass and carbon assessments, wood production, recreation, and education

Forests are ingrained in the history and cultural heritage of Wisconsin and have been an important economic contributor to the state – past and present. Our strategies seek to realize economic values from ecosystem services, make Wisconsin a hub of green forest product markets, increase the capacity of forest management/protection providers, and provide diverse recreational opportunities.

Best Management Practices

Wisconsin’s best management practices (BMPs) program is regulated at the local level, but not the state-level. The state department responsible for BMPs policy development is the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources.

Click here to view the most recent BMPs recommendations on the state forestry agency website.

Click the following links to view available BMP monitoring data and implementation rates from NASF’s 2015 BMP survey and NASF’s 2019 BMP survey.

Forest Action Plan

Keeping forests a vital part of Wisconsin life

Conserving and managing of working forest landscapes for multiple values and uses

Protecting forests from threats from invasive and native insects, diseases and pests, and wildfire impacts

Enhancing public benefits through community assistance and wildfire planning, biomass and carbon assessments, wood production, recreation, and education

Best Management Practices

Wisconsin Forestry Publications

State Management Plans

Wisconsin Contact Information