Longleaf Pine: A Southern Revival

from Pensacola Magazine, September 2024

LOOKING UP

by Kelly Oden

Centuries ago, the majestic longleaf pine forest covered an estimated 92 million acres of the southeastern United States—running from Virginia to Florida and along the Gulf Coast as far west as Texas. With one of the most diverse ecosystems in the world, the longleaf pine, with its long needles and tall, sturdy trunks, once dominated the southern landscape, but has since nearly disappeared. Fortunately, many public, private and nonprofit organizations are working together to restore this iconic species.

Vernon Compton is the Director of the Gulf Coastal Plain Ecosystem Partnership (GCPEP), a model of 16 public and private organizations working together to conserve and restore the longleaf pine ecosystem in Northwest Florida and southern Alabama.

“By 1995, less than three million of those original 92 million acres rangewide remained," Compton said. “And of that original inheritance, only 12,000 acres of old growth longleaf remain. We are fortunate because 72 percent of that old growth longleaf pine forest exists right here, primarily in and around Eglin Air Force Base. About half of that area was once the Choctawhatchee National Forest so it was never completely cut. You can walk the Florida National Scenic Trail and still see trees that may be 300 to 500 years old. The Florida National Scenic Trail starts on the east side of Eglin and wraps all the way around the base. It's about 72 miles long and it requires an outdoor recreation permit.”

The History

The longleaf pine has a deep history in the South. For indigenous peoples, the longleaf pine was an important part of life, providing materials for housing, medicine and tools. When Europeans began settling in the Southeast, they quickly saw that the trees' tall, straight trunks were ideal for ship masts, and their resin could produce tar, pitch and turpentine. These products were vital to the shipbuilding industry and helped to create the naval stores industry which consisted of pine-derived materials used to build and maintain ships. The strong wood of the longleaf also played a large role in building any of America’s towns and cities. In fact, those beautiful heart pine floors so beloved in old southern homes are crafted from the hard center wood of the longleaf pine.

While the early American naval stores and building industries did leave a mark on the longleaf populations, Compton says it was logging, agriculture and urban development in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries that saw the mass destruction of millions of acres of longleaf forest. “The forests were clear-cut and converted to other uses—to agricultural fields or development sites. If pine was replanted, it was usually planted with faster-growing and on some sites less ecologically beneficial species like loblolly and slash pine,” Compton said. By the mid-twentieth century, less than three percent of the original longleaf pine forest remained, and most of that in a degraded condition.

The Ecology

The longleaf pine is highly adaptable, making it an excellent tree for withstanding the varied soil, climate and weather conditions of the south. One of the most remarkable features of the longleaf pine is its resistance to fire. Longleaf pines rely on periodic fires to maintain their health. The thick bark of mature longleaf pines protects them from fire, while their seeds require the bare soil and nutrient-rich ash left by fires to germinate. Fires also help to clear out the underbrush, allowing the sunlight to reach the forest floor and sustain the diverse plant life that thrives in the understory. “It's very fire resistant,” Compton said. “Fire can kill it if the fire is hot enough. But all the plant species beneath the tree—the wiregrass and a lot of the ground cover are also fire loving. So, the more of that ground cover you have, the hotter the fire can be, and then the more of those species that you get. So, it's sort of circular. The ground cover and the trees depend upon fire, and then the wildlife all depend upon having healthy ground cover and more grasses.”

The longleaf understory is home to a rich variety of grasses, wildflowers and shrubs, many of which are found nowhere else in the world. “Much of the diversity of the system is found below your kneecap,” Compton explained. “It's the ground cover where there's hundreds of different species of wildflowers, grasses and carnivorous plants. Some people have called this area the Serengeti of carnivorous plants because there are so many—pitcher plants, sundews and all these small carnivorous plants. So, it's a unique ground cover, and the animals that live in that habitat depend on it.”

These plants provide habitat and food for a wide range of animals, from the gopher tortoise, which digs burrows that provide shelter for other species, to the red-cockaded woodpecker, an endangered bird that nests almost exclusively in mature longleaf pines. The longleaf pine ecosystem is one of the most biologically diverse in North America, rivaling even tropical rainforests in terms of species richness. In fact, the longleaf ecosystem supports an estimated 900 different plant species and provides habitat to approximately 100 bird species, 36 mammal species and 170 species of reptiles and amphibians.

The Revival

While the plight of the longleaf had been discussed for decades it was in the 1990s that conservation efforts began in earnest. “In the 90s, there was still a decline occurring, so more and more people were putting their heads together,” Compton said. “That's when two forestry professors from Auburn University, Rhett Johnson and Dean Gjerstad, started the Longleaf Alliance. The Longleaf Alliance is focused on all things longleaf, so we help private and public landowners learn and implement longleaf restoration and management. After that, America's Longleaf Restoration Initiative was born, and in 1995/1996 the GCPEP was formed. We are the oldest voluntary landowner partnership supporting longleaf ecosystem recovery, and we share a common vision of environmental stewardship.”

The GCPEP has been working for over two decades to restore longleaf pine forests on both public and private lands. Through a combination of prescribed burns, tree planting, and invasive species and habitat management, this partnership has helped to restore thousands of acres of longleaf pine forest providing critical habitat for endangered species and supporting sustainable forestry practices. In areas where longleaf pines and fire management have been successfully reintroduced, there has been a resurgence of the diverse plant and animal life that characterizes these ecosystems.

As for the long-term success of longleaf conservation efforts, Compton explained that America's Longleaf Restoration Initiative has identified significant geographic areas—areas that have the best chances of restoring and recovering longleaf. “One of those places is right here along the Gulf Coast,” Compton said. “We were the first partnership. Now there are partnerships like this scattered across the whole longleaf range. The shared goal is to restore 8 million acres of longleaf forest. Public and Private landowners working together have restored over 2.34 million acres to date, raising our current acreage total to some 5.2 million acres. The longleaf ecosystem recovery is headed in the right direction due to those collective landowner efforts.”

The Future

Compton believes that education and community involvement are important to the success of longleaf pine restoration efforts. Many of the remaining longleaf pine forests are located on private land, and engaging landowners in conservation efforts is essential. Programs that provide technical assistance and financial incentives to landowners have also been successful in encouraging the restoration and management of longleaf pine forests.

The Longleaf Alliance offers a variety of educational programming including learn and burns, field days and Longleaf Academies where private landowners can come spend a day or two learning everything about the longleaf ecosystem. “There are a lot of learning opportunities coming up,” Compton said. “We have our 15th Biennial Longleaf conference in Sandestin in October. That's going to be a week of learning opportunities. We will have a field day where people will get to see the only remaining coastal old growth longleaf forest that exists today on Eglin Air Force Base.” The conference is open to public and private landowners as well as anyone who has an interest in longleaf restoration and conservation.

A restored longleaf pine forest is not just about the trees themselves, but about the entire ecosystem that depends on them—the plants, the animals and the people who call this region home. We can all play a role in longleaf conservation by supporting conservation initiatives with time or donations, by advocating for sustainable forestry practices or by simply appreciating the beauty and significance of these magnificent trees and forests.

For more information on the longleaf pine visit longleafalliance.org and americaslongleaf.org.