From Primitive Woods to Cultivated Woodlots: Thoreau and the Forest History of Concord, Massachusetts

Abstract

U ntil very recently most American plant ecologists adhered to the concept of the forest as a stable self-replicating entity composed of the more shadetolerant species. As Raup noted, the climax or the relatively undisturbed, pristine presettlement forest was taken as a biological baseline against which various forest management practices were evaluated.' Like the pendulum, however, which swings from one extreme to another, ecological theory of late has shifted attention from stable forest systems to "forest history," seen as a chronicle of various "disasters" in the life of a given forest.' Today forests are often depicted as mosaics of even-aged woodland patches in various stages of recovery following disturbance. The ecological literature is replete with studies of the impact of fire, windthrows, and other natural disturbances on the structure of the forest," but ecologists have paid considerably less attention to the effects of routine or repetitive human activities on the composition of the forest, or have taken these effects for granted as the background for ecological analysis. Despite their seemingly tranquil nature today, most