Our Mission
The mission of the newly formed Auburn University Center for Longleaf Pine Ecosystems (CLPE) is to address knowledge gaps in the restoration, conservation and management of longleaf pine ecosystems to provide a variety of ecological, social and economic services for the people of Alabama and the Southeast.
Longleaf Pine Forests
The range of longleaf pine once stretched southward through nine states from Virginia to east Texas and covered over 140,000 square miles and 90 million acres. In 1880, approximately 18.2 million acres of longleaf pine covered Alabama. Interest in the restoration and management of longleaf pine ecosystems is growing because of increasing enthusiasm for economic, ecological, and recreational returns from longleaf pine forests. There is tremendous interest by landowners to convert land back to longleaf pine. In the last 10 years longleaf pine acreage in Alabama has increased by 60% to 860,000 acres, which is 3.7% of the forested land in Alabama. In the other southern states, longleaf acreage has either remained unchanged or declined.
The majority of longleaf forests are on private non-industrial lands but public agencies are important in leading the effort in longleaf restoration and recovery. Many private non-industrial landowners in Alabama and the Southeast have diverse management objectives and are interested in restoring longleaf ecosystems when knowledge and technical assistance is made available.
Incentives to landowners to replant with longleaf pine are:
- greater growth potential on poor and average sites compared to other southern pines,
- versatility in producing a variety of products,
- high quality of lumber,
- investment security,
- and risk aversion from wildfire, diseases, pests, wind damage and drought provide.
Economic returns from longleaf pine are closely coupled with multiple use objectives which include:
- aesthetics,
- hunting habitat,
- carbon sequestration,
- water purification,
- soil stabilization,
- high species richness in the groundcover,
- and protection of rare plants and animals.
Within longleaf pine forests, a few dozen species that wholly depend on the structure of longleaf ecosystems are now imperiled with global extinction. High species richness found mainly in the groundcover accounts for longleaf forests being considered regional hotspots of the World’s biodiversity.
