The Clean Water Act (CWA) requires that wetlands be protected from degradation because of their important ecological functions including maintenance of high water quality and provision of fish and wildlife habitat. However, this protection generally does not encompass riparian areasâ€"the lands bordering rivers and lakesâ€"even though they often provide the same functions as wetlands. Growing recognition of the similarities in wetland and riparian area functioning and the differences in their legal protection led the NRC in 1999 to undertake a study of riparian areas, which has culminated in Riparian Areas: Functioning and Strategies for Management. The report is intended to heighten awareness of riparian areas commensurate with their ecological and societal values. The primary conclusion is that, because riparian areas perform a disproportionate number of biological and physical functions on a unit area basis, restoration of riparian functions along America's waterbodies should be a national goal.

The timing could not be better for addressing riparian area management and the resulting impacts of surface water. The Forest Service leadership team has identified water and watershed management as the issue of the upcoming decade. These factors and more have moved riparian forests to the forefront of environmental management. Riparian Management in Forests of the Continental Eastern United States gives you the tools you need to take on this task. Each day, thousands of natural resource professionals face the problems involved in managing riparian forests. The challenge: fragmented ownership, fragmented ecosystems, and diverse interest groups. The solution requires a multidisciplinary approach, drawing on a complex mix of government agencies, private interests, and local communities as exemplified in the following initiatives: Chesapeake Bay Program "Save the Bay" Inland West Water Strategy New York City Watershed Project The Pacific Habitat Strategy The Anadromous Fish Habitat Riparian Management in Forests of the Continental Eastern United States summarizes the state-of-the-art in the management of forested riparian areas. It serves as a desktop reference for natural resource administrators, educators, and on-the-ground managers from industry, consulting firms, and municipal, state, and federal agencies who routinely face the complex problems of protecting riparian areas. Features

Helps managers, planners and field staff set and comply with Forest Practices Code standards for management of riparian management areas (RMAs).

The Forest Practices Code guidebooks help forest resource managers plan, prescribe and implement sound forest practices that comply with the Forest Practices Code. This guidebook focuses on the preparation and administration of logging plans, as required under the Forest Practices Code of British Columbia Act and the Operational Planning Regulations.

Describes how to develop a silviculture prescription - a site-specific plan that describes the forest management objectives for an area.

The British Columbia Forest Practices Code specifies planning and operational guidelines for each phase of timber harvesting operations around streams, lakes, and wetlands. This guide describes suitable practices to meet the objectives of the riparian management regulations within the Code, specifically the requirement to correctly identify streams on the basis of fish presence in order to ensure the protection of fish populations and habitats during all phases of forest harvesting. The guide defines the classes of streams distinguished for aquatic ecosystem and riparian zone management, identifies fish species that define a stream as fish-bearing under the Code, and describes factors influencing fish-stream identification such as stream reach, gradient, stream size, natural barriers, and fisheries sensitive zones. The guide concludes with methods for identifying fish streams, including measurement, sampling, data recording, and mapping procedures.

Sitka spruce, the largest of the world's spruces, is an important component of British Columbia's coastal forests. Its ecology gives it a special place in the sustainable management of the province's forests. However, in west coast forestry it is poorly known in comparison with its main coniferous companions -- Douglas-fir, western redcedar, and western hemlock. As an important international forestry resource, it is crucial that Sitka spruce -- its ecology and the ecosystems in which it occurs -- be clearly understood by those who are involved with its management.

Provides managers, planners and field staff with a recommended process for meeting biodiversity objectives - both landscape and stand level - as required under the Forest Practices Code.

In recent years, the forests of British Columbia have become a battleground for sustainable resource development. The conflicts are ever present, usually pitting environmentalists against the forest industry and forestry workers and communities. In an effort to broker peace in the woods, British Columbia's NDP government launched a number of promising new forest policy initiatives in the 1990s. In Search of Sustainability brings together a group of political scientists to examine this extraordinary burst of policy activism. Focusing on how much change has occurred and why, the authors examine seven components of BC forest policy: land use, forest practices, tenure, Aboriginal issues, timber supply, pricing, and jobs.