Outline of forestry

The following outline is provided as an overview of and guide to forestry: Forestry – science and craft of creating, managing, using, conserving, and repairing forests and associated resources to meet desired goals, needs, and values for human and environment benefits. Forestry is practiced in plantations and natural stands. Forestry accommodates a broad range of concerns, through what is known as multiple-use management, striving for sustainability in the provision of timber, fuel wood, wildlife habitat, natural water quality management, recreation, landscape and community protection, employment, aesthetically appealing landscapes, biodiversity management, watershed management, erosion control, and preserving forests as 'sinks' for atmospheric carbon dioxide. Tree – organism, whose species, age, vitality, growth, health, and size, are considered individually or more often, as part of a whole; Forest – defined as either a geographic area or delineated by the general composition of individuals; Biome – ecologically defined by its forest structure, leaf types, tree spacing, and climate Agroforestry – integration of forests into agricultural systems in order to optimize the production and positive effects within the system and minimize negative side effects of farming Boreal forestry – analyzes the particular challenges of forestry in the world's boreal regions Close to nature forestry – theory and practice that takes the forest as an ecosystem and manages it as such. It is based on reduced human intervention, that should be directed to accelerate the processes that nature would do by itself more slowly.