Introduction

Designing Sustainable Forest Landscapes describes a process for deliberate management of the form, composition and/or pattern of forests in ways that take account of multiple goals and objectives. Forest landscapes are not normally “designed”, but they are clearly altered as a consequence of human use and management. While natural, or unmanaged, forests may seem self-regulating, they are constantly changing and adapting, either to very gradual processes such as growth and succession, or more dynamic ones such as fire and windstorms. Natural and managed forests form spatial mosaics over large areas. It is the nature, form and distribution of these mosaics over space and time that can and should be consciously designed.