ABSTRACT
The historical range of the northern spotted owl includes western Washington, western Oregon, northwestern California, and southwestern British Columbia. The spotted owl prefers the vegetative characteristics of old growth forests in Washington and Oregon. Most spotted owl biologists agree that timber harvest and protection of habitat for nesting owl pairs are mutually exclusive or at least highly conflicting so that the production possibility frontier between timber harvest and owl habitat protection is convex toward the origin. The timber inventory is reduced by timber harvest and is increased by growth. The quantity of stumpage from public land is determined by policy and is not sensitive to price in the long run. The marginal cost for stumpage for private landowners is the marginal user cost of stumpage—the present value of future income foregone by selling one more unit of timber for harvest now rather than later.
