What is a woodland?
We use several terms when discussing the type of habitat we are working with, such as woodlands, young forest, shrublands, and early successional habitat: what exactly are we referring to?
It is a lot of terms to keep track of! All are important types of habitat consisting of understory vegetation that many species of wildlife rely on.
Here are some photos to give a better idea of what these areas look like (woodlands is used as a term to encompass all types):
- Woodland: an area covered with woody vegetation (e.g. vines, shrubs, small trees, mature trees)
- Young Forest: an area where young tree saplings are growing up
- Shrubland: an area with a high density of shrubs; shrubs are the dominant plant
- Early Successional Habitat: an area with growing grasses, herbs, shrubs, and tree saplings, such as grasslands, shrub thickets, young forest, and old agricultural fields
It is a lot of terms to keep track of! All are important types of habitat consisting of understory vegetation that many species of wildlife rely on.
Here are some photos to give a better idea of what these areas look like (woodlands is used as a term to encompass all types):
Woodlands:
open canopy, high density of stems, dominated by shrubs, forbs, and small trees |
Mature Forest:
closed canopy, dominated by old growth trees, little to no understory |
Let's revisit the concept of early successional habitat:
All plants start off as a seed and mature as time goes on- sometimes in just a season, other times over decades. They go through stages of life, much like we do. These stages are:
Early stage habitats were maintained by disturbance, such as forest fires, storms, and beaver activity. With increasing human development, control over these types of disturbances has increased as well. With no disturbance and forest maturation, early stage habitats now rely on human manipulation for the habitat to be maintained, meaning that habitat management is necessary for early successional species to be conserved.
All plants start off as a seed and mature as time goes on- sometimes in just a season, other times over decades. They go through stages of life, much like we do. These stages are:
- Early successional
- Mid- successional
- Late successional
- Mature, old-growth
Early stage habitats were maintained by disturbance, such as forest fires, storms, and beaver activity. With increasing human development, control over these types of disturbances has increased as well. With no disturbance and forest maturation, early stage habitats now rely on human manipulation for the habitat to be maintained, meaning that habitat management is necessary for early successional species to be conserved.