This paper empirically examines patterns of afforestation in vicinities immediately surrounding National Park/National River and National Forest lands. The public lands (Ozark National Forest and Buffalo National River) are found on the Ozark Plateau and represent different management mandates. A spatial lag model is presented comparing two LANDSAT images in conjunction with sociodemographic measures covering the same time period. The findings here make two important points. First, the public land boundaries are shown to act as ecological switches. Second, results underscore the importance of understanding how publicly managed lands with different mandates function within the larger social as well as geophysical landscape matrix. Empirical evidence demonstrates that public lands set aside for “preservation” (Buffalo National River) are associated with greater afforestation, whereas public lands set aside for “conservation and use of natural resources” (Ozark National Forest) are surrounded by less afforestation.
KeywordsLandcover ChangeAfforestationLANDSATSpatial Lag RegressionPublic Lands
Anselin, L., Syabri, I., & Kho, Y. (2006). GeoDa: An introduction to spatial data analysis. Geographical Analysis, 38, 5-22. doi:10.1111/j.0016-7363.2005.00671.x
Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department (AHTD). (2000). Roads, all. Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies, University of Arkansas.
Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department (AHTD). (2001). Digital elevation model. Fayetteville, AR: University of Arkansas.
Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department (AHTD). (2006). Public land boundaries (polygon). URL (last checked 1 October 2006). http://www.geostor.arkansas.gov
Arkansas Natural Resource Conservation Commission and the University of Arkansas’ Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies. (2005). Land use land cover fall 2004 (raster).
Bhattarai, M., & Hammig, M. (2001). Institutions and the environmental Kuznets Curve for deforestation: A crosscountry analysis for Latin America, Africa and Asia. World Development, 29, 995-1010. doi:10.1016/S0305-750X(01)00019-5
Caldwell, J. C. (1976). Toward a restatement of demographic transition theory. Population and Development Review, 2, 321-366. doi:10.2307/1971615
Carr, D. L., Suter, L., & Barbieri, A. (2005). Population dynamics and tropical deforestation: State of the debate and conceptual challenges. Population and Environment, 27, 89-113. doi:10.1007/s11111-005-0014-x
Evans, T. P., & Kelley, H. (2008). Assessing the transition from deforestation to forest regrowth with an agent-based model of land cover change for south-central Indiana (USA). Geoforum, 39, 819-832. doi:10.1016/j.geoforum.2007.03.010
Farmer, F. L., Miller, W. P., Moon, Z. K., & Goforth, L. (2010). Rural profile of Arkansas, 2009: Social and economic trends affecting rural Arkansas. Fayetteville, AR: Division of Agriculture, University of Arkansas.
Frentz, I. C., Farmer, F. L., Guldin, J. M., & Smith, K. G. (2004). Public lands and population growth. Society & Natural Resources, 17, 57-68. doi:10.1080/716100627
Kok, K. (2004). The role of population in understanding Honduran land use patterns. Journal of Environmental Management, 72, 73-89. doi:10.1016/j.jenvman.2004.03.013
Lambin, E. F., & Geist, H. J. (2006). Land-use and land-cover change, global change—The IGBP series. Berlin: Springer.
Lambin, E. F., & Geist, H. J. (2003). Regional differences in tropical deforestation. Environment, 45, 22-36.
Laurance, W. F., Albernaz, A. K. M., Schroth, G., Fearnside, P. M., Bergen, S., Venticinque, E. M., & Da Costa, C. (2002). Predictors of de- forestation in the Brazilian Amazon. Journal of Biogeography, 29, 737-748. doi:10.1046/j.1365-2699.2002.00721.x
Mather, A. S. (1992). The forest transition. Area, 24, 367-379.
Mather, A. S., & Needle, C. L. (1998). The forest transition: A theoretical basis. Area, 30, 117-124. doi:10.1111/j.1475-4762.1998.tb00055.x
Moon, Z. K., & Farmer, F. L. (2001). Population density surface: A new approach to an old problem. Society & Natural Resources, 14, 39-49. doi:10.1080/089419201300199545
Moon, Z. K., & Farmer, F. L. (2010). Human induced switches on public lands boundaries: The emergence of ecological islands? Society & Natural Resources, 23, 1-17. doi:10.1080/08941920802317606
Perz, S. G. (2002). The changing social contexts of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon. Social Science Quarterly, 83, 35-52. doi:10.1111/1540-6237.00069
Radeloff, V. C., Hammer, R. B., Voss, P. R., Hagen, A. E., Field, D. R., & Mladenoff, D. J. (2001). Human demographic trends and landscape level forest management in the northwest Wisconsin Pine Barrens. Forest Science, 47, 229-241
Rogers, S. (2010). Buffalo National River: The encyclopedia of Arkansas history & culture. URL. (last checked 2 May 2010). http://www.encyclopediaofarkansas.net/encyclopedia/entry-detail.aspx? search=1&entryID=7
Rosson Jr., J. F., & Rose, A. K. (2010). Arkansas' forests, 2005. (S. R. Station Ed.) Asheville, NC: US Department of Agriculture Forest Service.
Rudel, T. K., Bates, D., & Machinguiashi, R. (2002). A tropical forest transition? Agricultural change, out-migration, and secondary forests in the Ecuadorian Amazon. Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 92, 87-102. doi:10.1111/1467-8306.00281
Rudel, T. K. (1998). Is there a forest transition? Deforestation, reforestation, and development. Rural Sociology, 63, 533-552. doi:10.1111/j.1549-0831.1998.tb00691.x
Rudel, T., & Fu, C. (1996). A requiem for the Southern Regionalists: Reforestation in the South and the uses of regional social science. Social Science Quarterly, 77, 804-820.
Rudel, T. K., Coomes, O. T., Moran, E., Achard, F., Angelsen, A., Xu, J., & Lambin, E. (2005). Forest transitions: Towards a global understanding of land use change. Global Environmental Change, 15, 23- 31. doi:10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2004.11.001
Strausberg, S., & Hough, W.A. (1997). The Ouachita and Ozark-St. Francis National Forests: A history of the lands and USDA Forest service tenure. General Technical Report SO-I 21. Washington, DC: US Department of Agriculture.
US Census Bureau—Geography Division. (2006). TIGER/line files, 2006 Second edition. US Department of Commerce. URL. (last checked 8 March 2006). http://www.census.gov/geo/www/tiger
US Department of Commerce Washington DC: Bureau of the Census (producer). (1991). Census of population and housing, 1990 (UNITED STATES): Summary Tape File 1A (Computer file). Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (distributor), 1999.
US Department of Commerce Washington DC: Bureau of the Census (producer). (1993). Census of population and housing, 1990 (UNITED STATES): Summary Tape File 3A (Computer file). Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (distributor), 1999.
US Department of Commerce Washington DC: Bureau of the Census (producer). (2002a). Census of population and housing, 2000 (UNITED STATES): Summary File 1, Final National (Computer file). Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (distributor), 2003.
US Department of Commerce Washington DC: Bureau of the Census (producer). (2002b). Census of population and housing, 2000 (UNITED STATES): Summary File 3, Arkansas (Computer file). Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (distributor). 2002.
US Geological Survey. (1999). Landcover 30 M national landcover da- taset 1992 (raster).
Wilson, J. B., & King, W. M. (1995). Human-mediated vegetation switches as processes in landscape ecology. Landscape Ecology, 10, 191-196. doi:10.1007/BF00129253