Working With Your Woodland by Beattie, Thompson, & Levine

In my opinion, this is one of the best books for a landowner to read about forestry. If you can only get one book on forestry, this is the book for you. My only quible is that they concentrate on New England forests, but they at least explain that this is where their experience lies. The authors cover almost every aspect a landowner needs to know. The book is broken down into chapters on woodland potential, foresters, management plans, management techniques, harvesting products, and finances. Each of these chapters goes into depth on the topic without becoming to academic. They weigh the pros and cons of many different competing ideas including management types, competing land uses, and foresters. They also discuss how to decide the future of your forest in the last chapter by weighing all the book has taught you and deciding what end result you desire. It is also the only book I have seen on forestry that goes into the financial side of things, especially taxes. Having perfect trees is wonderful, if they don't cost a fortune to grow. There are many different editions out there, so be wary of the tax info is you purchase an older edition. The appendix will also help New England forest owners with a lot of state info. Read this book, it will pay for itself many times over.