in this regard including increased recognition of the value to biodiversity
of: (1) Ecologically sustainable logging practices. (2) Regrowth
forests, including regenerating stands on formerly cleared
but subsequently abandoned agricultural land (e.g. MacCleery,
1996; Ramankutty and Foley, 1999; Kanowski et al., 2006). (3)
Well planned as well as carefully established and managed plantations.
In all three cases, credible certification schemes have the potential
to validate the true ecological sustainability of management
practices in these off-reserve forests and hence the suitability of
these kinds of areas for forest biodiversity (Wintle and Lindenmayer,
2008). In these and other cases, more needs to be done to highlight
conservation successes and the potential for good
conservation outcomes – both in tropical and temperate ecosystems.
Environmental news is currently almost invariably negative.
This risks dis-enfranchising the general public, policy-makers and
politicians – precisely the groups of people from whom support
is needed to make conservation gains. This is not to suggest that
conservation scientists should say things are going well when they
are not. However, it is important to highlight where and when
good outcomes have occurred and that more of these are needed
and are possible with greater support and effective action. A good
example comes from Vancouver Island in western British Columbia
where extensive changes in logging practices from traditional
clearcutting to variable retention harvest systems have taken place
over large areas of private forest ownership (Bunnell and Dunsworth,
2009). Moreover, an extensive and well designed monitoring
program is now well established to quantify the responses of
different elements of the biota to altered silvicultural systems