Selective-Cut Forestry: $600,000 in Projected Revenue

What Selective-Cut Forestry Is

Selective-cut forestry (also called selective harvesting or selective logging) is a timber management practice in which individual trees or small groups of trees are harvested from a forest stand, while the surrounding forest remains intact. It is the opposite of clear-cutting, which removes all trees from a given area. Selective cutting can be designed to improve the health of the remaining forest — removing overcrowded, diseased, or low-value trees to improve growing conditions for higher-value species — while generating timber revenue from the removed material.

Selective harvesting is consistent with ongoing conservation easement management: the easement on the Aberdeen property prohibits development and requires maintenance of the forest ecosystem, but a properly designed selective harvest can improve long-term forest health and generate revenue without violating easement terms. The key is that the harvest plan must be designed and implemented by qualified foresters — like Davey Resource Group — who understand both the ecological requirements of the easement and the timber market conditions.

The $600,000 Projection

The Town of Purcellville's environmental asset management plan projects approximately $600,000 in selective-cut forestry revenue from the Aberdeen and related environmental asset parcels. This projection is based on the timber volume and species composition of the managed parcels, the current timber market prices for Virginia hardwood species, and the harvest schedule that Davey Resource Group has developed as part of the long-term forest management plan.

The $600,000 in projected forestry revenue is in addition to the $900,000-plus generated by the nutrient credit bank — meaning the Aberdeen property and associated parcels are projected to generate approximately $1.5 million in total non-tax municipal revenue from environmental asset management. For a municipality of 9,000 residents, this represents a significant non-tax income stream from conservation rather than from residents or businesses.

Compatibility with Nutrient Credit Banking

A key design constraint for the selective-cut program is that the harvest plan must not compromise the nutrient credit generation that is the Aberdeen Bank's primary revenue mechanism. Virginia DEQ's credit certification is based on canopy coverage, tree density, and species composition — parameters that must meet defined thresholds to sustain credit generation. A harvest plan that is too aggressive could reduce canopy coverage below certification thresholds and interrupt credit revenue. The Davey Resource Group's management of both programs ensures that the selective harvest is designed to be compatible with continued DEQ certification: in practice, selective removal of overcrowded or low-performing trees can actually improve canopy health and long-term credit generation capacity, while simultaneously generating timber revenue.

The Environmental Asset Portfolio