Скачать или смотреть A Brief Overview of the History, Ecology and Floristics of Longleaf Pine in St. Tammany Parish

A wide diversity of natural plant communities, or native habitats, are found in the St. Tammany Parish, Louisiana. These include bottomland hardwood forests and cypress swamps along larger rivers, small stream forests along smaller permanent rivers, and marshes along the northern fringe of Lake Pontchartrain. But at the top of the list of most noteworthy native habitats in the area is longleaf pine.
This region was historically greatly dominated by longleaf pine woodlands in the hills and flatwood savannas on the flats. These habitats originally occupied an estimated area of approximately 1.5 million acres across the eastern Florida Parishes, and an estimated 320,000 acres in St. Tammany, but have been greatly diminished in the last 125+ years by the actions of man.
As counterintuitive and illogical as it may seem to many, longleaf pine habitats were created and maintained by frequent natural and anthropogenic fire. In fact, there are many features that make longleaf pine the most fire-tolerant of all trees native to North America. Indeed, it has been said that taking fire out of the longleaf system is like taking rain out of the rain forest.
Generally unknown to the lay public, an astounding diversity of native plants and numerous associated animals are found almost exclusively in longleaf habitats. Many are imperiled today due to landscape domestication and habitat loss. In fact, St. Tammany Parish supports more types of rare native plants than any other parish in the state, the great majority of which are found in remnant longleaf pine habitats. Best quality Longleaf pine woodlands and savannas can support over 100 native plant species per acre.
Important plant communities are embedded within the longleaf pine flatwoods landscape, and include bayhead swamps, slash pine-pond cypress woodlands, and hillside seepage bogs. Each sustains an impressive diversity of native plants and animals


Latimore Smith is the Founder of Southern Wild Heritage, LLC, a conservation consulting firm founded in 2018 that specializes in longleaf pine habitat restoration, planning and management; floristic and ecological habitat assessments; rare flora inventory; and wetland mitigation bank establishment and management.

Prior to founding Southern Wild, he served as Director of Science and Stewardship for The Nature Conservancy – LA Office (TNC) from 2000 to 2018, where he, among other responsibilities, directed the restoration and management of all preserves owned by TNC across the state

Before joining TNC he was the Conservation Ecologist for the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Natural Heritage Program, from 1986 – 2000 and primary author of Natural Communities of Louisiana, (unpublished LDWF 2009) used in the Louisiana State Wildlife Action Plan.

He serves as the Louisiana representative on the board of The Longleaf Alliance, the leading organization promoting restoration and conservation of longleaf pine across the south (See weblink: https://longleafalliance.org/).

Latimore is recognized as a leading authority on the native plants and natural plant communities of Louisiana, and is one of the foremost restoration ecologists working in longleaf pine and shortleaf pine systems in the south.

In 2018 he was awarded the national award for Conservation and Restoration of wetlands by the Environmental Law Institute in Washington, DC.