Longleaf pine ecosystems, among the most species-rich ecosystems outside of the tropics, are estimated to have once covered 60-93 million acres of the Southeastern United States. Longleaf pine occurred on a variety of sites ranging from dry sandhillsto wet savannahs. The range of sites occupied or capable of being occupied makes them desired habitat for many popular game and non-game species, as well as a suite of threatened or endangered species, and species of conservation need. Ideal longleaf pine ecosystems are open, park-like forests that are the result of frequent fires. Alteration of the natural fire regime, timber harvesting, conversion to agriculture, and the loss to development are among the historical causes that have reduced this once grand ecosystem to approximately three percent of its former range.
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