Forest Management Plan
The forest management plan for the Blufflands/Rochester Plateau Section was revised 2015. This ecological section covers approximately 2.6 million acres from near the Twin Cities metropolitan area on the north, southeastward to the Iowa border. The Mississippi River is the Eastern border of the section and it extends to slightly west of Rochester. The Paleozoic Plateau Section includes 65,000 acres of state-managed forest land.
The Paleozoic Plateau Section will be the planning unit covering this area going forward. This coincides the planning area previously called the Blufflands/Rochester Plateau.
The Paleozoic Plateau Section is defined by the Mississippi River bluffs and the plateau stretching to the west of them. The forest ecosystems within this ecological section are mostly high quality hardwoods in the uplands and riparian hardwoods near water.
Defining or unique features of this part of the state include:
- High percentage (94 percent) of privately owned land.
- The Mississippi River borders this section to the east, much of the land near this is part of the Upper Mississippi River National Wildlife Refuge.
- A significant portion of the land is used for agriculture.
- The Whitewater Wildlife Management Area and the Richard J. Dorer Memorial Hardwood State Forest are the primary state administered units.
The section forest resource management plan outlines the planning process, forest vegetation management goals and directions, and implementation strategies for state-administered lands in the Section. It also identifies management opportunity areas, such as ruffed grouse management areas and old forest management complexes around old growth stands, in the Section.