As of 1997, the United States contained 747 million acres of forest land, an increase of 1 percent since 1987 to 33 percent of the total land area.
This is about 71 percent of the area that was forested in 1630 (1.05 billion acres). Most of the lost of forest area occured in the 1800's - the total forested area of the US has been nearly constant since the 1920's.
One third of all forested land is federally owned and about 7 percent is protected from all logging. About two-thirds of the forested land is classified as "timberland", meaning that it could produce 20 cubic feet or more of lumber per acre per year and is not legally restricted. About 11 percent of this timberland is of planted origin.
Growing-stock volume on US timberland increased by 6.9 percent between 1987 and 1997. Since 1993 net volume per acre has increased 37 percent. Approximately 58 percent is in softwoods, with the remaining 42 percent in hardwoods. Net annual growing-stock growth exceeded removals (logging) by 47 percent in 1996.
Source: Forest Resources of the United States, 1997
Published as: General Technical Report NC-219. St. Paul, MN: U.S. Dept. of Agriculture, Forest Service, North Central Research Station
See: http://www.ncrs.fs.fed.us/pubs/viewpub.asp?key=845