What we need to save are the stronger and healthier trees. In doing that, we need a nice age curve of individual trees - that is, individual trees representative of every age group, from sapling to mature mature trees - becase big trees are old trees, and trees, just like every other living thing, die.
The environmentalists who are telling us to save just the old growth trees are wrong about what constitutes a healthy forest...and they're also the ones insisting we close the fire roads, let brush go unchecked and leave stands of trees killed by fire, disease and pests untouched.
Unlike the old saying about people who can't see the forest for the trees, the environmentalists we're fighting ...we need a different term for us, maybe, to distinguish the forest managers from the tree hugging wackos...anyhow, the environazis can't see the trees for the forest...and a forest is COMPOSED of individual trees. That's socialist collectivism. It doesn't work in forestry, it doesn't work in wildlife management, and it doesn't work for the citizenry.
In unmanaged forests this is true. In managed forests some trees must be cut down to produce wood products.