Introduction

The New Jersey Pine Barrens, or Pinelands, comprise a 550,000-ha mosaic of upland and wetland vegetation on the outer Coastal Plain of southern New Jersey (Little 1979; McCormick and Forman 1979). As noted by Little (1979), the physiognomy of much of the area does not resemble the common perception of areas termed barrens; that is, areas relatively “bare” of tree growth or with only stunted trees (Heikens and Robertson 1994; Homoya 1994; Tyndall 1994). In the lowlands, Atlantic white cedar (Chamaecyparis thyoides) swamp forests approach 26,200 trees ha–1 with a basal area of 56–57 m ha–1 (McCormick 1979). In the upland oak–pine forest, black oak (Quercus velutina), white oak (Q. alba), scarlet oak (Q. coccinea), chestnut oak (Q. prinus), pitch pine (Pinus rigida), and shortleaf pine (P. echinata) tree density can average 824 trees ha–1 with a basal area of 22 m2 ha−1 (Gibson, Collins and Good 1988). Nevertheless, within the Pinelands there exist a number of distinct regions of dwarfed pitch pine forest known as the Pine Plains or pygmy forest (McCormick and Buell 1968; Good, Good and Andresen 1979; Windisch 1986).