Important Natural Climate Solutions for communities in Tennessee

Reforestation in Tennessee

Tennessee ranks fifth in the nation in reforestation opportunity, with 6.89 million acres identified by the Reforestation Hub as suitable for new forest, 98.4% of it privately owned.⁹ That opportunity touches much of what Tennesseans value: a multibillion-dollar forest-products sector and the jobs it supports, the white oak behind the state’s whiskey industry, the forested watersheds that supply clean drinking water, and the game and fish habitat that anchor a multibillion-dollar hunting and fishing economy. This resource examines the co-benefits of reforestation for Tennessee communities, profiles programs already delivering results, and describes the existing programs and partnerships through which reforestation can be expanded across the state.

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What difference does reforestation make for communities in Tennessee?

Forests are a cornerstone of Tennessee’s rural economy and reforestation sustains the industries that depend on them

Tennessee’s forestry sector generates $21.7 billion in annual output and employs more than 85,500 people statewide.¹ That economic base depends on healthy, productive forests, and on the next generation of trees being planted today.
Outdoor recreation supported by the state wildlife agency, including hunting, fishing, and wildlife viewing, generates more than $13 billion in total annual spending in Tennessee, supports 214,442 jobs, and delivers nearly $1.8 billion in state and local tax revenues. Much of this activity depends on the healthy forests, waters, and wildlife habitat that reforestation helps sustain.²
White oak is one of Tennessee’s most valuable hardwoods and a keystone species in its forests. Because its wood is watertight, it is the species the spirits industry relies on for whiskey barrels: bourbon and Tennessee whiskey must by law be aged in new charred oak, and white oak is what distillers such as Jack Daniel’s use to meet that standard. Without action, experts project a drop in white oak numbers within 40 to 50 years, as current management practices are not supporting the next generation of trees.³
Tennessee is losing about 240 acres of farmland and forest to development every single day.⁴ Once converted, this land does not return. At current rates of development, the American Farmland Trust projects Tennessee could lose about one million acres of productive rural land by 2040 under a business-as-usual scenario,⁵ permanently narrowing the window for voluntary reforestation on private land.

Reforestation protects Tennessee’s drinking water and lowers the cost of treating it

About 70% of Tennessee’s public-supply water is withdrawn from surface water, and the share is higher still in middle and eastern Tennessee, where reforestation opportunity is greatest.⁶^, ²⁵ As the state’s own Division of Forestry puts it, most clean water comes from forested watersheds.⁷
Forested watersheds deliver the cleanest, most treatment-ready surface water of any land cover type. Reforesting land adjacent to streams and in upland catchments reduces the sediment, nutrient, and pollutant loads reaching treatment systems,⁸ lowering operating costs and extending infrastructure capacity.
Riparian forest buffers filter runoff from the pastureland that dominates Tennessee’s reforestation-opportunity counties,⁹ cutting nitrogen by 17-56% and phosphorus by 4 to 20% before it reaches streams and drinking-water intakes;¹⁰ those same buffers and forests also slow runoff and lower downstream flood peaks.¹¹
Tennessee’s highest-opportunity counties, led by Greene, Bedford, and Maury,⁹ lie within the Cumberland and Tennessee River watersheds that supply drinking water to millions downstream,⁶^,¹² making reforestation there an investment in water infrastructure.

Reforestation reconnects the habitat Tennessee’s biodiversity depends on

The Tennessee and Cumberland river basins are among the most biologically diverse river systems in North America, home to more than 300 fish species and 125 freshwater mussel species, many found nowhere else on Earth.¹² That diversity rests on forested headwaters and streamside buffers, which keep water cool and clean and hold streambanks in place,¹³ and it sustains the fisheries that help anchor Tennessee’s outdoor economy.

Beyond its rivers, Tennessee’s forests support more than 340 bird species and 89 mammal species,¹⁴ including the deer, turkey, and other game that sustain the state’s hunting tradition and outdoor economy. Tennessee’s own Forest Action Plan names forest fragmentation, conversion, and loss of connectivity among the leading threats to those forests and the wildlife they support.¹⁵

Reforestation on private working land can rebuild the connections between Tennessee’s forest blocks that wildlife need to thrive. The Reforestation Hub identifies 1.47 million acres within the state’s Resilient and Connected Network, areas mapped as priorities for connected, healthy habitat, where new forest would strengthen the corridors animals use to move and find food, cover, and mates.⁹ The opportunity is concentrated in counties such as Giles, Hickman, Humphreys, Claiborne, and Wayne, across the Highland Rim and Appalachian foothills.⁹

Forests help naturally remove and store carbon

Tennessee’s forests cover 14 million acres, 52% of the state, and already serve as a significant carbon sink. Reforestation expands this capacity at scale.¹⁶
The Reforestation Hub identifies 6.89 million acres of reforestation opportunity in Tennessee, ranking the state #5 nationally. Reforesting these lands could capture approximately 14.76 million metric tons of CO₂ per year.⁹

Protecting Tennessee's Whiskey Legacy — The White Oak Initiative

Tennessee’s spirits industry depends on white oak barrels, and much of that white oak begins in Tennessee forests. By law, bourbon and Tennessee whiskey must be aged in new, charred oak, and white oak is the wood distillers use to meet that standard, a tree that takes 80 to 100 years to grow. The problem is that the next generation isn’t reaching the canopy: Forest Inventory Analysis data show that while mature white oaks remain abundant today, far fewer seedlings and saplings are recruiting behind them, and experts project a shortage within 40 to 50 years.[3] The stakes reach beyond the barrel, because white oak is a keystone species whose acorns are an essential food source for wildlife such as deer and turkey, so the ecological and economic case rests on the same tree.[32] The Tennessee Forestry Association, Tennessee Division of Forestry, UT Extension, Brown-Forman, Jack Daniel’s, Old Forester, and the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation are already building the solution, providing technical and financial assistance to private landowners across roughly 30 Tennessee counties and running an annual acorn collection program that grows white oak and shortleaf pine seedlings at the East Tennessee Nursery.[3, 22] Private landowners hold the large majority of Tennessee’s forests and are the only ones positioned to solve a problem this large and this long. With federal and private funding already committed and the model proven across those counties, the constraint now is reach: extending it to the rest of the state where white oak regeneration is falling behind.

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Family Forest Owners Building Long-Term Value Through Sustainable Stewardship

Most of Tennessee’s family forest owners, who together hold a large share of the state’s privately owned woodlands, manage their land without professional guidance or any income stream beyond an occasional timber sale. The result, too often, is high-grading: pulling out the most valuable trees, such as white oak, black walnut, and yellow-poplar, and leaving a degraded forest with diminished long-term productivity. The Family Forest Carbon Program, created by the American Forest Foundation in partnership with The Nature Conservancy, offers an alternative, providing participating landowners with annual payments, a professional forest management plan, and ongoing technical support in exchange for a 20-year commitment to sustainable management, on properties as small as 30 acres.[17] Early enrollment shows strong landowner interest; the program’s reach now depends on the outreach capacity to connect it with owners in the counties where that interest runs highest but program access is thinnest.

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Voluntary, Permanent, Income-Generating: How Working Woodlands Can Keep Tennessee Forests Standing

For Tennessee’s private forest owners, keeping land forested across generations often comes down to one question: can the forest pay for itself without being sold or developed? The Nature Conservancy’s Working Woodlands program offers one answer. Landowners enter a voluntary, permanent conservation easement, a binding legal agreement that prevents development, agriculture, and unsustainable forestry while letting them keep ownership and the right to harvest timber sustainably for income. The Nature Conservancy pairs the easement with professional forestry guidance and FSC certification support.[18] The Shafer family’s experience shows what this looks like in practice. The late John Shafer, who lived to 106, managed 3,120 acres of family forestland sustainably for decades, harvesting carefully enough that the forest stayed healthy and productive. In 2016, near the end of his life, he and his family enrolled the property in Working Woodlands, in his words, to “keep the property undeveloped and intact while still producing income.” His daughter, Rebecca Tuuk, recommends the program to other private forest owners as a way to protect both their land and their livelihoods.[18] For a state losing farmland and forest to development every day, the Shafer family’s choice shows what voluntary, income-generating conservation looks like, and how much depends on landowners being able to find and access the tools that make it possible.

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Americans overwhelmingly support practices that expand forest restoration

90% of voters nationwide (85% GOP, 92% IND, 95% DEM) support “providing technical assistance and education to farmers and forest owners so they can learn how to incorporate climate-smart practices on their land.”¹⁹

87% of voters nationwide (80% GOP, 88% IND, 93% DEM) support “providing financial incentives and programs for private forest and woodland landowners to sustainably manage their land to keep forests healthy and adopt practices that naturally remove carbon from the air.”¹⁹

Source: Survey of 1000 registered voters conducted in June 2024 by bipartisan research team New Bridge Strategy (R) and FM3 Research (D). Commissioned by U.S. Nature4Climate.

How reforestation can be supported and expanded in Tennessee:

Invest in landowner programs that create new income opportunities from voluntary reforestation on private land.

The Reforestation Hub identifies 6.89 million acres of reforestation opportunity in Tennessee, 98.4% of it on private land and 69% in pasture, concentrated in Middle Tennessee’s Highland Rim counties and the northeastern valley region.⁹ For most landowners, the constraint is less about willingness than about access: cost-share to offset establishment costs, professional forestry guidance, and markets that make new forest competitive with current land uses. Tennessee already coordinates federal Farm Bill programs such as EQIP and CRP alongside the Tennessee Agricultural Enhancement Program (TAEP), which reimburses 50 to 75% of forest establishment costs on private land, up to $20,000 per landowner each year.²⁰^,²¹ Where landowners connect with these programs, often through Tennessee Division of Forestry (TDF) and UT Extension area foresters, they can access federal matching dollars and new income from timber and ecosystem services, on a voluntary basis.

Invest in white oak and native species restoration through the Tennessee White Oak Initiative and TDF nursery programs.

White oak is one of Tennessee’s most economically and ecologically significant tree species: the raw material for the state’s whiskey industry, a keystone species for wildlife, and a long-lived carbon reservoir. The Tennessee White Oak Initiative has built a public-private partnership involving Jack Daniel’s, Brown-Forman, Old Forester, the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, Tennessee Division of Forestry (TDF), UT Extension, and the UT Tree Improvement Program, with an active acorn collection program feeding genetically improved seedlings into the East Tennessee Nursery, available to any Tennessee landowner, not just distillery partners.³^,²² The nursery produces 6 to 7 million seedlings each growing season,²³ grown from seed gathered within 50 miles of Tennessee’s borders so they are suited to the state’s growing conditions. Its capacity, alongside seed orchard development through the UT Tree Improvement Program,²⁴ is what determines whether seedling supply can keep pace as planting demand grows and whether the genetics available are matched to the sites where these century-long trees will stand.³^,²⁰^,²²

Fund riparian forest buffer planting along Tennessee’s priority stream corridors.

The Cumberland and Tennessee River systems and their Middle Tennessee tributaries, including the Caney Fork, Stones River, Duck River, and Elk River and their headwaters, run through the state’s highest-opportunity reforestation counties and supply drinking water to millions of Tennesseans downstream.⁶^,⁹ Riparian buffer planting in these corridors delivers four benefits together: water quality protection for the surface water that middle and eastern Tennesseans rely on for an even greater share of their public supply,⁶ flood risk reduction for communities in the Highland Rim valleys, wildlife connectivity across fragmented agricultural landscapes, and reforestation of the stream-adjacent land most likely to attract voluntary landowner participation. Tennessee’s streams are already under documented pressure: Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation (TDEC) estimates that about 30% of the state’s streams cannot support a healthy fish population and nearly 40% are not fit for human recreation, with agricultural runoff among the leading contributors.²⁶ Riparian buffers are among the most cost-effective conservation practices available, with establishment costs on the order of a few hundred dollars per acre,¹³ delivering measurable reductions in nitrogen and sediment loading.¹⁰

Expand TDF forester capacity to build the professional infrastructure that reforestation at scale requires.

Tennessee’s 6.89 million acres of reforestation opportunity, 98.4% of it on private land, can only be realized through the professional forestry capacity that turns landowner interest into planted acres.⁹ Tennessee Division of Forestry (TDF) area foresters are central to that work: they write management plans, guide cost-share enrollment, and provide the technical assistance that connects landowners to programs. In the most recent reporting year TDF assisted 17,739 forest landowners, wrote 182 forest management plans covering 26,065 acres and 477 prescription plans covering 39,049 acres, and funded 33 cost-share applications totaling $250,833.²⁰ That is real reach, but against roughly 197,040 non-industrial private forest owners and 9.7 million acres of private forest,²⁰ alongside 6.89 million acres of reforestation opportunity,⁹ the pace of intensive plan-writing sits well below the scale the full opportunity would require. Tennessee’s Division of Forestry has itself reported that landowner demand for management and harvesting plans outstrips the resources available to write them.²⁷ Sustained forester capacity is what lets programs like the Family Forest Carbon Program, the White Oak Initiative, and Tennessee Agricultural Enhancement Program (TAEP) cost-share reach landowners as enrollment grows.¹⁵

Fund invasive species control integrated with reforestation cost-share programs statewide.

Invasive plants are a documented barrier to reforestation across Tennessee. Shade-tolerant woody invaders such as bush honeysuckle, autumn olive, and multiflora rose are prolific seeders and resprouters that hold a competitive advantage over native species and, left unaddressed, can outcompete and even replace young native trees before a planting establishes.²⁸^,²⁹ Pairing invasive control with reforestation cost-share protects the larger investment in seedlings and site preparation, and because several of these invaders are also familiar pasture and field weeds, their control aligns with management goals many landowners already pursue.

Fund bottomland hardwood reforestation in West Tennessee.

West Tennessee presents a distinct reforestation opportunity. The Reforestation Hub identifies Dyer, Gibson, Haywood, Tipton, and Weakley counties as the state’s leading counties for marginal cropland reforestation opportunity, land in the Mississippi Alluvial Plain historically covered by bottomland hardwood forest, cleared for soybeans and other crops in the 1960s and 1970s, and in many cases yielding a reliable harvest only one or two years in five because of seasonal flooding and high water tables.⁹^,³⁰ Reforesting these sites with native species suited to West Tennessee’s flood-prone alluvial soils, such as bald cypress, Nuttall oak, cherrybark oak, and cottonwood, would restore floodplain function, reduce agricultural runoff reaching the Mississippi River, and rebuild wildlife habitat in one of the most heavily cleared bottomland landscapes in the region.³⁰ Federal Wetland Reserve Easements and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service restoration programs already fund bottomland hardwood reforestation in this geography, work TDF has long supported through technical assistance to private landowners, so sustained state capacity would coordinate with and extend programs already in place.³⁰^,³¹

Click for References

1. Menard, J., English, B. C., & Jensen, K. (2021). Tennessee ag & forestry stats: Economic contributions of agriculture and forestry in Tennessee. University of Tennessee Institute of Agriculture. https://arec.tennessee.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/17/2021/12/TN_AgStats_2021_accessible.pdf

2. Boyd Center for Business and Economic Research. (2026). The economic impact of TWRA operations and outdoor recreation supported by TWRA in Tennessee. Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency. https://www.tn.gov/content/dam/tn/twra/documents/annual-reports/TWRA_Economic-Impact_0226.pdf

3. Tennessee Forestry Association. (n.d.). White oak. https://www.tnforestry.com/white-oak-initiative

4. Office of the Governor of Tennessee. (2025, May 12). Gov. Lee signs Farmland Preservation Act into law [Press release]. State of Tennessee. https://www.tn.gov/governor/news/2025/5/12/gov–lee-signs-farmland-preservation-act-into-law.html

5. American Farmland Trust. (2022). Farms under threat 2040: Tennessee. https://storage.googleapis.com/csp-fut2040.appspot.com/state-reports/FUT2040_TN.pdf

6. Ransom, R. K., Knierim, K. J., Ladd, D., Ham, B., & Dempsey, A. (2024). Status of public-supply water sources in 2022 and the development of a geographic information system methodology for the Public Drinking Water Source Water Assessment Program in Tennessee (Circular 1522). U.S. Geological Survey. https://doi.org/10.3133/cir1522

7. Tennessee Department of Agriculture, Division of Forestry. (n.d.). Water quality and forest protection. https://www.tn.gov/agriculture/forests/protection/water-quality.html

8. Caldwell, P. V., Martin, K. L., Vose, J. M., Baker, J. S., Warziniack, T. W., Costanza, J. K., Frey, G. E., Nehra, A., & Mihiar, C. M. (2023). Forested watersheds provide the highest water quality among all land cover types, but the benefit of this ecosystem service depends on landscape context. Science of the Total Environment, 882, Article 163550.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2023.163550

9. The Nature Conservancy, & American Forests. (2025). Reforestation Hub: Tennessee. https://reforestationhub.org/map/state/tennessee

10. Kleinman, P., Brooks, R. P., Fernandez, C., Nassry, M., Veith, T., McCarty, G., Wallace, C., Hagan, E., Saporito, L., Hyberg, S., Iovanna, R., Claggett, S., Duriancik, L., & Tsegaye, T. (2019). Riparian forest buffers of the Susquehanna-Chesapeake watershed: Observations, assessments, and recommendations. U.S. Department of Agriculture, Farm Service Agency. https://www.fsa.usda.gov/sites/default/files/documents/CREP-Riparian-Forest-Buffer-FINAL-REPORT.pdf

11. U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service. (n.d.). Watershed services: The important link between forests and water. https://www.fs.usda.gov/ecosystemservices/pdf/Watershed_Services.pdf

12. The Nature Conservancy. (n.d.). Tennessee and Cumberland river systems. https://www.nature.org/en-us/about-us/where-we-work/united-states/tennessee/stories-in-tennessee/tennessee-river-and-cumberland-river-program/

13. Ohio State University Extension. (n.d.). Riparian forest buffers (NRCS 391). AgBMPs. https://agbmps.osu.edu/bmp/riparian-forest-buffers-nrcs-391

14. Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency. (n.d.). Wildlife species in Tennessee. https://www.tn.gov/twra/wildlife/species.html

15. Tennessee Department of Agriculture, Division of Forestry. (2020). Tennessee forest action plan 2020–2030. https://www.tn.gov/agriculture/forests/protection/ag-forests-action-plan.html

16. Tennessee Department of Agriculture, Division of Forestry. (n.d.). Forests. https://www.tn.gov/agriculture/forests.html

17. American Forest Foundation. (2024). Family Forest Carbon Program expands into the South. https://www.forestfoundation.org/why-we-do-it/family-forest-blog/family-forest-carbon-program-expands-into-the-south/

18. The Nature Conservancy. (n.d.). Saving a forest, saving the Earth. https://www.nature.org/en-us/about-us/where-we-work/united-states/tennessee/stories-in-tennessee/saving-a-forest-saving-the-earth/

19. U.S. Nature4Climate. (2024, August 7). Support for implementing natural climate solutions in the United States is strong and growing. https://usnature4climate.org/2024/08/07/support-for-implementing-natural-climate-solutions-in-the-united-states-is-strong-and-growing/

20. U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service. (2025). State and private forestry fact sheet: Tennessee. https://apps.fs.usda.gov/nicportal/temppdf/sfs/naweb/TN_s t d.pdf

21. Tennessee Department of Agriculture, Division of Forestry. (n.d.). Forest Establishment & Improvement Cost Share Program (TAEP). https://www.tn.gov/agriculture/forests/landowner-assistance/financial-assistance/forest-establishment-improvement-cost-share.html

22. The Lynchburg Times. (2023, December 19). $450K grant awarded to help sustain white oaks used to make Jack Daniels. https://thelynchburgtimes.com/nfwf-grant-white-oaks/

23. Tennessee Department of Agriculture, Division of Forestry. (n.d.). Tree seedlings. https://www.tn.gov/agriculture/forests/seedlings.html

24. University of Tennessee Tree Improvement Program. (n.d.). UT Tree Improvement Program. https://treeimprovement.tennessee.edu

25. Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation, Division of Water Resources. (2020). Tennessee groundwater monitoring and management: Groundwater 305(b) report 2020. https://www.tn.gov/content/dam/tn/environment/water/archive/wr_wq_report-groundwater-305b-2020.pdf

26. Tennessee Environmental Council. (n.d.). State of the environment: Water. https://www.tectn.org/stateofwater.html [Reporting figures from the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation, 2020 Impaired Waters Report.]

27. Tennessee Department of Agriculture, Division of Forestry. (2015). Tennessee forest action plan 2011–2015: Five-year review. https://www.stateforesters.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/TN-FAP_8-Five-YearReview.pdf

28. Tennessee Department of Agriculture, Division of Forestry. (n.d.). Amur honeysuckle. ProtectTNForests. https://www.tn.gov/protecttnforests/invasive-plants/bush-honeysuckle.html

29. Natural Resources Conservation Service. (n.d.). Tennessee forestry. U.S. Department of Agriculture. https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/conservation-basics/conservation-by-state/tennessee/tennessee-forestry

30. Applegate, H. W., & Ensminger, P. (1996). Reforestation in Tennessee. In T. D. Landis & D. B. South (Tech. Coords.), National proceedings: Forest and Conservation Nursery Associations. USDA Forest Service. https://rngr.net/publications/proceedings/1996/applegate.pdf

31. Natural Resources Conservation Service. (n.d.). Wetland Reserve Easements. U.S. Department of Agriculture. https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/programs-initiatives/wre-wetland-reserve-easement

Coming soon: Make the case for reforestation

Customize a PDF infographic to help you make the case for why reforestation is essential to empower and protect communities in Tennessee from the effects of the changing climate.

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Contact experts on reforestation:

Below is a list of organizations that specialize in reforestation within our coalition. Send us an email and we’ll direct you to the correct person to communicate with.

Explore our “Science for Decision-Makers” page

The “Science for Decision-Makers” section highlights key research on nature-based solutions in the U.S., including strategies like reforestation and improving forest management, complemented by blog articles, case studies, videos, and infographics that summarizes the research and explain the impact it can have on real-world situations.

See resources on forest practices

What is the science?

See the climate mitigation potential of forest strategies in our Science page.

What else can be done?

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Important Natural Climate Solutionsfor communities in Tennessee

Important Natural Climate Solutions for communities in Tennessee

Reforestation in Tennessee

What difference does reforestation make for communities in Tennessee?

Forests are a cornerstone of Tennessee’s rural economy and reforestation sustains the industries that depend on them

Reforestation protects Tennessee’s drinking water and lowers the cost of treating it

Reforestation reconnects the habitat Tennessee’s biodiversity depends on

Forests help naturally remove and store carbon

Americans overwhelmingly support practices that expand forest restoration

How reforestation can be supported and expanded in Tennessee:

Invest in landowner programs that create new income opportunities from voluntary reforestation on private land.

Invest in white oak and native species restoration through the Tennessee White Oak Initiative and TDF nursery programs.

Fund riparian forest buffer planting along Tennessee’s priority stream corridors.

Expand TDF forester capacity to build the professional infrastructure that reforestation at scale requires.

Fund invasive species control integrated with reforestation cost-share programs statewide.

Fund bottomland hardwood reforestation in West Tennessee.

Coming soon: Make the case for reforestation

Learn More

Contact experts on reforestation:

Explore our “Science for Decision-Makers” page

What is the science?

Important Natural Climate Solutions
for communities in Tennessee