Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Canterbury, 2008. / Typescript (photocopy). Includes bibliographical references (leaves 182-200). Also available via the World Wide Web.

Urbanization has reduced the population in rural areas while the urban population has increased in Sweden. As a consequence, also the number of distance forest owners increases continuously and today they own one third of Sweden's privately-owned forests. The purpose of this study was to describe the forest owner cooperative Norrskog’s distance forest owners, their perception of Norrskog's current services and their demand for services in the future. Data was collected through a web-based and a postal questionnaire. The results showed that the average age of Norrskog's distance forest owners was 63 years, a large proportion lived in metropolitan areas and a majority had more than 500 km to their forest property. Most of them owned their forest property together with relatives, 67 % were quite or very satisfied with their forest management, although most of them thought they had little knowledge of forest management. According to forest ownership, management of the family's land was valued the highest along with the feeling of ownership. Maximum yield and growth were valued the lowest. It was found that the forest owners in general were satisfied with the services offered by Norrskog. Thinning and precommercial cleaning got the highest average rating values and forest management plan and property valuation got the lowest. Among services for the future, - documentation of implemented silvicultural measures in the forestry plan was the most popular. Among Norrskog's distance forest owners many generational changes will likely occur soon. The new owners may be more interested in new ways of communication and services and therefore Norrskog should broaden its service portfolio to ease distance forest ownership.

The Santa Ana River (SAR) is the largest river in Southern California. The flow of the SAR begins in the San Bernardino Mountains and discharges into the Pacific Ocean at Huntington Beach. The SAR contains one of the most essential and rare biodiversity hotspots on earth. In order to protect the wildlife, and suit population demands, the SAR must meet the Clean Water Act (CWA) regulations. The SAR Reach 6 is the uppermost segment of the river, and is currently listed under the CWA 303(d) List for impaired water due to contamination of cadmium, copper, and lead from an unknown source based on limited data provided in 1997 by the San Bernardino County Flood Control District (SBCFCD). This project focused on confirming the contemporary occurrence and identifying the potential source(s) of Cd, Cu, and Pb by comparing new water sample data with that of previous studies The analysis of previous data identified an interesting correlation between high water hardness and elevated lead levels. The new results from this study suggest that there continues to be a source of these metals in the upper parts of Reach 6 of the SAR. Moreover, the limited data obtained in this study suggests that the source of the contamination is upstream to the northeast of the primary sampling site, possibly on private lands. Future, more comprehensive studies will be required to determine whether Reach 6 of the SAR should remain on the 303(d) list. Source identification if necessary, will be a further challenge.