In what was once an old growth redwood forest that was heavily logged in 1968, a National Park Service forester points to an unruly tangle of spindly trees, 900 to the acre and so jam-packed it is difficult to walk through. Not far away is a section that was thinned 20 years ago, when the number of trees per acre was reduced to fewer than 300. The redwoods in this area are much larger in diameter and far more robust, the understory greener and more diverse. …The thinned forest is part of a project called Redwoods Rising, which is aimed at creating old growth redwood forests for the future. Carried out by Redwood National and State Parks and Save the Redwoods League, crews are using chain saws and logging equipment and planning prescribed fires, to mimic the traits of a young healthy redwood forest and undo the damage from decades of unbridled logging and indiscriminate reseeding. [to access the full story a NY Times subscription is required]