Establishing a transect, where trees are measured in a strip through the forest area, will provide a good basis to assess the present timber resource and what "treatment" is needed. There are three basic silviculture options - leave the stand to grow on - thin the stand to improve its growth or - disturb the stand enough to encourage vigorous natural regeneration. Most of the regrowth forest areas on freehold lands will be in the second category, with stands so overstocked that they are producing little net timber growth.

Once trees are over about 10 cm diameter, thinning needs to be a commercial operation, to avoid high costs of non-commercial thinning and a waste of the timber resource. Unfortunately at the present time there is a limited market for the small diameter and poorly formed trees that need to be removed from the forest to allow the better trees to grow on. This is expected to change dramatically within the next decade, with a number of potential markets developing.