The 2008 Farm Bill amended the Cooperative Forestry Assistance Act (CFAA) to require states to complete a statewide assessment of forest resource conditions and a long-term statewide forest resource strategy. The DC State Forest Action Plan (SFAP) is a comprehensive roadmap for investing federal, District, and private resources into managing and maintaining the urban forest. The DC State Forest Action Plan (SFAP) is a comprehensive roadmap for investing federal, District, and private resources into managing and maintaining the urban forest. 
Washington DC has many tracts of continuous forested area, providing opportunities for diverse ecosystems including Rock Creek Park, Palisades Parkway, the C&O Canal National Historical Park and Fort Dupont. Common DC wildlife includes bald eagles, bats, coyotes, deer, ducks, eastern box turtles, eastern cottontails, foxes, owls, woodchucks and more. 
Washington DC straddles two ecoregions, the Piedmont and the Southeast Plains ecoregion. The dominant native vegetation on most of the well-drained loamy soil of the Piedmont is deciduous forest, and the native vegetation for the Southeast Plains in the District is mostly hardwoods with some softwoods.