A study from the US Department of Agriculture’s Forest Service shows that New Hampshire is the most forested of the 48 contiguous states. According to the USDA study 88.9 percent of New Hampshire is covered by trees, beating out neighboring states Maine at 83.1 percent and Vermont at 81.5
The study’s lead author David Nowak says evaluators looked over 80,000 points dropped randomly onto satellite photos from around 2005 to complete the study.
Nowak: In essence I’d say it’s like dropping a penny from an airplane, what would the penny hit first on the way down.
Nowak says New Hampshire might beat out Maine and Vermont because it has less agricultural land, and more mountains, which don’t lend themselves to development.
However, when it comes to urban tree cover, New Hampshire is third, at 64 percent, behind Massachusetts and Connecticut.