Presettlement forest communities in Louisiana, north of the Red River, were reconstructed by the Point-Quarter method, using 1062 bearing trees (36 species) recorded in land surveys of 1813-1814. Swamp hardwoods adjacent to the Mississippi, Black, and Ouachita rivers were dominated by white oak; sub-dominants included red oak, cypress, water oak, hickory, and sweetgum. The Tributary Bottomland Hardwoods Community, a rich species assemblage, included ironwood, white oak, hickory, sweetgum, beech, bay, holly, maple, and sassafras. Low Pleistocene terraces supported a Flatwoods Community co-dominated by pines, white oak, and red oak. An Upland Pine Forest occupied Tertiary sediments of the Kisatchie Wold (probably dominated by longleaf pine in the south, shortleaf pine to the north). Prior to European settlement, natural fires and Indian cultivation practices prohibited hardwood invasion of the uplands and allowed pines to dominate. Fire and cultivation produced prairies on edaphically favorable sites.