Section 45-0105. Definitions

As  used  or  referred  to  in this article unless a different meaning
  clearly appears from the context:
    1. The term  "trust"  shall  mean  the  state  nature  and  historical
  preserve trust continued by section 45-0107 of this article.
    2.  The  term  "trustee"  shall mean the commissioner of environmental
  conservation.
    3. The term "real property" shall mean  lands  and  waters,  including
  improvements  thereon, structures, and hereditaments, title to which may
  be in fee simple absolute or any  lesser  interest,  including  but  not
  limited  to,  easements, rights of way, uses, leases, licenses and every
  estate, interest or right, legal or equitable.
    4. The term "preserve" shall mean  the  state  nature  and  historical
  preserve,  as  referred  to  in  section  4  of article XIV of the State
  Constitution.
    5. The term "lands of ecological significance" shall mean  state-owned
  lands  and  waters that harbor plants, animals or ecological communities
  that are rare in New York state or exemplary occurrences of more  common
  ecological  communities.  For  the  purposes  of  this article, the term
  "exemplary   occurrences   of   an   ecological   community"   means   a
  representative,  high  quality  example  of a given ecological community
  type, characterized by a distinctive assemblage of interacting plant and
  animal populations, including old-growth forests.
    6. The term "old-growth forest" shall mean a parcel of  at  least  ten
  acres  which  includes  all  of  the  following:  an  abundance  of late
  successional tree species, at least one hundred eighty  to  two  hundred
  years  of  age  in  a contiguous forested landscape that has evolved and
  reproduced itself naturally, with the capacity  for  self  perpetuation,
  arranged  in a stratified forest structure consisting of multiple growth
  layers throughout the canopy and forest  floor,  featuring  canopy  gaps
  formed   by  natural  disturbances  creating  an  uneven  canopy  and  a
  conspicuous absence of multiple stemmed trees and  coppices.  Typically,
  old-growth  forest  sites  also are characterized by an irregular forest
  floor containing an abundance of coarse woody materials which are  often
  covered  by  mosses and lichens, show limited signs of human disturbance
  since European settlement, have  distinct  soil  horizons  that  include
  definite  organic,  mineral,  alluvial  accumulation, and unconsolidated
  layers, and have an understory that displays well developed and  diverse
  surface herbaceous layers.