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Northern hardwood trees display a wide variety of stem forms and defects, which can substantially reduce their financial value and also complicate their silviculture. While attributes of stem form and defect have been incorporated into tree classification systems, their ability to assess product value and recovery in standing trees has not been adequately tested. To address this issue, we classified stem form and risk using a system developed by the Northern Hardwoods Research Institute (NHRI) for four species across several locations in Maine, New Hampshire, and New Brunswick: sugar maple (Acer saccharum Marsh.), red maple (Acer rubrum L.), yellow birch (Betula alleghaniensis Britton), and northern red oak (Quercus rubra L.). Using these data, we (i) quantified interspecific and regional variation in stem form and damage, (ii) related potential sawlog recovery to tree size, form, and risk, and (iii) compared the …