Guest guest Posted August 27, 2008 Report Share Posted August 27, 2008 --Today for you 32 new articles about earth's trees! (391st edition) --You can now RSS tree news in a regional format at: http://forestpolicyresearch.org --To Subscribe / to the world-wide email format send a blank email to: earthtreenews- OR earthtreenews- In this Issue: PNW-USA Index: --Alaska: 1) Peat bogs to woodlands on a global scale --Pacific Northwest: 2) New regional forester for USFS --Washington: 3) Corporate takeover of a rural town, 4) Seattle School's forest destruction scam falls thru, 5) They make logging machines, --Oregon: 6) Smart vs. dumb thinning, 7) Cascade-Siskiyou Monument management plan doesn't protect enough, 8) As always… all's quiet at Opal Creek, 9) Gordon Meadows restoration plan in the Santiam, 10) Human caused landslide not human caused, --California: 11) Reversing Fir's dominance over Oak, 12) Logger's want eco-exemption for " Emergency fire salvage " and " Thinnings " 13) Cont. 14) Office of Inspector General says logging in Sequoia National monument OK! 15) Will fire fears fuel logging? 16) County to give 1,200 acres of open space to a developer-backed land trust, 17) What will become of forestry on PL's land? 18) Sierra Nevada salvage-logging case heads to the Supreme Court, --Montana: 19) Suspicious Hemlock Elk Fuels Reduction and Forest Health Project --Nevada: 20) Another illegal whoofoo (Wildland Fire Use fire) has blown up --Arizona: 21) Coconino National Forest abandon bad wildlife rules --Colorado: 22) Beetle has a punch-to-the-stomach type of effect --Michigan: 23) He'd like to save your ash --Wisconsin: 24) Chequamegon-Nicolet NF is a top ten endangered forests --Connecticut: 25) Forestry isn't rocket science, it's more complicated! --Chesapeake Watershed: 26) Forestry for the Bay, a public service program --New York: 27) Conservation group to sell off 90,000 acres, --Virginia: 28) Tree ring history study --Appalachia: 29) Conserving Forest " balds " --USA: 30) Between preventing forest fires and promoting wood fires, 31) Rise above all this whoofoo madness, 32) Loggers say big deadly machines makes work less deadly, Alaska: 1) In a 13,700-year-old peat bog, ecologist Ed Berg reaches into the moss and pulls out more evidence of the drastic changes afoot due to the Earth's warming climate. Rooting through a handful of mossy duff, Berg, an ecologist for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, shows remains of shrubs and other plants taking hold over the last 30 years in a patch of ground that has long been too soggy for woody plants to grow. In other words, the ground is drying out, and the peat bog is turning into forest. " There has been a big change, " Berg said. Core samples taken from the bog show moss nearly 22 feet (6.7 metres) under the ground, with no sign of trees or shrubs growing here for centuries, Berg said. In 50 years, the bog could be covered by black spruce trees, he said. Welcome to Alaska, where the blow of climate change will fall harder than on any other U.S. state. Records indicate that Alaska has already experienced the largest regional warming of any U.S. state -- an average 3 degrees Celsius since the 1960s and about 4.5 degrees Celsius in the interior of the state during winter months. " We've got mounds of evidence that an extremely powerful and unprecedented climate-driven change is underway, " said Glenn Juday, a forest ecologist at the University of Alaska in Fairbanks. " It's not that this might happen, Juday said. " These changes are underway and there are more changes coming. " Peat bogs are about 50 percent composed of carbon, and drying or burning would release heat-trapping carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/westcoastnews/story.html?id=c8dd6862-ef4\ 2-4229-9cd5-6cb05ec76635 PNW: 2) Forest Service Chief Gail Kimbell has named Mary Wagner as regional forester for the Pacific Northwest. She is currently the deputy regional forester based in Utah for the Intermountain region. Wagner will start her new job in Portland in October. She will oversee 17 national forests and one national grassland in Oregon and Washington state. She succeeds Linda Goodman, who retired in March. Wagner began with the Forest Service in 1983. She was the agency's first national director of Wilderness and Wild and Scenic Rivers and has worked in forests in Utah, Nevada and Idaho. http://www.ktvz.com/Global/story.asp?S=8886994 Washington: 3) The 2000 Census counted a population of 803 residents in Brinnon. Upon completion, the developer estimates about 1,700 would inhabit the resort. Statesman Group of Companies, which is based in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, bills its proposal as a " super green development. " " In the end game, you are going to have a sustainable green area, which you don't have today, " McFall said. " The idea is to bring people here for an eco-tourism experience. " The facts are that this resort will bring hundreds of new visitors to Brinnon who want to enjoy the beauty and rural nature of the area, " he said. Brinnon business owners who oppose the resort point out that it will add more than double the number of people already living in the area. At issue is a $300 million, 890-unit master-planned resort on 252.6 acres of Black Point south of Brinnon and Pleasant Harbor Marina. The Western Washington Growth Management Hearings Board will hear arguments at 10 a.m. Monday in the Port Townsend Pope Marine Building. The board will have 60 days to decide if the county's rezoning of the property for the resort violated the state Growth Management Act. The Brinnon resort would encompass the existing Pleasant Harbor Marina, which will remain at 284 slips, and a " retail village " with 90 condominium units would be added. An 18-hole golf course would be constructed on a site previously used as a Thousand Trails campground. The development would add 280 jobs and inject about $2.5 million into Jefferson County's revenue-deficient tax coffers, said Ian McFall, project marketing representative and pro-economic development Brinnon-area resident. The estimated assessed value of the project upon completion would be $450 million, McFall said, which could bring in $2.5 million in annual tax revenue for schools, roads and emergency services. It would also be good for the environment, he said. http://www.peninsuladailynews.com/article/20080824/NEWS/808240303 4) Mother Earth has been around long before you or I, before any human, before life itself. Yet us humans treat it like garbage. Like our needs are the only important ones. Stop being so vain! Case and point: The Seattle School District have decided to cut down many terrific trees to make room for a parking lot on the Ingraham High School campus. Why not use the grassy area on the other side of the school? Sure, it's not as pretty but doesn't cost the lives of trees that have been there since before the school was built. Vain sons of bitches. The School District has pulled all its building permits, so it can ignore environmental laws and cut down the trees. The School District is claiming to be a private property owner, with no accountability to anyone, and having the right to cut down trees, with out filing environmental checklists and then in the fall resubmit all their plans to build. http://unvain.blogspot.com/2008/08/todays-reminder-respect-nature.html UPDATE: The Seattle School District can't cut down some 100 trees on the Ingraham High School campus until it obtains a permit from the city, a King County Superior Court judge ruled Monday. http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2008138212_trees26m.html 5) Since it's much more efficient than manual labor and more adaptable than the bucket, the grapple rake, which hydraulically opens, closes, and moves its jaws of spaced metal tines, is becoming indispensable. It can remove trees, logs and brush or surface rake limbs and debris without removing needed topsoil or piling up unnecessary dirt. It can dig out roots and stumps. It can securely pick up, move, and stack logs, trees, or irregular loads up to several thousand pounds. With intertwined teeth, it can also grab and place material down to 3 inches, and reach within inches of desired forest habitat without disturbing it to rake, lift, drag, or haul loads. It can even create piles and pick them up from the front or lift them from the top, which is especially helpful when loading debris piles onto trailers or tending the piles for burn disposal. In Steamboat, Colorado, Bob Chapman was faced with the enormous task of removing 300 trees because of beetle kill on his 70-acre property. Bob hired a commercial timber company to do the work due to the enormity of the un-welcomed task. " I wondered how they were going to clean up the huge mess without destroying habitat for the living trees and adjoining grassland. I was so impressed with the way a skid steer mounted grapple rake navigated living trees while removing huge loads of debris that I talked the timber company into letting me operate it for a few days. " Chapman said " It looked like a war zone, with logs, branches, and stumps everywhere. " The timber company used the hydraulic grapple rake manufactured by Anbo Manufacturing, based in Colville, Washington. http://home-office-recovery-plan.com/using-hydraulic-grapples-in-fire-prevention\ -and-forest-management/ Oregon: 6) It is one thing to thin small trees where hundreds or thousands of small trees are 100% of the area. And it something else again to thin the little guys in stands where it's partly them and partly older stuff certain to be killed by the likes of budworn and beetle. On a landscape like that, insects would thin via dieoff, and management by killoff. Many stands are in dieoff, or reasonably anticipated for dieoff. (Insects aren't the only climate-coupled culprit. Drought can do it by itself, and hot drought can do it quicker. A little further down the road, dry hot soils will snuff seedlings. The insects are just one o' the bunch in a dieoff. Evidence described by Allen, Breshears, Knorr, and others include Allen's paper on " Massive forest dieoff, Breshears' paper on " Massive Vegetation ( i.e., conifer) Dieoff. " Allen describes one in terms of shift of edge or ecotone, where lower elevation ponderosa died off from drought, and shows little if any sign of recovery after 50 years. IPCC 2007 cited research indicating that for widespead species such as the lodgepole pine, there'll be expansion toward the poles,** a " reduction " (can we say thinning?) at mid-range, and " decimation " in the southern portions of its range. Locate whatever parts of Oregon are getting or expected to be getting thinned by climate-coupled variables including insects. Determine what if any parts of Oregon are going to get thinned by climate-coupled variables, or double-thinned by climate in combination with management. And try to get some idea of (whatever) extent future hot dry soils might do their own kind of thinning, thinning the future, by snuffing any babies trying to set root. - Lance Olson - stumpsdontlie (AT) googl (DOT) com 7) Eight years after the creation of the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management has established a final management plan for the 52,947-acre area. The decision announced Thursday spells out how the agency plans to manage the monument created in 2000, the first-ever monument in the nation established for its rich diversity of flora and fauna. Included in the 123-page document are plans to use thinning and prescribed fire treatments on 5,465 acres in old-growth areas and to remove vegetation nearer populated areas to reduce wildfire hazards. The monument, whose distinct features include Pilot Rock and Soda Mountain, is in the mountains east of Ashland where the Cascade and Siskiyou mountains intersect. When the proposed management plan was released early in 2005, the agency received some 13,000 comment letters, including a dozen administrative protests. The final decision also calls for decommissioning 53 miles of roads and closing another 21 miles. " Decommissioning puts roads to bed, " Hunter said. " In some places, that may mean doing very little. There may be trees growing in the road. But decommissioning means the road is going away. Closing a road means putting up a barricade, not allowing access to motorized vehicles. " " Instead of listening to scientists and thousands and thousands of citizens who painstakingly asked BLM all during the planning process to live up to the monument's protection mandate, the BLM has delivered only half a protection loaf, " he said. " The BLM is playing fast and loose with public process — and the law. Sadly for all, a judge will likely have to instruct BLM to take the monument's protection mandate seriously, " he added. Dominick DellaSala, a forest ecologist who is executive director of programs for the Ashland-based National Center for Conservation Science & Policy, agreed. He said his concern is that the practice of cattle grazing will only be modified and not removed as environmentalists urge, that not enough roads are being closed or decommissioned and that big trees may not be protected from logging. However, he agreed that some thinning is needed in the monument. " The BLM has shown that the monument — our nation's first monument to biodiversity — is protected on paper alone because the agency cannot divest itself from a resource extraction agenda that has historically degraded these lands and caused ecological and social disruptions, " he said. http://www.mailtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080822/NEWS/808220341 8) Almost nothing happened on my most recent visit to Opal Creek --or at least that's how it seemed at the time. I didn't talk on the telephone because there was no phone.I didn't listen to talk radio because there was no reception. I didn't watch television because there was no TV. I didn't receive a single e-mail because there was no computer. And I didn't drive anywhere because my car was parked three miles away. But I didn't miss any of that, even though I was hardly roughing it. I stayed two nights in a 1930s cabin that had a king bed, full kitchen, refrigerator, electric lights and modern plumbing with hot water for the bath and shower. A wood stove would have kept me warm, but the temperature was too mild to need it. And I came away realizing that hardly anything has changed in the decade since Opal Creek in the Willamette National Forest was saved. Which is just fine for those who seek out the solitude and beauty of this old-growth forest in the Cascade foothills east of Salem. Opal Creek, in the Willamette National Forest a 100-mile drive from Portland, is the name of the virgin valley that was the setting for one of the nation's most contentious land conservation battles of the 1990s. With prodding from his constituents, Oregon Sen. Mark Hatfield capped his career by getting Congress to protect Opal Creek as a scenic recreation area and wilderness on Oct. 3, 1996, the final legislative triumph of his 30-year Senate career. As a result of that legislation, chain saws will never take down the 500-year-old trees. And the heavy equipment used to dig the mines at Jawbone Flats, one of Oregon's most remote villages deep inside Opal Creek, won't return now that the heavy-metal-laced mine tailings have been removed. http://blog.oregonlive.com/terryrichard/2008/08/opal_creek.html 9) The Gordon Meadows plan is one of the first in a series of major, landscape-scale restoration projects proposed for Oregon forests by a consortium of interests including lead organizations on this project Oregon Websites and Watersheds Project, Inc. and the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde. Gordon Meadow is a mountain meadow (an ancient cultivated camas field complex) in the South Santiam watershed of the Willamette National Forest. The area was home to the South Santiam Molalla Indians (and the Kalapuya, Klamath, Chinook, and Paiute Indians) for hundreds and perhaps thousands of years prior to Euro-American arrival in Oregon. It is an ancient landscape, populated by human beings from time immemorial. The Project is designed for 1,900 acres, or about 3 square miles, but the South Santiam Molalla landscape extends for over 45,000 acres or 70 square miles. The ultimate goal is to restore it all to heritage conditions. The Gordon Meadows Project will achieve those purposes through active stewardship, including removal of excess second-cohort trees and fuels, application of anthropogenic (prescribed) fire intended to protect old-growth trees, reinstate old-growth development pathways, and enhance ancient camas, beargrass, and huckleberry fields, reinvigoration of active harvest of native foods and fibers, and inspiration and active engagement of the local community, Indian and non-Indian alike, in landscape restoration and maintenance. Collaborators include ORWW, the Grand Ronde Tribes, the US Forest Service, private landowners, and a variety of civic and community groups. Additional collaborators are being encouraged and will be formally invited as the Project proceeds. An earlier restoration project, the Jim's Creek Savanna Restoration Project [here], will serve as a demonstration and model for South Santiam forest landscape restoration. Historical research in anthropology, landscape geography, ethno-botany, wildlife ecology, forest science, and fire science will accompany the active stewardship actions. Harvesting of commercial products including sawlogs, biomass for energy, and " wild " foods and fibers will help to fund the Project. http://westinstenv.org/sosf/2008/08/21/the-gordon-meadows-project/ 10) Human activities — road building and clear cutting — frequently get the blame for landslides, but Forest Service geologists don't think that's what happened on the Frazier slide, The ground gave way just below a narrow logging road and partially across a 15-year-old clear-cut. But the majority of the failure occurred in a stand of trees well over 100 years old. The chaotic mayhem that occurred that January morning or the frenetic work of bulldozers and backhoes that followed in February and March is hard to believe when one visits the site in summer. The railroad tracks run level on neat beds of fresh gravel. Above the upper tracks that sustained the most damage, about 20 acres of bare dirt slopes sharply, tinged a yellow brown from a seed-growing medium. The first faint tufts of grass planted to help anchor what's left have begun to sprout. Along the tracks Union Pacific has installed high fence posts with wires that will trip and alert the railroad if the land slumps again. The 40 acres below that is all boulder and gravel, installed by the railroad almost down to bedrock level to create a safe, solid support structure for the rail bed. It looks like a gray gash against the otherwise green hillside, but Leverton said the rocks provide habitat for pikas, a hamster-sized furry creature related to rabbits. The tracks double back in a long hairpin turn to descend the mountainside, and below the lower tracks, the Forest Service has chosen to mostly let the rumpled land lie. The eight to 10 feet of slide burying Forest Road 5876 will remain there, a Volkswagen-sized boulder sitting amid the dirt and strewn trees. Only a small portion of the debris on nearby Forest Service Road 399 will be cleared to allow Union Pacific access to a water drainage system. Coyote Creek flows perpendicular to the roads, clear and cold just now, as does Salt Creek below it. " We'll have a water quality issue out of Coyote Creek and Salt Creek for some unknown number of years, but we're through the worst of it, " Leverton said. The last piece of this landslide puzzle: massive mounds of dirt. Union Pacific officials first thought they would use the rocks and mud to shore up the mountain and use as part of their rail bed, but that turned out to be impossible, said Dave Orrell, general contractor for Union Pacific. " It was almost liquid in form, " he said. " There was no way you could use it as engineered fill that could withstand the weight of a train. " While they hauled in tons of rock from four quarries, they hauled away the slurry in rail cars and dump trucks. It was so wet it oozed where ever they tried to place it, Orrell said. " It would just run down the slope until it found a flat spot, " he said. http://www.myspace.com/olyecology California: 11) The spread of Douglas fir started in the '30s when policy changes called for wildfires to be extinguished. The oak forest became overgrown. Moisture and shade beneath the canopy created perfect conditions for the Douglas fir to thrive. The change from oak woodland to fir forest would have occurred over a few generations. Air-quality rules and nearby homes make controlled burns impossible. Cutting the trees and then hauling them away was rejected because it would have led to unacceptable " collateral damage. " After tree trunks are cut into, they are left to die and, as they rot, fall in pieces to the ground. The process takes about five years. Marla Hastings led the way up a gentle slope in Annadel State Park, into a stand of Oregon white oak and over spreading stalks of tan bunch grass. Rodents scurried underfoot, a rabbit hopped into sight, deer gently trod the hillside. Hastings, a California State Parks Department senior environmental scientist, stopped at a long-dead Douglas fir, its trunk spotted with the work of foraging woodpeckers, its rotted top crashed to the ground. A deep cut circled the tree's trunk -- the same cut that marks the thousands of other dead or dying firs that jut from Annadel's sea of rolling woodlands like so many shipwreck masts. To many, it is a jarring sight. But to Hastings, the landscape tells a little-known tale of a 20-year effort to kill Douglas firs in order to save the park's 1,500 acres of white oaks. " We're trying to hold the line against the invasion of the Douglas fir, " she said. " This is the most outstanding example of white oak distribution, pretty much anywhere. " The dead firs, and the abundant healthy oak groves swaying with bunch grass, signal the plan's success, she said. " In the absence of management, this would have been a closed-canopy Douglas fir forest, " she said. " We would have lost our oak woodland. " In Annadel last week, Hastings snapped off a young green fir branch and flung it aside. She called attention to the call of a pileated woodpecker; the birds feast on the bugs in the dead fir snags. She pointed out a spreading hillside of white oak, spiked with barren dead Douglas fir. " I see it as a legacy project, " she said. " We're stewards of the land. We have a huge responsibility to steward it properly with good science behind us. " http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20080824/NEWS/808240414/1350 & title=Saving_o\ aks_by_killing_firs# 12) Even before fall rains are able to douse the flames of Northern California wildfires, the timber industry and its allies in Sacramento and Washington are maneuvering to use the fires as an excuse for more old-growth logging in national forests. The usual suspects are acting quickly to ensure unimpeded salvage logging of trees within the half-million-acre fire mosaic created since early summer lightning storms roamed the state. Also, flying in the face of all prevailing science, they are invoking " fire prevention " to suspend prohibitions on logging old-growth in unburned areas. The drumbeat was heard in Sacramento on Aug. 13 when industry representatives and policymakers gathered for a " critical wildfire forum " hosted by Assemblyman Doug LaMalfa and the Rural Legislative Caucus. Bill Wickman of the American Forest Resource Council, which represents some 100 timber companies, invited 50 of his colleagues to the forum, including several foresters, mill owners and logging contractors; and no fewer than six representatives of Sierra Pacific Industries, California's largest private landowner and a company that feeds heavily on national forest old-growth. " A desired outcome " of the forum, said Wickman, " would be enough political recognition and support to take some action to better allow thinning and salvage to occur without always being held up. " Thinning and salvage logging sales are rarely " held up, " a trivial concern to Wickman and LaMalfa compared with the need to get the cut out. LaMalfa, a Republican out of Butte County, issued a press release prior to the forum to make the unprovable claim that " removing many of these sick or dangerous trees will help pay for itself. " (U.S. taxpayers heavily subsidize timber salvage sales on public lands.) Even more fantastic was his assertion that, " There's no question that keeping fires from reaching the disastrous size we've seen will help save lives, property and our forests themselves. " http://www.sacbee.com/110/story/1179124.html 13) There is a move by Rep. Wally Herger to request that salvage logging begin on the thousands of acres burned in Shasta and Trinity counties. His reasoning is that " the priority must be on protection of life and property from active wildfires. " On the surface, salvage logging sounds like a good idea. Anyone who has seen the dead trees standing near Whiskeytown Lake and Weaverville might think that those dead trees are at risk for more burning. And it is depressing to see those dead trees standing. The logging companies that promote clear-cutting and the politicians who are supported by them would have you believe that the burned forests need to be logged right now. Log it now, to protect us from more fires, and while the remaining wood is still usable. They would have you believe that " tree huggers " are blocking their efforts for no good reason. However, like many things in life, this issue requires a closer look. According to an article published on June 12, 2007, in Science Daily, salvage logging may not be the best activity to protect our forests. A study conducted by the Oregon State University Department of Forest Science examined the effects of salvage logging in Oregon forests after fires. The study reported that in the past, forest managers assumed that removing dead trees would reduce fuel loads and planting conifers could hasten the return of fire-resistant forests. What the analysis in this study revealed is that, " after accounting for the effects of topography, Silver Fire severity and other environmental variables, the Biscuit Fire severity was higher where they had done salvage logging and planting. " The study suggests that one possible reason for the higher risk of fire in burned areas that have been logged and then replanted, is that many old growth trees survive severe fires. But salvage logging essentially clear-cuts a burned area, removing all the trees. Then new trees are planted. The Oregon State study states: " Young forests in this region are susceptible to recurring severe fires. Compared to an older forest with branches high above the forest floor, young trees are very vulnerable, whether they are planted or naturally regenerated. " http://www.redding.com/news/2008/aug/25/science-says-salvage-logging-isnt-so-sim\ ple/ 14) Capping a politically sensitive, nine-month investigation, the Agriculture Department's Office of Inspector General dismissed complaints about logging that took place near the monument's Trail of 100 Giants. Environmentalists and their Capitol Hill allies had suggested the tree removals violated multiple federal policies. " Our review did not substantiate the six allegations presented and related concerns, " the investigators stated, adding that the Forest Service acted " to improve public safety. " The investigators twice traveled to the 327,769-acre Giant Sequoia National Monument, a center of controversy and litigation ever since President Clinton established it in 2000. They found that none of the felled trees were beloved giant sequoias. They also determined the Forest Service followed public notice and environmental review requirements. " The Forest Service generally complied with all applicable laws, regulations, policies and agreements that were in effect, " the investigators stated. Some of the Forest Service rules themselves, though, remain a work in progress and subject to some future revision. The new report was requested by three House members who serve on the powerful subcommittee that funds the Agriculture Department. The House members, in turn, were responding to complaints initially raised by advocates with Save America's Forests and Sequoia Forestkeeper. The environmentalists contended the Forest Service unnecessarily cut more than 200 protected trees in 2004, thereby benefiting a local sawmill. The seven-page Office of Inspector General report was submitted to Hinchey and other House members Aug. 7 but made public without fanfare on the inspector general's Web site this week. Spokesmen for Hinchey and Rep. Jim Moran, a Virginia Democrat who also requested the investigation, could not be reached to comment Wednesday. The Forest Service actions in question began in 2004, when the agency targeted some 130 dead or dying trees for removal. A Forest Service specialist subsequently concluded an additional 74 trees should be removed because they, too, were potentially hazardous. The Forest Service determined, and investigators agreed, that the tree removals in the national monument could proceed without a formal environmental review in order to protect public safety. http://www.myrtlebeachonline.com/611/story/562531.html 15) Anyone living in Northern California knew this day would come. Much of the region is forested and a century of fire suppression has clogged the woods with underbrush. All it needed was one lightning strike. It got 1,000 of them earlier this month. More than a million acres have burned so far this fire season and more are expected before the rains come in October or November. Fifteen firefighters have died and 500 homes have burned. " We can't just walk away from fires because we have too many people who live in and use the forest, " he said. " Just letting fire go by itself will never be an acceptable alternative. " But even managed forests are not immune to serious damage. About 2,000 acres of the 48,000-acre Jackson Demonstration State Forest in Mendocino have burned this year, said forest manager Marc Jameson of Cal Fire. He said much of the fire damage came in aged second-growth forest that had been managed and thinned as recently as the 1970s. Craig Pedersen, a forester who works at the forest, said most of it has been logged at some point. The area that burned was last actively harvested 80 years ago. Logging and forest management on the lands have been tied up since a 2000 lawsuit filed by the Campaign to Restore Jackson State Redwood Forest. " It's set us back in a lot of things, " Pedersen said. In January, the Board of Forestry approved a new forest management plan that will allow harvesting to start again, Pedersen said. Of the 515 acres set for harvest in the plan, 400 were burned in the recent fires. http://www.capitalpress.info/main.asp?SectionID=67 & SubSectionID=616 & ArticleID=43\ 914 & TM=46818.11 16) Orange County supervisors Tuesday approved a plan to give control of 1,200 acres of open space to a land trust backed by a developer that supports building a six-lane toll road through the property. The developer, Rancho Mission Viejo, says it plans to add the land to its own 17,000-acre open space preserve and maintain it as undeveloped land. The land was originally set aside as part of an earlier agreement to offset the environmental and wildlife effects of housing developments. Rancho Mission Viejo said the transfer would provide more resources, such as the reserve's $200-million endowment, to enhance and protect the land. County officials portrayed the transfer as bureaucratic streamlining that is part of a plan to consolidate management of up to 33,000 acres of open space in southern Orange County under a single entity. But a lawyer for a board member on the conservancy that now oversees the land sent a letter opposing the transfer to supervisors Monday, saying it appeared to be a way to eventually give a portion of it to the public agency that is seeking to build the toll road through it. " We believe that such a transfer is not in the interest of the public, " wrote attorney Todd T. Cardiff on behalf of Michael Lindsey, a member of the Donna O'Neill Land Conservancy board. Supervisors approved the proposal unanimously, with little debate and no public opposition. The proposal also must be approved by the San Clemente City Council, which is scheduled to vote on it Sept. 2, before it can take effect. http://www.latimes.com/news/science/environment/la-me-ocland20-2008aug20,0,65974\ 23.story 17) The end of an era and certainly a step in the right direction: Pacific Lumber will no longer be clearcutting vast forest tracts in Humboldt County nor will they be felling the remnants of the magnificent old growth coastal redwoods once in their ownership. The North Coast activists (and forests) finally get an end to some terribly egregious logging practices. But what will actually replace them? Listen to the YouTube video with Mike Jani and he talks of 'variable retention' making it sound like a panacea. Some would vehemently disagree. I've personally seen some variable retention which looks like clearcuts with little islands of 'wildlife habitat' scattered about. Only time will tell just how much the forest management of these lands improves in the hands of Humboldt Redwood Company. While my pessimism is ever present, this is truly a giant step forward and something we can hope will carry over elsewhere. We need to end clearcutting practices across the state and stop the cutting of all old growth redwoods.A bit of history re this drama: Mike Jani used to work for Big Creek Lumber. He was the driving force in getting Santa Cruz County to draft a set of rules to the Board of Forestry rather than change zoning to eliminate logging. For two years a dozen or more enviros and industry reps met to craft a mutually acceptable rule package. In the end, Mark Morganthaler negotiated the final changes on behalf of the environmental community while Jani negotiated for the timber industry. While neither side was completely happy with the compromise, we shook hands on the package. We spent the next year following the Board of Forestry around the state while they dissected the rules at each successive meeting. Amazingly, Jani lobbied hard against many of the package's proposed rule changes. In the end, so few were adopted by the Board of Forestry, that Santa Cruz County Supervisors made the original zoning changes to prohibit logging in a variety of zone districts. More history: Cynthia Elkins, reporter for KMUD, was the Executive Director for EPIC for many years and personally engaged in many of the Pacific Lumber/Maxxam battles which finally led to this change in ownership. How ironic (and I would assume satisfying) that she is now reporting the changing of the guard. JodiFredi 18) A stalled Sierra Nevada salvage-logging venture is sparking the Supreme Court's next major environmental showdown. What began as a 238-acre Sequoia National Forest timber sale has drawn in big players on all sides. The fight, pitting California officials against the Bush administration, will determine how easy it will be to challenge future forest decisions nationwide. " It's . . . whether or not the public has a right to be involved, " Jim Bensman, an Illinois-based environmentalist who's involved in the case, said Friday. " The number one priority for the Bush administration, aside from logging, has been to reduce public accountability. " Attorneys are preparing for their Oct. 8 oral arguments. The case sounds acutely technical, as many key environmental disputes often do. The proposed timber sale itself, which got the ball rolling five years ago, has long since been canceled. But there's a reason that farmers, home builders, law professors and others are still weighing in: The winner could hold the key to the courthouse door. " The United States seeks . . . to shield from judicial review certain rules that bar the public from participation in federal management decisions affecting national forests, " California Attorney General Edmund G. Brown, Jr. complained in a legal filing. One key question is standing, which means who gets to sue. Another is ripeness, which means when suits can proceed. The answers to both will have consequences for public land well beyond the Sierra Nevada. The Sequoia National Forest encompasses the Giant Sequoia National Monument. In both areas, environmentalists worry about the public being improperly shut out of Forest Service logging decisions. The worries aren't always justified. http://www.mcclatchydc.com/homepage/story/50002.html Montana: 19) Flathead National Forest released an Environmental Assessment (EA) last Friday for the proposed " Hemlock Elk Fuels Reduction and Forest Health Project. " The project aims to reduce " hazardous fuels " on federal land in a part of the valley that is heavily checkerboarded with Plum Creek land, while providing wood for the area's timber cutters and mills. But some critics are skeptical of the proposal. While the three " action alternatives " includeded in the plan contain subtle differences, they all call for fuel reduction in the wildland-urban interface, reseeding projects and a commercial timber harvest component that will log between 663 and 779 acres-some of it via clearcuts. This and other facets of the agency's treatment plan have raised the hackles on some locals who feel that unnecessary cutting between the heavily logged Plum Creek sections would remove important cover for grizzly bears and other animals frequenting the area. " A lot of the cutting units are outside their own definition of wildland-urban interface, " says Arlene Montgomery, a valley resident and program director for the conservation group Friends of the Wild Swan. She wonders why the agency would focus a " fuel reduction " project outside of its self-defined borders. " I live in the wildland-urban interface, but apparently this goes way beyond a fuel reduction project. " If the proposed action moves forward, treatments would begin in 2010 and continue for two to three years. Restoration treatments like road decommissioning, culvert installation and tree planting might take an additional two years-if the funding holds out, says the EA. The treatments will occur in a busy grizzly corridor, used by bears roving between the Mission Mountain Wilderness to the west and the Bob Marshall Wilderness to the east. This makes conservationists worry that the bears could lose important land connecting the two. And calling it a " fuel reduction project " sounds disingenuous to Montgomery. " There's not a lot of fuel reduction to do because the lands are already logged, " she says. " This project is just going to put clearcuts on Forest Service land right next to sections that are already clearcut. " http://www.missoulanews.com/index.cfm?do=article.details & id=E178D11F-14D1-13A2-9\ FBD534CD4B8DC14 Nevada: 20) Another illegal whoofoo (Wildland Fire Use fire) instigated by the USFS has blown up. The East Slide Rock Ridge WFU Fire was ignited Aug 10th on the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest about 15 miles southeast of Jarbidge, Nevada. Today it is a reported 18,250 acres and 3.5 miles from town. The Humboldt-Toiyabe NF declared the ESRR Fire to be a whoofoo based on a secret amendment they slipped into their Fire Plan last June without any Environmental Impact Statement. Environmental Assessment, or notice to the public of any kind. Edward Monnig, Forest Supervisor, apparently thinks NEPA does not apply to him! The ESRR WFU Fire [here] was only 300 acres on Aug 17th, a week after ignition. But by Aug 20th it had grown to 5,000 acres and was threatening 30 historic cabins and the Pole Creek Guard Station. By Aug 21st the fire was nearly 10,000 acres and had spread out of the Maximum Manageable Area (previously established at 113,000 acres). Even so, the whoofoo designation was retained. On Aug 21 the ESRR WFU Fire grew to 11,250 acres and the wind was blowing. Wiser heads prevailed and the whoofoo designation was scrapped. A Type 1 IMT (the big boys) was requested to suppress the fire. Yesterday the fire had grown to 14,500 acres and was out of control. Forty mph winds forced the Type 1 IMT Incident Commander (Summerfelt) to pull the 300+ fire personnel from the line in all divisions in late afternoon. All aerial resources, including heavy helicopters and airtankers, were grounded. This morning the Elko Daily Free Press [here] reported the ESRR Formerly a Whoofoo Fire to be 18,250 acres and roaring towards town. The Elko County Commissioners held an emergency meeting: http://westinstenv.org/sosf/2008/08/25/nevada-whoofoo-blows-up/ Arizona: 21) After a reconsideration forced by environmentalists' objections, the Coconino National Forest today issued a decision that abandons a controversial new wildlife rule in a timber sale near Flagstaff — the first time the agency tried implementing the new rule, which affects 11 national forests in the Southwest. The new 2007 goshawk guidelines, which would have applied to ponderosa pine and mixed-conifer forests across Arizona and New Mexico, would have sharply increased large-tree logging and reduced forest canopy to as little as 10 percent. " The illegal new goshawk guidelines allow logging big trees at the peril of mature forests and wildlife across two states, " said Taylor McKinnon, public lands director for the Center for Biological Diversity, " We're relieved that the Forest Service's analysis demonstrated that their own new guidelines are illegal. " In its reanalysis, the Forest Service concluded it could not lawfully implement the new goshawk guidelines without first changing the 1996 standards and guidelines. In response, the agency abandoned its proposal and the new rule and wrote a new proposal intended to comply with forest-plan standards and guidelines. " If the new rule can't be used legally here, it can't be used in any Arizona or New Mexico national forest, " McKinnon said. " Today's decision confirms what we've been saying for a year now: the new rule is illegal, it would harm public forests and wildlife, and it should be formally withdrawn. " Since the Jack Smith timber sale decision, the agency's regional silviculturalist who spearheaded the new goshawk guidelines has taken a timber industry job. The silviculturalist, Marlin Johnson, now is seeking approval for logging on tribal lands and the same national forests in which he attempted to ease logging restrictions. http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/2008/jack-smith-08-22-200\ 8.html Colorado: 22) While touring the forest near the Willow Creek Pass subdivision in North Routt, John Twitchell makes a similar observation. " Look at all the cones on the ground, " said Twitchell, a Steamboat Springs-based forester with the Colorado State Forest Service. " The next forest is here, it's just waiting to come. … The forest isn't going away. It's going to grow. " Not everyone has had as much time to cope as Cammer. Many Routt County residents are only beginning to lose their trees. Like Cammer, Twitchell described the experience as similar to the grieving process, and he admits he's still working through it himself. " It's emotional, whether it's a single tree in the front yard or a stand of trees, " Twitchell said. " Almost every landowner I deal with … this has a punch-to-the-stomach type of effect. There's usually a little bit of anger, but, eventually, they do get to acceptance. " After 24 years in her Strawberry Park home, Peggy Berglund has lost all of her pine trees to the mountain pine beetle. " I'm sad, but it's Mother Nature at work, " Berglund said. " I'll replant something — probably not pine. " Thick concentrations of same-aged lodgepole pine trees proved unhealthy for pine forests across the Rocky Mountain West. Combined with the right climatic conditions, namely drought, these stressed forests provided what Andy Cadenhead called a virtually unlimited supply of food and habitat for the mountain pine beetle. The result was a perfect breeding ground for an expansion of the pest that has claimed 1.5 million acres in Colorado and likely will kill the majority of Colorado's large-diameter lodgepole pine trees within the next three to five years. " What we're seeing is an intensity of the epidemic that has not been seen since the area was settled, " said Cadenhead, a Steamboat Springs-based supervisory forester with the U.S. Forest Service. Although many property owners, like Berglund, are skittish of lodgepole pine after the pain of the mountain pine beetle epidemic, Tara Mehall said it is an unnecessary apprehension. She recommends landowners plant lodgepole pine, noting that it is one of Colorado's fastest-growing native species. A young pine takes about five years to get established, Mehall said, then grows about a foot a year. " It's going to eat all the mature pine and move on, " Mehall, a Steamboat Springs-based forester with the Colorado State Forest Service, said about the mountain pine beetle. " Lodgepole pine is here for a reason. It's a native species. " http://www.steamboatpilot.com/news/2008/aug/24/dying_pines_are_mourned_new_fores\ t_emerging/ Michigan: 23) GRAND RAPIDS -- Trevor Hill-Rowley might not know you, but he'd like to save your ash, or help you save your own. Hill-Rowley, 19, is one of six Grand Rapids-area students of the Urban Institute for Contemporary Arts' ArtWorks program who are wrapping up a five-week project aimed at getting the word out about the emerald ash borer and what the pest is doing to Michigan's ash trees. A press conference around the Save Your Ash campaign was scheduled for this morning in Riverside Park on the city's Northwest Side. Besides Hill-Rowley, other students are Marne Becker-Baratta, 16; Brianna Blauser, 17; Kelsey Bont, 16; Kelsey Sloop, 18; and Amber Stout, 18. Hundreds of red fabric tags and a trio of banners will hang for the next two weeks from 562 ash trees in the park. " We really want people to understand that there's an important visual and aesthetic impact to the loss of trees, as well as an economic impact, " said Rachel Hood, executive director of the West Michigan Environmental Action Council, which commissioned the project. The student artwork, Hood said, " really helps people understand from a more emotional perspective how important these trees are. " http://www.mlive.com/grpress/news/index.ssf/2008/08/grand_rapids_students_use_ar\ t.html Wisconsin: 24) Environmentalists took to the air over Ashland to make their case that the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest is endangered forests from over-logging. Vanessa Feltes flew along. From the sky to the ground, the Environmental Law and Policy Center and the Habitat Education Center explore the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest. On Wednesday, they used both airplanes and boot leather to ride above and walk through the forest. They say the forest is one of the top ten most endangered national forests. The Chequamegon-Nicolet Forest covers about 1.5 million acres in northern Wisconsin. Habitat Education Center's Resource Ecologist Dave Zaber has had many experiences by plane and on foot exploring the forest. That's given him the first hand knowledge of how bad things really are. " I let the woods, the damage, and the ground do the talking. " Zaber says it isn't only logging disrupting the forest, but it's also trails, roads, and dust. http://www.businessnorth.com/kuws.asp?RID=2471 " What's happening here is the forest service is proposing too much logging and too many timber sales too fast and in too many of the wrong places and the result of that is we're putting clean water, threatened species, and other important natural resource's values at risk. " Forest Ecologist Don Waller says the Chequamegon National Forest is among the most endangered in the country in part because of what he calls excessive logging. " I'm concerned because the national forests are at a turning point. We are heavily logged right now, yet we have several sensitive species there. " Zaber says the Chequamegon-Nicolet Forest excessive logging began long ago. " The whole area was logged extensively starting around 1850, by about 1920 virtually all of the merchantable timber had been removed from the upper-Midwest. " Zaber says now they want those areas to grow back…but Zaber says their efforts come both the positive and the negative. " There's higher valued timber, there's some extensive forests that are now ripe in the eyes of those who would exploit those forests for cutting again. It's the second round of cutting and we haven't even recovered from the first round yet. " Although Chequamegon-Nicolet is on their top ten most logged national forests, they say it doesn't mean no more cutting of timber can be done…there's just a better way to do it. http://www.businessnorth.com/kuws.asp?RID=2465 Connecticut: 25) NORFOLK - Dan Donahue likes to say that forestry isn't rocket science. It's a lot more complicated than that. " There's a lot about rocket science that's been figured out, but forests are subject to the intricate web of life: the interactions of plants, animals, sun, air, you name it, " said Donahue, director of land protection at the Norcross Wildlife Foundation in Monson, Mass. That complexity is why he and other Northeast foresters are increasingly being called on by private landowners to help them manage their wooded acreage, commonly called " family forests. " Many of the owners have civic motives, wanting to protect their forests and ensure that invasive plant species and insects do not get a foothold. Others are curious about whether they can harvest timber without hurting their forests, tap their maples for sap or improve the wildlife habitat for hunting and nature-watching. The region's foresters are encouraging the interest with outreach programs, on-site assessments and other services - all intended to make the satisfaction of preserving the land outweigh the financial lure of selling it to developers. That's especially important in the Northeast, where the majority of forested land is held by private landowners rather than the state and federal governments. In much of New England, including Connecticut and Massachusetts, about 80 percent of forested land is in the hands of private owners. Nationally, it is just below 50 percent. http://www.courant.com/news/local/statewire/hc-22161919.apds.m0730.bc-ct--famiau\ g22,0,7285811.story Chesapeake Watershed: 26) If a tree falls in the forest, Craig Highfield cares. Highfield, 36, is the coordinator for Forestry for the Bay, a public service program launched this year that promotes sustainable forest management as a way to improve the health of the region's woodlands and the water quality of local streams, rivers, and the Chesapeake Bay. " Our Chesapeake forests provide us a wealth of services, " Highfield explains. " From filtering our water to providing habitat to supplying timber and pulp, woodlands have always been and continue to be a vital resource for our region and waterways. " Riparian (waterside) forests act as buffers for streams, reducing the flow of pollutants by as much as 90 percent in some cases, according to Highfield. Trees also hold soils in place, reducing erosion. And they create a landscape of surpassing beauty—perhaps the kind of view Captain John Smith saw in 1608, when he reported a cypress with a circumference of 18 feet during his Bay sojourn. " Approximately 750,000 acres—an amount of land equivalent to 20 Washington, D.C.s—have been developed since the early 1980s, " Highfield says, " and about 100 acres of forest are lost each day. Remaining forests also face new stresses like fragmentation, air pollution, invasive pests, diseases, and damage to new growth from browsing deer. " A big challenge, Highfield says, is that approximately 80 percent of all the forests in the Bay watershed are privately owned. The majority of these landowners own less than 10 acres, and many face challenges in managing their forestland while helping to improve the health of the Bay. In addition, the number of woodland owners in the region is increasing at a time when state forestry budgets allocated to address their needs are shrinking. Forestry for the Bay is intended to help fill that service gap. With a goal of keeping the lands of the watershed wooded and healthy, Forestry for the Bay targets small and medium acreage landowners who want to conserve their woodland and restore trees to their property. " We want participants to develop their own goals for their land, " says Highfield. " What do they want their land to look like in five, 10 or 20 years? Do they want to promote the growth of specific tree species? Do they plan on harvesting trees sustainably? Forestry for the Bay provides the resources to support their objectives. " http://www.cbf.org/site/News2?abbr=SB_News_ & page=NewsArticle & id=36167 New York: 27) ALBANY - A conservation group announced Thursday that 90,500 acres of timberlands it bought last year in the central and southern Adirondacks are up for sale with prohibitions against residential and commercial development. The Nature Conservancy plans to sell five lots to timber management companies subject to conservation easements with the state. Those prohibit development but permit logging with protections for habitats and river corridors, provide for some public recreation and allow ongoing leases by the landowners with hunting clubs. The forests, mainly in the towns of Newcomb, Indian Lake, North Hudson, Minerva and Long Lake, touch six counties and dozens of towns. One parcel stretches more than 10 miles in northern Essex County. The five sale blocks range from 1,691 to 58,502 acres. " Protected by a conservation easement, the working forest lands being offered for sale will continue to contribute to the park's wild feel, intact nature, and economic underpinnings, just as they have for more than a century, " said Michael Carr, executive director of the Conservancy's Adirondack Chapter. The nonprofit group last year purchased 161,000 acres long held by Finch, Pruyn & Co. for $110 million. The state has agreed to buy at least 57,699 acres to add to New York's 2.6-million acre Adirondack Forest Preserve, where logging is prohibited. That portion would include the Boreas Ponds, Essex Chain of Lakes, Hudson Gorge and Opalescent River headwaters. It would open to the public gradually during a 10-year transition as hunting club or other leases are phased out. http://www.newsday.com/news/local/wire/newyork/ny-bc-ny--adirondackland0821aug21\ ,0,2654949.story Virginia: 28) When Dan Druckenbrod looks at trees he sees trees, but he also sees history -- lots of it. A Longwood University assistant professor of environmental science, Druckenbrod is leading research projects at two of the most historic homes in America -- Monticello and Mount Vernon. " Much of my research is about tree rings and forest change in an effort to understand landscapes, " Druckenbrod said. " In both projects, I'm interested in how the surrounding forests have changed over time, which is largely in response to how Jefferson and Washington used the environment two centuries ago. " Druckenbrod is using tree rings, geographic information systems and other documentary evidence, such as maps, to reconstruct the forest histories of the two historic sites. " There are lots of woods you can look at in Virginia, but it's fun to get to work at Mount Vernon and Monticello, " Druckenbrod said. " It's not only environmental history but the history of our country. " Druckenbrod started working with Monticello in 2002 as a University of Virginia graduate student. A large part of the Monticello project, sponsored by the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, is to determine what Montalto, the large hill behind Monticello, looked like during Jefferson's time. Montalto, also called Brown's Mountain, was acquired by Jefferson in 1777. Jefferson had plans for the site, but it is unclear whether any were realized before his daughter sold the tract in 1832 -- six years after Jefferson's death -- to pay off his debts. The Jefferson Foundation was worried about the land being developed and purchased the 330-acre tract in 2004. " Hopefully this research will help to shed some light on the timing of the field-clearing, since the foundation wants to reconstruct the appearance to that of Thomas Jefferson's retirement years, " Druckenbrod said. The Mount Vernon Ladies' Association is funding Druckenbrod's work at Mount Vernon. The association invited Druckenbrod to submit a proposal based on his work at Monticello and earlier, similar research at Montpelier, James Madison's home in Orange County. http://www.inrich.com/cva/ric/news.apx.-content-articles-RTD-2008-08-26-0014.htm\ l Appalachia: 29) Forest " balds " are patches of forest that are inexplicably devoid of trees. The more general term for this is " clearings " but we usually use that word to also refer to forest regions which were cleared via human causes such as logging. The great smokey mountains of the Appalachian mountain region have a bunch of these balds, which exist naturally. It has been hypothesized that these balds are remnants of lightning fires but nobody really knows. What naturalists/biologists do know is that there are several dozen species of wildflowers which exist nowhere else except these smokey mountain balds. Now, as forests grow naturally, the balds are being overrun by encroaching conifers. As the balds disappear so do the rare species of flowers. In a short couple of decades most, if not all, of these wildflower species will be extinct. The national forest service is currently the steward of the majority of the great smokey mountain range. Here is the problem: Should the forest service build roads to these balds to allow loggers access to the trees and then push them back a bit thereby postponing the disappearance of the balds and, subsequently, the disappearance of the wildflower species? If you say YES then you will preserve several species of wildflower at the expense of a large road cutting through several miles of forest and access to pristine forest region by the evil(?) logging companies. If you say NO then you will allow the extinction of dozens or more of a natural species. But let nature take its course. This is actually a real problem and, by default, the cash strapped forest service is doing nothing, which is probably a good thing. http://blog-of-revelation.blogspot.com/2008/08/trouble-with-overestimating-our.h\ tml USA: 30) Somewhere between preventing forest fires and promoting wood fires, the Western Forestry Leadership Coalition is walking a fine line. " It's like supporting being 'green,' while also supporting ample energy supplies. You have to be careful, or one of your feet will trip over the other, " said Bob Atchison, rural forestry coordinator with the Kansas Forest Service. The WFLC is a partnership of state and federal government leaders, he said. Its forester members are spread out from Kansas to the American-affiliated Pacific islands. The group's most recent report suggests why belonging is increasingly a balancing act, Atchison said. That report is coming from dedicated foresters. Its title is " From Wood Waste to Renewable Energy. " Atchison added, however, that three factors make the report's proposals workable: The 2008 farm bill includes opportunities for wood-to-energy programs. If funded, these provisions would probably lead to expanded wood-heating efforts, such as Fuels for Schools. " In a way, the president has added his support, too, " Atchison said. " He's set a national goal for the United States to achieve an annual output of 35 billion 'gallons' in renewable and alternative fuels by 2017. " As currently defined, however, woody biomass from our national forests can't count in meeting that goal. That could be a problem. " Wildfires in the west release millions of tons of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere almost every year. In contrast, today's modern biomass (wood waste) systems are clean-burning. " In a separate survey, the WFLC found that most western states have already tried the idea of again using wood fuel for heat - with related cost savings of $7,500 to $1 million per year, " Atchison said. " What's needed now is to take the idea beyond the government pilot-project stage, but do so in a way that also helps to prevent wildfires, to promote healthier watersheds and forests, and to create jobs. " http://www.hpj.com/archives/2008/aug08/aug25/Westernforesters-Usingwoodf.cfm?tit\ le=Western%20foresters-%20Using%20wood%20for%20heat%20can%20help%20forests 31) Let us rise above all this whoofoo madness. Instead, let's discuss the SOLUTION to our forest management difficulties. Our forest resources are being destroyed. That includes timber, wildlife habitat, watershed values, heritage, soils, air quality, recreation opportunity, scenery, and public health and safety, with damages compounding and accumulating every hour, day, and week, year after year. Our priceless heritage forests, are being consumed by fire and converted to brush. Something must be done. Let It Burn, whether by whoofoo (WFU, or Wildland Fire Use), non-suppression " suppression " fires, or deliberate " containment " backburning that extends fires for months across vast acreages, are policies and practices that destroy forests. Fire " exclusion " is all but impossible, nor is it particularly healthy for forests. Instead fires should be at the right times, in the right places, and done in the right way. Forests also need to be prepared to receive those properly timed, located, and administered fires. Need a useful phrase to describe all that? Try " restoration forestry. " That's the term the pros use. The whole and complete idea of restoration forestry also includes: 1. Heritage landscape renovation, 2. Managing for fire resiliency and old-growth development pathways, 3. Watershed protection, 4. Protecting and enhancing wildlife habitat, 5. Active stewardship with positive economic returns, 6. Compliance with environmental laws… http://westinstenv.org/sosf/2008/08/20/restoration-forestry-is-the-answer/ 32) Loggers have big tractors with power winches attached to chains, which skid the logs through the forest. Get in the way and you can be hurt. Sometimes a big piece of wood can splinter off and hit someone. And when there is a logging injury, help is often far away. Cell phones may not work in a forest, and helicopters can't land, which means that workers who could be saved, lose their race with time. The second most dangerous occupation is logging, where 86.4 workers per 100,000 died. That was an increase from 2006 when there were 82.3 fatal logging injuries for every 100,000 workers, but down from four years ago when, with more than 92 deaths per 100,000, logging led the nation in deaths on the job. " Logging has become less dangerous because of mechanization, " said Eric Johnson, editor of the Northern Logging & Timber Processing magazine. Instead of working with chain saws on the ground, loggers now often sit in the steel enclosed cabs of big machines. The loggers work the controls that send chain saws out into the trunk of a tree from a safer distance. Still, there are many ways to get hurt. Loggers working outside can get crushed when trees fall in the wrong direction. And big broken branches snagged high up in the treetops often drop unexpectedly as the trees come down. " They call them widow-makers, " said Johnson. Once logs are cut up, they have to be hauled to trucks. http://money.cnn.com/2008/08/20/news/fewer_workers_die_on_job/?postversion=20080\ 82015 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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