New Biscuit Camp Established!

sousaphone, 01.06.2005 12:28

Call out to all forest lovers!

The Siskiyou Summer push is on! Logging companies are gearing up to punch into several Biscuit old-growth sales as we type. Logging is imminent; we need your help!

Come join us at our community mobilization & education camp dedicated to protection of our public lands. Located right in the heart of what's at stake, forest defenders, community activists, and all who love wilderness are coming together again to organize. At the camp we will be going on hikes, teaching each other skills in areas such as: direct action, community organizing, climbing, and local ecology. Everyone is invited - come out for the day, a few days, or a week or more to help protect our endangered forests.

For those who have been involved in this movement already, it is important at this point to remember that there is MUCH left to save. We are still waiting for rulings on lawsuits that affect many of the impending timber sales. Stall time right now is really valuable… come help, have fun, and defend our forests!

What to bring: yourself, prepared to camp. We will have some food to share, but if you are able please bring some as well.

When: Now!

Directions: From the I-5, take the Merlin exit (It's north of the Grant's Pass exits, and south of Wolf Creek & Sunny Valley exits). Head west through the town of Merlin about 11 miles on Galice Rd. towards Galice, then turn left onto Briggs Rd. (also known as FS 25. It's about 2 miles after you cross the Rogue River). After turning onto Briggs Rd, go 10 1/2 miles to the detour turn, but instead of turning right, keep going straight for 1 more mile, then take a right onto FS 100. A few hundred yards down FS 100, take a right onto FS 600. Camp is at the end of FS 600!

(Please Note: This is a mobile camp, and the location may change depending on the needs of the forest. Updates will be posted at www.rogueimc.org, portland.indymedia.org, and www.cascadiarising.org. Or just give us a call.)

Contact us for more info!
Wild Siskiyou Action
(541) 659-2682
 siskiyou@cascadiarising.org

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much more to defend than has been lost 01.06.2005 - 21:47 There IS much more burned, live Siskiyou forest left to defend from the Biscuit Salvage Project than has been lost to date. Most of the matrix sales have been cut and sold, which leaves just old-growth reserve and roadless areas. Stand firm. steelhead> encouragement and long distance 03.06.2005 - 14:42 Yessssss, THanks for reminding us of how much is left. These roadless areas are beyond monetary value, they are vauable beyond what words can describe. Future generations will eventually cherish every acre that we could save in it's native state. Dont' hesitate, even if you are thousansds of miles away, write letters, make phone calls, donate money to the cause. Could someone quickly post an update on the critical people we should be pressuring, their contact info, and what groups donations can be sent to where they will be used to stop logging of roadless and LSR. Peace and love PS Please go to  http://www.nativeforest.org/middle_east_fork/deis_action_alert.htm to send in official comments on the Middle East Fork, a 6000 acre old growth destroyer of a plan for Montana's bitteroot. mild elixir> Forest killers?? 05.06.2005 - 09:20 ....in the name of "nature"? Now that the Bitterroot is a wasteland of burned rotted timber and beetle-infested forests, you're turning your efforts to the Biscuit? Unfortunately, much of the Biscuit will suffer the same fate as the Bitterroot. Preserving perfect bark beetle habitat wil result in many more trees dying and future fires being much more intense. Just watch this summer's fire season up in Montana. It could make 2000 look like a backyard BBQ. BTW, the joke is that the Sierra Club finished off California's forests and decided to move up to Missoula to do their "magic". Millions of dead trees in the San Bernardino NF with significant amounts in the Sequoia NF, too. I'm currently seeing man-enhanced drought occurring in my neck of the woods, near Yosemite, causing drought stress and mortality from overstocking and a lack of active management due to Clinton's fatally-flawed Sierra Nevada Framework. I don't see the amendment to it coming online for many, many months still, either. Hotfeet> Homepage:: http://www.foreststewardsguild.org Bitterroot editorial 07.06.2005 - 06:06 Sunday, June 5, 2005 Missoulian Opinion Put forest restoration ideas to work - SUMMARY: Forest Service's Middle East Fork project represents a healthy change in approach to forest management. From any ridge top overlooking the East Fork of the Bitterroot River, forestry appears to be something of a trial-and-error proposition. Unnaturally dense patches of trees growing in 30-year-old clearcuts scarcely disguise the bulldozed terraces that made the Bitterroot National Forest infamous a generation ago as a monument to mismanagement. A much more recent logging scar makes a mockery of slash disposal, a parody of the fuel-reduction benefits ascribed to logging. Dirt roads run alongside creeks and crisscross the hillsides of nearly every side drainage; gates and signs barring vehicles stand as the last line of defense for wildlife in an area considered critical winter range for elk and mule deer. In the patches so far spared the chainsaw, many - in some tracts, most - of the big trees are dead, killed by an ongoing beetle infestation of epidemic proportions. Huge expanses of the forest were burned in the fires of 2000; in a few places, burned trees were "salvaged" for lumber; most of the burned snags remain standing. They, along with all those beetle-killed trees, promise to fall into jackstraw jumbles, possibly to fuel intense, perhaps massive forest fires well into the future. In some of the lightly logged and unburned patches, there are only old trees, no younger ones growing. In much of the drainage, a century of aggressive firefighting has allowed trees to crowd what once was relatively open forest, making the next dry summer and lightning strike the makings of the Mother of All Wildfires. The agency responsible for managing the national forest, the U.S. Forest Service, quite obviously hasn't gotten things quite right in the East Fork. Anyone who gets out much in the West might add that it hasn't exactly cracked the case elsewhere, either. The question is whether to keep trying to get it right. That's the question implied in the 3-pound-2-ounce, 1 1/4-inch-thick Draft Environmental Impact Statement the Forest Service prepared and is now circulating for public review on its proposed "Middle East Fork Hazardous Fuel Reduction" project. You can find a less bulky digital version of the document online at www.fs.fed.us/r1/bitterroot/planning/decisiondocs/mef.htm. The first major Montana undertaking authorized by a 2003 law Congress dubbed the "Healthy Forests Restoration Act," the Middle East Fork project reflects the Forest Service's much-evolved, state-of-the-art (and it is as much art as science) concept of forest management. The project has two explicit objectives - to reduce the threat potential wildfires pose to private property, homes, cabins and people along the East Fork; and to help restore at least some of the forest to healthier condition. The Forest Service doesn't - but might well - also add confidence-building as a third major objective. Many eyes are on the Bitterroot National Forest, and significant success in reducing fire danger and improving forest stewardship is sure to influence public perceptions elsewhere in Montana and the West, where similar projects are in planning stages. Failure also would be duly noted. Half of the East Fork project is virtually without controversy - the part involving removing trees and other potential fuels in close proximity to homes and other private property. Perhaps there ought to be greater debate over the expenditure of substantial sums of tax dollars essentially to provide preventive fire protection for relatively few private landowners who've chosen to buy and build in the midst of a fire-prone ecosystem. City dwellers must foot such bills on their own through insurance premiums and the cost of meeting fire-wise building codes. But past forest management practices have unquestionably increased the fire danger to developments surrounded by national forests, and Congress clearly intended with the Healthy Forests Restoration Act to address this problem. Reducing fire danger near homes, subdivisions and communities is an undertaking that enjoys widespread support. The other half of the proposed project is steeped in controversy. That's the part focused on restoration. The Forest Service proposal calls for logging some 6,400 acres in total out of the 26,000-acre project area. Some environmentalists openly scoff at the idea of the Forest Service doing anything with the forest that Mother Nature couldn't do better. Listen closely, and you'll also discern doctrinaire opposition to anything involving commercial logging. Some people view commercial logging the way others might regard loan-sharking in a cathedral. You'd have to have a hole in your soul to stand next to a towering ponderosa overlooking the East Fork and not at least understand where these folks are coming from. Yet dogmatic opposition to commercial logging in the national forest will, to most of us, seem needlessly rigid and impractical. Logging opponents adroitly mix science with their religion, but they have a tendency to pick and choose from the body of science to extract the bits and pieces that bolster their beliefs, downplaying those that don't. Open-minded people will find ample, albeit not conclusive, scientific basis for well-regulated logging as one part of good forest stewardship. While some consider logging a form of destruction, it isn't always so. If what you "destroy" is an unnatural, unhealthy condition, that "destruction" actually can aid in the forest's restoration. That's the theory driving the Forest Service's proposal, anyway. One of the problems in need of fixing in the Bitterroot - and throughout the West - is the overgrown nature of forests. These are forests that evolved with periodic wildfire where, for decades, people have done all they can to prevent and put out wildfires. Aggressive fire suppression has increased the amount of vegetation, thus fuel, available to burn. In many places, fire suppression also has affected the species of trees growing by making it possible for less-fire-resistant trees to thrive. Another problem can be seen in patches of old-growth timber, where 300-year-old pines are surrounded by 200-year-old Douglas firs that are dead or doomed by the beetle epidemic. Few younger trees grow in some of those stands, least of all young ponderosas, which need more sunlight to grow. As the firs die and fall to the ground, they'll create a fuel base likely to kill the old-growth pines when wildfire inevitably sweeps through. When that happens, there'll be no old trees and no young trees. The condition of the forest, with its heightened vulnerability to fire, insects and disease, isn't natural - at least, not entirely. It's at least partly the result of the way the land has been managed - at times, mismanaged. It's probably true that, over geologic time, nature will run its course. Left alone, the forest undoubtedly is capable of restoring itself. But to the extent that the condition of the forest has been shaped by people, we'd contend people have a moral obligation - not merely an opportunity - to set things right. Some of us also are too impatient to wait millennia. The answer to too many trees and too many of the wrong kinds of trees is to remove some. Doing so not only reduces fire danger, but can also encourage the growth of young trees needed to ensure the forest endures over time. There's a school of thought that removing infested trees also can help combat beetle epidemics, but no one really thinks logging on the scale proposed in the East Fork can have any real effect on the massive beetle epidemic now under way. Removing dead and dying trees, however, can reduce the potential for unnaturally intense wildfires. Reducing the amount of fuel can allow greater and safer use of controlled fire to revitalize the fire-evolved forest or improve wildlife habitat and also reduce the vulnerability of the remaining old-growth ponderosas. Managing the forest primarily to provide raw material for sawmills ranks high on the list of past forest-stewardship mistakes. The folly of that approach remains easy to see throughout western Montana, including the East Fork. Read the Forest Service documents and listen to agency scientists, however, and you'll see they're learning from those mistakes. The logging proposed in the East Fork isn't merely for the sake of logging. It's the means, not the end. The proposed logging is focused and purposeful, aimed at restoring more natural conditions to the forest. The fact that some of the trees to be removed have commercial value and their sale can help underwrite the cost of the overall project bothers some people. We see it as a plus. The thing we can't say with any authority is that, with the kind of measures proposed in the East Fork project, the Forest Service has finally gotten it right. As we say, forest management has proved to be a learn-as-you-go proposition. Whether the proposed East Fork project succeeds entirely is a matter of educated guesswork. Certainly, the project offers another opportunity to learn. While the scale is relatively large for a single Forest Service project, the 6,400 acres to be selectively logged and the entire 26,000-acre middle East Fork area comprise tiny fractions of the Bitterroot National Forest and even smaller fractions of the national forests of western Montana. From any high ridge overlooking the project area, you can see the Anaconda-Pintler Wilderness to the east. That's an area where nature dictates without much human intervention. Over time, we'll see how that works. Meanwhile, there are other, large expanses of the Bitterroot National Forest that have been managed largely as commercial timberland. We're seeing how that works, too. The proposed East Fork project represents a reasonable, plausible attempt to improve on past management - to try something different. There would seem to be ample room to try one thing here, another thing there, until we finally get it right. Comment by poster: MARVELOUS article! Some parts of it are applicable to the dwindling "preservationist" movement. However, all roads STILL point to a balanced approach and a striving towards "restoration forestry". Hotfeet> Homepage:: http://www.foreststewardsguild.org Bitterroot mole, found you in my home state 08.06.2005 - 10:31 The comment entitled Forest Killers?? is an absulute attempt to subverse the truth and put up smoke screens in order to promote commercial logging. Time for the remedy. I have been working for almost a year to shed light onto the massive commercial logging project planned for the Middle East Fork of the Bitterroot ( http://www.nativeforest.org/middle_east_fork.htm). I have ground truthed this timber sale on three separate occassions, toured it with loggers, enviros, community members, FS on May 4th, and recently attended a scientific panel on the project in Hamilton. All of these scientists made it into the field to see the project. Here is a summary of that very volatile meeting. The science panel in Hamilton organized by the Native Forest Network and Friends of the Bitterroot debunked several arguements put forth to support large-scale commercial logging in native stands of old growth forests effected by bark beetle and proposed under Alternative two of the Middle East Fork Hazardous Fuel Reduction project. Three out of four panelists agreed that there is no proven ecological justification that thinning will stop bark beetle spread or reduce the risk of fire, and that the commercial logging outside the wildland urban interface (WUI) would compact soils causing chronic erosion into streams, degrade fisheries, and have long-lasting negative impacts on the ecology of the area. There is no peer-reviewed science that supports logging as a way to control beetles. Panelists described the massive reservoir of beetles that are native to our forests, and the unsuccessful attempts to remove and control them. Fire behavior is not simply driven by fuels, and suggesting a high intensity severe fire is the only outcome for the Middle East Fork area is wrong. Fire always burns in a mosaic, and low intensity fires in high fuel areas are part of that mosaic. Soils are fully capable of withstanding a fire, as they have for millennia, and loss of productivity is not a valid concern. We should consider and embrace the vast variability in disturbance regimes that have historically occurred in these mixed forest types. Alternative three would provide jobs protecting homes by treating the community protection zone and the WUI and use taxpayer money efficiently so that three communities including the Middle East Fork could be protected for the taxpayer expense of Alternative two. It leaves behind the ecologically damaging, unscientifically supported aspects that sacrifice the outstanding heritage of our public lands. We are now in the process of planning a scientific panel for Missoula. The scientific community is getting up in arms about this because they have been ignored by the Forest Service, or selectively used for so long. Further, one scientist has misrepresented and made false accusations against others, and this has only encouraged them to get more involved. The Missoulian editorial posted after the Nature Killers posting was extremely strange and controversial. I am posting some rebuttals which are currently continuing. The article does not even do what it tries to do, encourage us to trust the FS, well. It starts out talking about the failed legacy of Forest Management in the Bitterroot, the roads by every stream, and so on. Anyhow, for my Pacific Northwest brethren and sistren, the Middle East Fork is very similar to many large timber sales that you have seen in the PNW. It is patchwork or large clear-cuts, terraced slopes with plantations, native forest stands and an incredibly large elk herd that passes through the area. The timber sale targets the old growth stands and will reduce Douglas fir snags from 100-200 per acre, to around 4-10. It's the same old story in a new disguise. Dear Editor of the Missoulian, What a strange editorial from the Missoulian regarding the Bitterroot National Forest’s proposal to log 4,000 acres of old growth forest up the East Fork of the Bitterroot River. We are told that forest management on the Bitterroot National Forest has been "a trial-and-error proposition" and that the "Forest Service hasn’t gotten things quite right in the East Fork." The editorial describes how over the years much of the East Fork has been clearcut, bulldozed with terraces and "dirt roads run alongside creeks and crisscross the hillsides of nearly every side drainage." The editorial points out that a recent logging project, (which coincidentally was cut as part of the Burned Area Recovery Plan in 2003), "makes a mockery of slash disposal, a parody of the fuel-reduction benefits ascribed to logging." Reading the editorial, one gets the impression that the Bitterroot National Forest is seriously mismanaged. That’s why the conclusion the editorial draws – supporting the Forest Service’s proposal to log another 4,000 acres of old growth – is so peculiar. The title of the editorial was "Put forest restoration ideas to work." Great idea, but why wasn’t the watershed and road restoration plan for the East Fork that local conservation groups submitted as part of their Alternative 3 mentioned? Why not mention that Bitterroot Supervisor Dave Bull eliminated this restoration work from Alternative 3, in part, because the Bitterroot has failed to deliver on $16 million in promised watershed restoration work from the Burned Area Recovery Plan? Or, why not take Congress to task for the paltry sum they’ve provided the Bitterroot to do real restoration work? The bottom line is cutting 4,000 acres of old growth in a watershed that everyone acknowledges is in poor health due to roads and logging practices, is not what most reasonable people consider forest restoration. Finally, I just wanted to add that alternative three was devloped by a coalition of environmental groups and proposed treatment in the WUI and CPZ. You saw reference to it in the rebuttal to the editorial just above. Please comment on this sale at  http://www.nativeforest.org/middle_east_fork/deis_action_alert.htm Keep up the sacred fight for the Siskiyou's! We are with you from Montana. Old growth stands> Bitterroot Blathering? 09.06.2005 - 19:06 The editorial was finely written but overstated the "sins" of past management practices. Certainly, not every stream on the Bitterroot has a road directly adjacent (ie, within the protected streamcourse buffer). Certainly not every piece of managed ground has thick layers of old growth logging slash. I, too, have direct experience with the area in question. Certainly, your definition of old growth is quite different from mine. A 135 year old 12" dbh pine tree suppressed underneath a large majestic pine COULD be considered "old growth" by using sheer years of growth. However, it would still be a prime candidate for logging, as its removal would make the large pine more healthy and more resistent to bark beetles. That is the more common approach to forest management on this exact project. Yes, salvage operations do NOT reduce bark beetle problems but you also seem to be against any removal of excessive green trees which DO spawn clouds of bark beetles. Salvage sales DO reduce future fire intensity and could make the difference between our fire resistent pines surviving or dying in a future fire. Just look at the pictures that Mtn_high posted sometime back of the Bitterroot, with all the problems of the forests up there shown in great detail. You people are perfectly OK with letting those forests burn at high intensity because you think it's "natural". If it were "natural" there wouldn't be ANY 300 year old pines. The forests desperately need to be returned to a "natural" fire regime but, we can't get there without removing some excess trees, some of which are of "commercial" size (10+" dbh). My question is: What is wrong with restoring forests to "natural" stocking levels and species composition, under "Healthy Forests"? And that goes for all our western National Forests. If the stands are already there, I'm all for leaving them the hell alone, except for quick-burning and cool controlled burns. However, there just aren't too many areas in that condition, thanks to the "sins" of the past by misguided forest managers. You seem to be fighting those same old tired battles of the last millenium. Join us in the new millenium or be left behind in the courts. Hotfeet> Homepage:: http://www.foreststewardsguild.org wow!! 10.06.2005 - 19:30 ya know, i've read this site for a spell here and there, almost always appalled by the comments. It's incredible that people who proclaim to care for forests are so incapable of thinking outside of the mindset that they were born into.(or the one that pays for their cable tv) Yeah, go back east and ask folk who've worked in industry there what they think of the industry they worked for. Chances are, if they're retired (or still working) it was great, beautiful, the best job ever. Ask others who's lives have been destroyed because, well, that's business...Right? You may get a different idea of what industry is and what it's function is. What i'm saying in a convoluted way is, hotfeet, you are a liar, and the saddest part is you justify your lies by believing them...unquestioningly. I know, it is a mortal sin deserving of death to question authority, science, the falliability of humans. But we know all right? We're God buddy, and reading close minded, patronizing posts such as yours and every other person who comments on this website is just verification of that. Please, continue to post your all knowingness, and while your doing that, think of all those marginal humans before us who stood up and said enough is enough, regardless of scientific proof and ingrained moral beliefs. We do not evolve through acquiescence my friend, it is through questioning and courage. You are obviously someone profitting from commercial salvage in some way, i don't have to be God to see that. Oh yeah, one more thing, since i'm God i'll procalim this, as long as there is profit to be made in the forest, there will never be sincere restoration, END COMMERCIAL SALVAGE LOGGING ON PUBLIC LAND!! echo> e-mail:: echo@riseup.net Answer the question! 10.06.2005 - 20:46 Not many can claim to have seen as many different forests and conditions as I have seen. If I don't share my experience and expertise, it will be lost to mankind. I still consider myself to have a middle of the road focus, having been on both sides of the fence in the past. Of course, you're going to label and stereotype me because you don't agree with or even accept my experience. I see a much bigger picture than you selfish "preservationists" who can't see beyond their own lifetimes. Yes, I have a higher calling and I take my work seriously. (BTW, I do NOT get paid for doing this....I do this for fun!) No, really, I do sincerely want to educate people to see the truths of sound science and sane ecosystem management. Your hatred has no place in our forests. I truly encourage you folks to make the Forest Service walk their talk, fight against corruption and keep partisan politics (both sides) out of the scientific arena. My main goal is to restore old growth conditions back to our National Forests, allowing endangered species to regain sustainability and to enjoy fresh, clean plentiful water. Not much different from many Americans but, the methods needed are despised by all "preservationists". They'd rather see it burn, pouring toxic gasses into our atmosphere and resulting in accelerated and destructive logging in places not in their own backyards. Again, I ask you all: What is wrong with restoring "natural" stocking levels and "natural" species composition to our National Forests under "Healthy Forests"? I could care less if the mills make money and consider it their "patriotic duty" to only break even on Federal forest projects. Again, I say that to win in court, you'd better bring more than a "feeling in your heart" to the courtroom. Hotfeet> Homepage:: http://www.foreststewardsguild.org Response to Hotfeet 10.06.2005 - 21:46 I want you to understand something right now, history is chock full of people who've claimed to be experts because they have more "experience and expertise". Well, this is what makes them experts, right? I have experience with dealing with human beings every day of my life (just like you i'm sure), and yet, i'll be damned if i understand humans any better than i did when i was 6 years old. I'm not questioning your experience nor expertise, i'm sure they're both extensive. What i question is the sincerity of restoration of (badly) managed public lands after a forest fire. We have out there at our fingertips a range of scientific opinion from no salvage logging at all to log every dead tree. And yet, i have never ever witnessed a timber sale eis that has chosen to not salvage. And why? is that because it is what is best for forests, or best for people who profit off of salvage logging forests. When there is an experiment called "moratorium" on salvage logging federally funded forests for, let's say 4 years (shit, we've been logging them for 100 and look at the mess we have now), and the forests end up being in worse condition than they presently are, i'll admit i'm wrong. Untill then, i will not be convinced that forest health is not in jeopardy as long as profit is part of the equation...period. How do you generate revenue to restore forest health without a means...what's the means to generate money to restore forests? What is it? It's logging, it's grazing, it's mining and inholding taxes and recreation taxes and fees. It's a diabolical catch 22 that needs to be exposed for what it is... a fucking lie!! You say you don't work in the woods for money, it's fun? Well, some folk do work in the woods for money, and there services would be better rendered performing sincere restoration of water and woods. And that's possible, but not under the current framework of "environmental law" nor appropriation of funds (we need money to continue the occupation of Iraq). Environmental law is set up to extract resources, and hopefully, appease opportunistic enviros who have wormed their way into positions of enviro power. Finally my friend, do not speak to me of sound management until cumulative impacts of past extraction is taken into consideration. You cannot have the full picture of impact on a site until you consider the impacts of the entire area that encompasses the site. Is this sound science? Maybe not, but it only seems logical. I have no hate my friend, i speak honestly as i have seen the forests here as well and spent a fair amount of time within them, and the state of some of these places is truly sad; should i speak with happiness and hope? And you, someone with your experience? to continue to spread the lies of the timber industry? I'm either way wrong buddy or you're misguided or evil...it's one of the 2. We could be wrong, both of us, all of us, can you accept that? Answer that question. John Felsner (echo)> e-mail:: echo@riseup.net Hateful Words 11.06.2005 - 13:39 John, Steelhead, Jay, OGS, etc.: Is everyone who feels that commercial harvest can be a valuable tool for improving forest health a greedy timber profiteer? Is everyone who questions your supreme wisdom a liar? Hotfeet has stated in a previous post that trees should not be cut for economic reasons, and you still accuse him of being a timber beast just because s/he's pro-management. Time after time, you people attack the person instead of the idea. It seems to me that you are more opposed to people making a living from restoring and managing the land than you are supportive of improving the natural environment. Stop hating people so much, and try to start loving the Earth a little more. John: you claim that, "i have never ever witnessed a timber sale eis that has chosen to not salvage." Let's see ... the Biscuit EIS chose not to salvage on 96% of the burn area. How do you explain that? And never mind the fact that, if the FS chooses not to salvage at all, they have no reason or need to waste time and money creating and EIS. You make it seem as if the Forest Service is out to cut down every tree that ever has or might ever burn, which is very far from reality. Even if the FS did want to salvage an entire burn area, various buffer zone and leave tree requirements (in place for environmental protection) would limit their activities to only a fraction of the total area. More later ... Moon Muffin> The key to ending salvage sales 12.06.2005 - 08:16 The key to ending salvage sales is to "fix" our forests so that they survive droughts, bark beetles and fires. While some areas "naturally" burn at high intensity, and require no treatments, others require fuels treatments to restore a natural fire cycle. Nearly pure stands of lodgepole and knobcone pines should not be logged in the name of "fuels management". However, if there is a substantial ponderosa pine or Douglas fir component, then thinning projects can help to restore old growth and fire resistance in those kinds of stands. Again, site specificity and sound science should rule over a one-size-fits-all approach that "preservationists" want. Salvage logging can help America to become less dependent on imported wood from clearcuts in other countries. Remember, think globally and act locally. Don't trust the Forest Service until they prove that they will do what they say in their own documents. Federal forests in our National Parks and Wilderness Areas have not been harvested when they have burned. For example, MILLIONS of commercially valuable trees burned in the 1988 fires in the western part of Yosemite National Park. Those areas are quite visible from every highway going into Yosemite Valley. 17 years later, there's still not much regeneration of the native species and snags continue to fall, building big piles of forest fuels waiting for the next inevitable fire. Yes, it's "natural" and I have no problem with letting that area recover on its own. I've also been seeing non-commercial fuels projects in the unburned areas adjacent to those fires. Is this appropriate, given that National Parks should be left alone, in many people's minds? Of course, people like to bring up the Yellowstone fires but, those areas "naturally" burn at high-intensity on a regular basis, with a quick recovery. You cannot apply that to ponderosa pine forests, which "naturally" burn at low intensity. Again, site specific treatments are needed to restore stands which are in an "unnatural" condition. When my original question is answered, we can move on to more constructive discussions but, otherwise, the "preservationists" will continue to lose cases in court. Oh, and one more thing. I meant to say that I don't get paid to post here. This is just a fun thing I do to, hopefully, bring the extreme viewpoints closer to the middle. Please don't label me when you don't know (and don't care) about my educated viewpoint. I've "been there and done that" and either confirmed or rejected many, many policies and laws, in my own mind. I wouldn't have rejected the SAF and joined the Forest Stewards Guild if I didn't love our forests. Check out their concepts and goals, people. Thanks for the kind words, Moon Hotfeet> Homepage:: http://foreststewardsguild.org Direct harvest to plantations 12.06.2005 - 16:26 Well, one thing for sure is that a lot of environmental groups are not pushing for zero cut. For example, Alternative Three of the Middle East Fork Fuels Reduction Project here in Montana was created by a coalition of enviro groups. It calls for some commercial logging, and provides jobs, while focusing work in the WUI and Community Protection Zone. But the agency wants to log 4000 acres of unmanaged old growth forests as well. It is very true, that this while thing boils down to money. Many enviro groups are trying to direct harvest toward previously logged areas, especially those that were replanted. We have all heard the stats about how little old growth remains standing, and most of that on public land. We know that in Oregon the Wolverine, Pacific Fischer, Spotted Owl, Great Grey Owl and many more species than I could name are almost gone or declinging. So if the intention of the Forest Service and the timber industry, is in line with Forest Restoration, why do they not simply take the path of least reistance, away from the mountains of evidence that say we should stay out of roadless areas and old growth forests. Away from the overwhelming public opinion that wants old growth preserved. So what that 96% of the Biscuit fire area is being left alone. Isn't the 4% being logged part of the tiny fraction of unlogged forest that remains. And it we are spending our time in LSR's and old growth forests logging, then who is working to improve the condition in these heavily roaded areas with plantations and terraced slopes. In my opinion, to not focus on these areas, that have all ready been degraded by management, is the real failure in Forestry. Biodiversity is highest in the understory, and these dense tree farms shade out the understory. Interlocking canopies cause lower branches to die, a wonderful recipe for a quick moving fire storm. By deffinition, a Forester should return to the same stand to work over and over, just like a farmer, working the same fields over and over. To continue reaching for the old growth trees that are a public resource is not really Forestry at all, it is simply robbing the bank. It is the farmer depleting his soil and deciding to plow into the neighboring National Wildlife Refuge. I do not know if commercial forestry is OK for public lands because I have never seen it without corporate dominance. But I will say, that the big picture is being missed, for the people and for the lands. Cultural preservation of the PNW lies in preservation of biodiversity and all wilderness that remains. This is priceless. old growth stands> experience pays 12.06.2005 - 21:40 Hotfoot asks: What is wrong with restoring "natural" stocking levels and "natural" species composition to our National Forests under "Healthy Forests"? I think that it is a noble task, but commercial logging is rarely the tool to accomplish this. In a perfect world - one without timber interests always taking more - the utilization of restoration byproducts would make sense. Biscuit is not restoration, the FS admits its, so it is sort of a red herring in this venue. I do have a couple question for Hotfoot - How do you know what is "natural"? How do know what species, in what densities - over space and time - was natural historically in a given place? Do bulldozers and chainsaws help best emulate natural disturbances, or does prescribed fire and pile and burning do a better job? Is high intesity fire natural in knobcobe pine, chapparal and ridges natural? What is more altered from its historic range, national forests, or the millions of acres of private industrial land operated with short rotation forestry, pesticides and plantations? Somethin to chew on. 5% left> "Commercial" logging? 15.06.2005 - 06:37 People need to adjust their idea of "commercial" logging. I've worked on timber sales that log trees mostly in the 9-18" dbh size that clog the understory and steal precious water from old growth trees that never had to develop deep root systems. Yes, those size trees are quite merchantable and mills will make products out of them. Depending on the amounts of this timber in the different sizes, there may or may not be some larger trees needed to entice bidders. These larger trees are usually in the 18-22" size but can run up to 29" dbh, under the CASPO guidelines (BTW, this applies to Sierra Nevada sales). Any of the larger sized trees will be the ones in the poorest health, form and almost always a weedy white fir or incense cedar. That being said, these kinds of sales accomplish several goals at once. Fuel levels are reduced, more water is available for the biggest and best trees that remain, crowns are seperated without reducing canopy closure below recommended levels while habitat for endangered owls and goshawks are definitely improved. PLUS, people seems to like these stands that are open underneath with towering trees shading the entire area. Streams are well-protected with adequate buffers and logging slash is completely removed. What is there to not like? "Natural" can be "interpolated" from historical accounts and verified using science by adjusting stocking levels according to rainfall averages. In order to restore stocking level across all size classes, trees in all those classes must be removed and those need to be utilized rather than left as firewood that will heat our atmosphere. There is no worries about depleting soils, as the remaining trees will certainly provide ample material to replenish what they take. These areas in timber sales will be ready for a regular program of "natural" fire and superior trees can once again become the huge old growth that all of us stand in awe of. You people may enjoy vast towering snag patches but most Americans don't. Most of our forests are in an "unnatural" condition and man has to intervene. The West is in a gigantic slow motion natural disaster that is definitely man-caused. Don't you think we have a moral obligation to "fix" as much as we can before it's all gone?? I want what you want but you disagree on the methods. I'm the one in the forest everyday and I do see the big picture, having worked in CA, OR, MT, ID, OK, AR, WY, SD and SC on timber projects. Hotfeet> Homepage:: http://www.foreststewardsguild.org