Primal Nature: Updates

In a report entitled Evidence for a Recent Increase in Forest Growth, Sean M. McMahon, Geoffrey G. Parker, and Dawn R. Miller document an increase in the rate of growth of fifty-five mixed hardwood plots at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, 2600 acres on the . . . For more, click here.

The Nova Scotia Natural Resources Minister, John MacDonell, announced February 17 that the province has bought 9710 acres (3900 hectares) of land from Wagner Forest Nova Scotia Ltd. The parcels include: For more, click here ,

Two items in the news underscore the importance of connectivity for preserving wildlife as the climate changes . . .

The Ecological Society of America (ESA) released a position statement: Ecosystem Management in a Changing Climate at . . .

The Wildlands Project has released a report by Barbara Dugelby, titled Climate Disruption and Connectivity: Toward a Strategy. . .

In an opinion piece published by Yale 360, Rob Young and Orrin Pilkey, authors of The Rising Sea, explain that planners need to assume . . .

In April and November 2009 Tom Kenney, Rob Messick, Hal Morgan, and Kenyon Kelly located a new (or additional) big tree area . . .

We are pleased to report the publication of Ontario's Old-Growth Forests: A Guidebook Complete with History, Ecology, and Maps by Michael Henry and Peter Quinby. The book includes directions to fifty-nine old-growth sites throughout the province and contains more than 180 color photographs as well as 55 color maps. An introductory chapter discusses old growth forest in general. Each subsequent chapter presents a type of forest, with introductory material on the history and ecology of that type in Ontario and accounts of individual sites. It concludes with a glossary, bibliography and resources, and a list of GPS coordinates. The book is available from the publisher Fitzhenry and Whiteside A companion web site www.oldgrowth.ca will post updates to the book and gives advice on finding and reporting new sites.

12/07/09 Senate Bill 2747 on Funding for Land and Water Conservation Needs Support

Senate Bill 2747, the Land and Water Conservation Authorization and Funding Act of 2009, would amend the Land and Water Conservation Fund Act of 1965 to ensure that money in the fund each year is spent for conservation. In the past other types of projects have absorbed much of the money. The bill would provide a permanent funding source for National Parks, National Forests, National Wildlife Refuges, and other public lands and make possible grants to state and local governments for parks and recreation. It was introduced November 6 by Senator Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico and in early December was under consideration by the Energy and Natural Resources Committee.

Coastal habitats such as mangrove forests, sea grass meadows, and tidal salt marshes, sequester up to fifty times more carbon per hectare than is sequestered by tropical forests, according to an article by Emily Pidgeon: "Carbon Sequestration by Coastal Marine Habitats: Important Missing Sinks," published by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature. The coastal marine plants store carbon throughout their life cycles, most of it in sediments where it may remain for thousands of years. Forests occupy a far larger geographical area than do coastal habitats, so the fact that coastal habitats are valuable for carbon storage does not decrease the importance of preserving forests. However, coastal habitats are an often overlooked factor in slowing climate change, and are not sufficiently protected. Twenty percent of mangroves, for example, have been lost in the last thirty years, she points out. We should add that both mangrove swamps and boreal forest (see below) include significant areas of primary forest.

Jeremy Hance. "Coastal Habitats May Sequester 50 Times More Carbon Than Tropical Forests by Area." Mongabay.com . November 16, 2009.

Emily Pidgeon. "Carbon Sequestration by Coastal Marine Habitats: Important Missing Sinks," in The Management of Natural Coastal Carbon Sinks, ed. Dan Laffoley and Gabriel Grimsditch. International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). November 2009.

A report by Matt Carlson, Jeff Wells, and Dina Roberts, The Carbon the World Forgot: Conserving the Capacity of Canada's Boreal Forest Region to Mitigate and Adapt to Climate Change, draws on scientific studies to conclude that "the global boreal region is the world's largest terrestrial carbon storehouse, containing almost twice as much carbon per unit area as tropical forests." The carbon in the boreal region is stored in the surface vegetation but also and to a much greater extent in the associated soils, permafrost deposits, wetlands, and peat lands. Disturbing the boreal forest vegetation or soils releases carbon. Conserving the boreal forests contributes both to reducing the rate of climate change and to minimizing its adverse effects.

Canada is leading the way in conservation of boreal forests, as the federal and provincial governments have protected over 125 million acres since 2001. Other nations need to follow its initiative, and international policies on climate change need to take into account scientific knowledge of the importance of the boreal region. "Accounting for all anthropogenic impacts to forest and peatland carbon should be mandatory, and biotic carbon projects should be required to have a positive or neutral effect on biodiversity and ecosystem services," the authors state. The report was released by the Boreal Songbird Initiative, a Canadian organization.

In the article "Wilderness Conservation in an Era of Global Warming and Invasive Species: a Case Study from Minnesota's Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness," published in Natural Areas Journal (29:385-393), Lee E. Frelich and Peter B. Reich present the need for conservationists, land managers, and scientists to face the threats to wilderness and systematically design strategies for dealing with them. The threats, which include climate change, non-native earthworms, insect pests, invasive trees, and an overabundance of deer can be expected to result in tremendous changes to eastern forests. The authors, in fact, go so far as to state that "the current human generation is likely to witness the end of the existing forest types in the BWCAW (and indeed the last remnants of the pre-European settlement forest throughout eastern North America). . . ." The regulations under which wildernesses are administered will likely need to be changed to respond to the threats, they point out. Preventing invasive trees like European Buckthorn from completely taking over a forest may, for instance, necessitate cutting trees, where all cutting is currently forbidden. Nevertheless, they conclude that, through the forthcoming changes, "wilderness areas like the BWCAW will continue to play a role of primary importance as potential reservoirs of biodiversity and as references and controls to be compared to the rest of the planet where extraction of resources controls ecosystem function."

This writer found a sad illustration of Lee Frelich's and Peter Reich's comment about the end of "pre-European settlement forest" in eastern North America when she walked the Memorial Loop Trail in Nantahala National Forest's Joyce Kilmer Wilderness this past weekend. The towering hemlocks, which are the most distinctive feature of the area, had lost virtually all their leaves due to the ravages of the Hemlock Wooly Adelgid. The trees were still standing but dead branches lay on the ground. The change has been rapid. The couple who invited us to visit the Wilderness with them had been to the site only a year or two ago. At that time the trees had been clothed in green, giving the area a completely different appearance.

The title of an article released online by Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment asks a question: "Will environmental changes reinforce the impact of global warming on the prairie-forest border of central North America?" In the text authors L. E. Frelich and P. B. Reich answer their question in the affirmative. Global warming is expected to shift the border between prairie and forest north eastwards, with prairie and savannah replacing forests. The change will be magnified by a variety of environmental factors including an increase in droughts, fires, and windstorms, invasive exotic plants and animals, and increases in the populations of deer and non-native earthworms. Land managers will be faced with such questions as whether to try to halt the change or to facilitate the shift to prairie or savannah. The article, which is to be published in the paper version of the journal in 2009, is available now at http://forestecology.cfans.umn.edu/index.html

R. Bruce Allison, adjunct professor of Forest and Wildlife Ecology at the University of Wisconsin, is trying to develop a non-destructive technique for studying a living tree's internal structure. He would like to replace the boring of trees to determine their ring patterns, with portable x-ray computer tomography scanning, as practiced in medicine. The chief difficulty is creating a scanning instrument portable enough to carry into a forest. At present he and his cross-disciplinary team of researchers are viewing, at the Wisconsin Institute of Medical Research, log samples from a Bristlecone Pine that was felled as the result of a fire at a visitor center in California.

Source: "WI Researchers Study Bristlecone Pine," in Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, The Wisconsin Urban Forestry Insider, August 28, 2009.

8/15/09 Letters Needed to Support Expansion of Wilderness in Adirondack State Park

The Adirondack Park Agency is considering proposals to expand Five Ponds Wilderness and Round Lake Wilderness and in the process link the two; to eliminate float planes on Lows Lake; to establish a new canoe route into Five Ponds Wilderness; and to declare certain waters as wilderness. The area in question is in St. Lawrence and Hamilton Counties in the northwestern portion of the park. Five Ponds Wilderness, as presently designated, contains the largest known contiguous area of unlogged forest in the Northeast. Managing adjacent areas as wilderness would enhance the ecological and the recreational value of the area and would be a step in creating a future 410,000-acre Bob Marshall Great Wilderness. Letters should be sent by US mail or fax to Richard Weber, Assistant Planning Director, Adirondack Park Agency, PO Box 99, Ray Brook NY 12977, and must be received by the agency by 5 pm, August 28. For further information go to the Web sites of the Adirondack Council and the Adirondack Park Agency.

7/15/09 Petition for Designation of Kittatinny-Shawangunk National Raptor Migration Corridor

A group of wildlife biologists and natural resource professionals, with the backing of numerous agencies, conservation organizations, companies, and individuals, has submitted a formal petition to US Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar asking him to designate a Kittatinny-Shawangunk National Raptor Migration Corridor. The proposed corridor stretches 250 miles along the Kittatinny-Shawangunk Ridge and encompasses 2,2126,000 acres in parts of New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. Sixteen species of raptors use the corridor along with butterflies and other migrating species. Designation would not change any local, state, or national laws or regulations or involve any land purchases. It would, however, call attention to and strengthen conservation projects in the area and complement local land-planning initiatives. For more information go to www.raptorcorridor.org .

The establishment of a 2.5 million acre Ancient Forest National Park, stretching from the Rogue River in Oregon to the Trinity River in California has been proposed.. The park would allow the entire area to be administered to protect the ancient forest it harbors and would allow plants and animals to move freely as they attempt to adjust to climate change. The park would encompass a strip of wild land twenty to forty miles wide, which includes established wilderness areas, designated critical wildlife habitat, and unprotected roadless areas. Very little private land is within the proposed area. For more information go to www.ancientforestnationalpark.org .

The Adirondack Park Agency has released the 2009 Adirondack Park Official Map showing state and private land-use plans. The map shows recent state land acquisitions including Round Lake Wilderness Area, Madawasca Flow-Quebec Brook Primitive Area, and the Raquette-Jordan Boreal Primitive Area. The previous revision of the land-use map was released in 2003. Adirondack Park encompasses six million areas of state and privately-owned land. The map can be accessed at <http://www.apa.state.ny.us/gis/index,.html>.

3/27/09 Big Wilson Stream Forest (now Elliottsville Old Growth Forest) to be Preserved in Maine

Forester Roger Merchant sent us the following excellent news: "Alan Hutchinson with the Forest Society of Maine just informed me that LURC has secured and assured a “no harvest” designation for the entire 260 acre Elliottsville Old Growth Forest [Piscatquis County], and Plum Creek has agreed to these conditions which are part of the larger conservation easement negotiations. Apparently the Maine Natural Areas Program and other forest conservation interests were instrumental in assuring protection and preservation of this unique old growth forest."

January 15 the U.S. Senate passed, 73-21, the Omnibus Public Lands Management Act (S. 22), which would designate over two million acres of wilderness and includes sixteen wilderness bills from nine states. The two million acres include land in three eastern states: more than 37,000 acres in West Virginia's Monongahela National Forest (see http://www.wvwild.org); almost 40,000 acres in Virginia's Jefferson National Forest (see http://www.virginiawilderness.org); and over 11,000 acres within Michigan's Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore along Lake Superior (described at http://www.nps.gov/piro/ ). The legislation also establishes new National Scenic Areas in Jefferson National Forest and designates Taunton River in Massachusetts as Wild and Scenic. The Public Lands Act was passed by the U.S. House of Representatives March 25. President Obama is expected to sign the act shortly. Our thanks to those of you who lobbied for this major piece of legislation.

Arne Naess, Norwegian philosopher, writer, and mountaineer died in his sleep January 12 at the age of 96. He is important to many of us as the founder of the concept of deep ecology, a biocentric point of view, in which humans and wildlife--plants and animals--are part of a complex web of life in which all parts are of equal importance. D. H. Lawrence expressed this view in his essay "Pan in America." "What can a man do with his life but live it? And what does life consist in, save a vivid relatedness between the man and the living universe that surrounds him? Yet man insulates himself more and more into mechanism . . . ." May Arne Naess' influence continue and grow.

The Arc of Appalachia Preserve System has instituted an Appalachian Forest School to offer ecology, natural history, and stewardship courses on America's temperate forests. The courses will include field trips to explore selected wilderness areas. The first wilderness field trip will be to the Florida Panhandle, March 12-17. The system's first preserve was the Highlands Nature Sanctuary founded in 1995 in the Rocky Fork Gorge region of southern Ohio. The system now works in ten other preserve regions along the Arc of Appalachia and is based on volunteer grass roots efforts. For information on the preserve system and on the offerings of the Appalachian Forest School go to http://www.highlandssanctuary.org .

The Louisiana Chapter of The Nature Conservancy and Weyerhaeuser have agreed upon a conservation easement for 322 acres of Longleaf Pine . . .

Barry and Carolyn Knapp have donated a conservation easement on 430 acres of their Loess Hills farm to the Iowa chapter of The Nature Conservancy. The acreage, which will be protected from development and gravel mining, connects the Conservancy's 3187-acre Broken Kettle Grasslands Preserve to the Big Sioux River. Broken Kettle, which provides habitat for the prairie rattlesnake and a host of other wildlife, is the largest contiguous native prairie in the state. The Conservancy reintroduced bison to the preserve in October. Rising above the Missouri Valley, the Loess Hills are formed of windblown silt. The Knapps have placed conservation easements on a total of 2300 acres.

Sources: The Nature Conservancy [Magazine], winter 2008, p. 67; and the Web site of The Nature Conservancy.

In September Governor David Paterson signed into law the Bruce S. Kershner Old Growth Forest Preservation and Protection Act, which protects from logging, old-growth forests on state land outside the State Forest Preserve, where old growth is already protected. The act defines old growth as land at least ten acres in extent, which includes "an abundance of late successional tree species, at least one hundred eighty to two hundred years of age in a contiguous forested landscape that has evolved and reproduced itself naturally, with the capacity for self perpetuation, arranged in a stratified forest structure consisting of multiple growth layers throughout the canopy and forest floor, featuring canopy gaps formed by natural disturbances creating an uneven canopy and a conspicuous absence of multiple stemmed trees and coppices." The state owns some 900,000 acres of land outside the Forest Preserve. Bruce Kershner whom the law honors, worked tirelessly to identify and protect old growth..

Brian Nearing, "New Law Safeguards Ancient Trees," Times Union [Albany], September 13, 2008.

The foliage in the Northeast this fall was spectacular, with maples in brilliant red and gold, but an infestation of Longhorned Beetles . . .

A team of scientists headed by Don Cameron, ecologist with the Maine Natural Areas Program, has examined Big Wilson Stream Forest in Piscataquis County, Maine (see Alert 5/16/08 below) and confirmed that it is, as forester Roger Merchant had suggested, a late successional forest with little sign of past management--only a "few rotting cut stumps in several limited areas and a small pile of debris." Cameron describes the upland portion of the 360-acre forest as "an exemplary Spruce-Northern Hardwoods Forest Natural Community" and the floodplain portion as a "Hardwood River Terrace Forest, a rare natural community type." Plum Creek Timber Company, which owns the floodplain forest and 215 acres of the upland forest, has taken the forest off its logging schedule, and there is hope that, now that the forest's condition has been formally evaluated, conservationists will purchase it. (See additional details in the Maine chapter of the Old Growth in the East.)

Sources: Don Cameron, Maine Natural Areas Program. "Big Wilson Stream Forest," A Summary Report, July 14, 2008.

Roger Merchant, University of Maine Cooperative Extension, Personal Communication.

A study published under the above title in the journal Nature suggests that old-growth forests generally absorb more carbon dioxide than they give off. Researchers from six nations, who studied 519 different plots, found that forests continue to sequester carbon for many centuries. When individual trees die, shorter trees, which have waited for greater access to light, replace them and maintain productivity. Logging the forests causes an increase in the release of carbon dioxide for five to twenty years, until re-growth is sufficiently mature to take in more carbon than it gives off. The study is based in part on data from the AmeriFlux and CarboEurope programs.

Beverly Law of Oregon State University, director of the AmeriFlux Network states, "If you are concerned about offsetting greenhouse gas emissions and look at old forests from nothing more than a carbon perspective, the best thing to do is leave them alone." The article concludes:: "Because old-growth forests steadily accumulate carbon for centuries, they contain vast quantities of it. They will lose much of this carbon to the atmosphere if they are disturbed, so carbon accounting rules for forests should give credit for leaving old-growth forest intact."

Sources: Sebastiaan Luyssaert et al., "Old-Growth Forests as Global Carbon Sinks," Nature 455 (11 Sept. 2008): 213-15; and "Old Growth Forests Are Valuable Carbon Sinks," EurekAlert!, Oregon State University, September 10, 2006.

The Flomaton Natural Area, a fifty-eight acre tract of never-logged Longleaf Pine, with trees more than 300 years old, was clear cut . . .

The question as to whether the green fields of Kentucky’s horse country were preceded by closed-canopy forest or by savanna has been convincingly answered by Ryan McEwan and Brian McCarthy . . .

June 24, 2008 the State of Florida and U.S. Sugar reached a tentative agreement under which the State will buy the company and all its assets, including 292 square miles of farmland, for $1.75 billion. U.S. Sugar's land lies between Lake Okeechobee and the Everglades. If the deal goes through as it is expected to do, the state will protect the land from development and will construct on it a network of reservoirs and marshes to collect and purify water and direct it south to the Everglades. U.S. Sugar's land is not all contiguous. Exchanges with other companies will have to be arranged to consolidate the state's holdings. The company will be able to continue farming the land for six years in order to meet current contracts. The deal was made possible in part by the fact that the sugar industry in the United States has been suffering financially because of imports of sugar. For a perceptive commentary on the purchase see "Deal Recalls Big, Bold Roots of Conservation," by Emily Badger in the online Miller-McCune Magazine, July 31, 2008, <http://www.miller-mccune.com/article/540>.

Ironically and sadly a few days before the agreement was announced a researcher who would have been thrilled by the news was killed in the crash of a small plane. David Maehr, a conservation biologist and associate professor at the University of Kentucky died while making an aerial survey of black bears in Highlands County, Florida. He was serving as a visiting scientist at Archbold Biological Station in Lake Placid during a sabbatical from the university. He cared deeply about protecting Florida's bears and panthers and had in the past worked to protect the panther for the Florida Game and Fresh Water Fish Commission.

Sources: Brian Skoloff, "Florida Buys Part of Everglades," Lexington Herald-Leader, June 25, 2008 and Jillian Ogawa," Plane Crash Kills UK Professor," Lexington Herald-Leader, June 22, 2008.

Michigan legislators have filed the Beaver Basin Wilderness bill, which would set aside as Wilderness 11,739 acres at Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore. Establishment of the Beaver Basin Wilderness is one of the components of the general management plan for the Park, which was decided upon in 2004. So far this year only one Wilderness bill has passed Congress and been signed into law, the Wild Sky Wilderness Act for Washington State.

Sources: The Wilderness Society, Wilderness Report #215; and The Mining Journal, May 15, 2008.

5/21/08 Alert: Prevent Development of Back Country in Nantahala National Forest

The Western North Carolina Alliance asks readers to help prevent development in the now-intact Fires Creek Watershed in Nantahala National Forest, North Carolina. Developers planning to construct houses on a fifty-acre inholding, have asked for permission to access the site by road. The US Forest Service is currently considering the proposal for a road. According to the Alliance, the scoping notice falsely implies that Phillips Ridge Trail already provides road access almost to the inholding. Phillips Ridge Trail, the Alliance says, is just what its name implies, a trail for hikers and horseback riders. The trail is too close to creeks to be suitable for cars, and trying to allow it to carry cars would require major construction. The watershed is a treasure, with a trail system allowing multi-day hikes away from roads and with relatively intact streams, harboring rare aquatic species. Comments can be sent, before June 6, to Steve Lohr, District Ranger, Tusquitee District, 123 Woodland Drive, Murphy, NC 28906 or by e-mail to <comments-southern-north-carolina-nantahala-tusquitee@fs.fed.us> . For further information, call Ryan Griffin of the Alliance at 828-258-8737 .

5/16/08, rev. 6/8/08 Alert: Preserve Threatened Old Growth in Northern Maine

Maine forester, Roger Merchant, reports that Plum Creek Timber Company plans to log an isolated, likely old-growth, forest north of Big Wilson Falls in Piscataquis County this summer. The forest is more than 220 acres in extent and includes White Pine, Northern White-Cedar, maple, and hemlock well over 200 years in age. There are no signs of logging, Merchant reports. The land is located on the east side of Big Wilson Stream, north of Camp XII and south of the AT corridor. To reach the old growth, Plum Creek plans to construct a temporary bridge across Big Wilson from the south side adjacent to Big Wilson Cliffs. Plum Creek owns more forest in the United States than any other company, and may be responsive to public pressure because of concerns about its image. To help save the old growth write to Rick Holley, President and CEO of Plum Creek, 999 Third Avenue, Suite 4300, Seattle, WA 98104 or call Plum Creek (1-800-858-5347). [For the positive outcome, go to 9/16/08 and 3/27/09 above.]

To acquire cypress trees for mulch, timber companies logged 80,000 acres of cypress forest in Louisiana in six years. Because of the work of members of the Save Our Cypress (www.saveourcypress.org), the logging has been reduced to "a trickle," . . . .

Neil Pederson will teach a course in the Ecology of Old-Growth Forests at Eastern Kentucky University in Richmond, Kentucky, in the fall of 2008. The course will be held Wednesday evenings from 6:00 to 7:50 pm and will carry two semester-hours of credit.. Neil is dedicating it to the memory of Robert Zahner. A skeleton syllabus is posted at <http://people.eku.edu/pedersonn/classes/ecoOGfor/>.

Southwestern Florida has considerable old growth, in particular in Audubon's Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary, Fakahatchee Strand State Preserve, and Big Cypress National Preserve. It also provides habitat for endangered wood storks and endangered Florida panthers, among other wildlife. The area’s streams, wet prairies, and wet woodlands and forests . . .

The North Carolina Wildlife Federation will present its Conservationist of the Year Award to Rob Messick . . .

January 29 the West Virginia Congressional delegation introduced legislation to protect as Wilderness 47,000 acres in Monongahela National Forest. The Wild Monongahela Act would expand the existing Dolly Sods, Cranberry and Otter Creek Wilderness Areas and create four new areas: Spice Run (7124 acres, currently accessible only by boat on the Greenbrier River), Cheat Mountain (7955 acres, including the high falls of the Cheat River and accessible by train), Big Draft (5242 acres), and Roaring Plains West (6820 acres). The Monongahela encompasses a total of 919,000 acres, of which 78,041 are currently designated as wilderness. The West Virginia Wilderness Coalition hopes that additional acreage, in particular the Seneca Creek Backcountry, Roaring Plains East and North, and the East Fork of the Greenbrier will be added to the bill before it passes. For further information see the Coalition's web site: http://www.wvwild.org .

In an article in Geographical Review Susy Svatek Ziegler presents the vegetation history of steep slopes west of Noonmark . . .

The Appalachian Regional Reforestation Initiative (ARRI) is bringing hope that former strip mines in Appalachia can be restored to healthy forest. An estimated 300,000 hectares of land in the Eastern United States on which mature forests . . .

National Public Radio's All Things Considered reported New Year's Eve on a study of the carbon dioxide flux at Harvard Forest in Petersham, Massachusetts. Researchers have found that the oldest portion of the forest, which was used as a woodlot but never clear cut and which includes trees three hundred years old, removes from the air one ton of carbon dioxide per acre per year. Younger stands elsewhere in the forest capture even more carbon dioxide. Surprisingly the carbon dioxide that is removed from the air is not all stored in the trees; apparently half goes into the soil. Researchers do not know why carbon dioxide goes into the soil, researcher Steven Wofsy told NPR. They also do not know whether this and other forests will continue to sequester carbon indefinitely or will begin releasing it. In recent years the rate of capture has increased.

A report by Josh Kelly on 891 acres of contiguous primary forest on Laurel Knob in Pisgah National Forest has been added to our examples of old growth. Josh Kelly and colleagues mapped Laurel Knob in the summer of 2006. The account is illustrated by photographs by Kelly, Dan Entmacher and Tom Kenney.

As 2007 draws to a close, the Wilderness Society has compiled the status of pending Wilderness legislation. Most bills concern the western United States, but legislation on Virginia and Georgia is also before Congress. The Virginia Ridge and Valley Act (see our April 25, 2007 posting) was passed by the House, but is still in the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. The Chattahoochee National Forest Act of 2007 (H.R. 707) (see our August 13, 2006 posting) is still in the House Natural Resources Subcommittee on National Parks, Forests, and Public Lands and the House Agriculture Subcommittee on Department Operations, Oversight, Nutrition and Forestry., 2007

The state of Massachusetts announced July 5 that it has purchased the nine-hundred-acre Spectacle Pond Farm in Sandisfield, Berkshire County. The land connects two other state-owned conservation lands, Otis State Forest to the north and the Clam River Flood Protection area to the south. The land is part of what is known as the New Marlborough Forest Block, 82,000 acres that has few roads and that has undergone relatively little other anthropogenic disruption. The farm includes fifteen to twenty acres of old-growth forest, largely hemlock; and the sixty-two-acre Lower Spectacle Pond, one of only two large ponds in the Berkshires that have an undeveloped shoreline and that were, until the purchase, unprotected. It has been the subject of a family dispute. Certain family members sold half the farm to the Massachusetts Audubon Society last December; other family members sold the balance of the land to a developer. The state, which had been wanting to purchase the land for at least twenty-five years, then stepped in and obtained the entire farm from the two parties for a total of $5.2 million.

Wangness, Lisa. "A Swath of Berkshires' Past Saved for Future." Boston Globe, July 6, 2007.

At Fernbank Forest on International Bird Migration Day, May 12, bird watchers spotted or heard twenty-nine bird species, none of them just passing through although many of them came to the site only for the summer. The sixty-five acre mesic-hardwood, old-growth forest in metropolitan Atlanta is an official banding location, but the number of migratory birds being netted and banded there is dropping. In 1995, ornithologists banded 140 birds; in 2006, only 22. The birds passing through this year have included the Veery and Swainson's Thrush and the Tennessee and Blackpoll Warblers. As for summer visitors, a Wood Thrush has come to the same area of Fernbank from South America for several summers. The biologist who led the bird walk in May pointed out that Wood Thrushes return to the very same tree each year. Thus logging severely impacts them. She suggested that people leave ten to twenty feet of trunk to provide nesting places for bluebirds and other species if they must cut a tree. The article on Fernbank, in fact, has much the same theme as the cover story in the July-August Audubon magazine: "Common Birds in Decline . . and How You Can Help."

Davis, Mary Byrd, Old Growth in the East: A Survey, available online in the supporter’s portion of this web site.

Shelton, Stacy. "All Aflutter at Fernbank: Watchers Look Out for Migratory Birds." Atlanta Journal-Constitution, May 13, 2007, p. 1D.

Six U.S. scientists, led by James Hansen, director of Nasa's Goodard Institute for Space Studies, have published a paper in Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society arguing that human-caused emissions of carbon dioxide could produce a dramatic flip in climate that would raise sea levels as much as several meters by 2100. Intense, planet-wide, efforts to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases within the next decade are essential if we are to prevent the destruction of the natural world as we know it and of civilization, the scientists state. Thoroughly documented, "Climate Change and Trace Gases" implicitly criticizes the United Nation's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change for underestimating the likelihood and the results of the melting of glaciers and polar ice sheets in the twenty-first century. The report, with an abstract, are available through the Goddard Institute's Web site: http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/abstracts/2007/Hansen_etal_2.html .

Sources: Steve Connor, "The Earth Today Stands in Imminent Peril," The Independent (UK), June 1, 2007 and the report itself.

Minnesota Point, which juts out into Lake Superior, is the longest freshwater sandbar in North America. On the eastern end is an old-growth forest with Red and White Pines and Paper Birch, varied shrubs, and a herbaceous layer, which includes rare ferns belonging to the genus Botrychium. Eighteen acres of the forest are preserved as the Minnesota Point Pine Forest Scientific and Natural Area (SNA). Unfortunately, the city of Duluth's Sky Harbor Airport, which serves seaplanes and other small planes, is also on the point.

According to regulations of the Federal Aviation Administration and the Minnesota Department of Transportation, some one hundred or more old trees at the southern end of the airport runway, many of them in the SNA, need to be cut to clear a safety zone. Old pines have been cut at the site in the past. Logging impacts the "dynamic between the shifting sands and the winds and the vegetation," Steve Wilson of the state's Department of Natural Resources, has pointed out. Furthermore, the area is important for migrating songbirds; and removing vegetation and adding lights will likely impact them.

Because of the protests of conservationists and others, the logging is on hold, while ways to preserve the natural features of the area but make the airport safe are under discussion. John Myers of the Duluth News-Tribune says that the "options include a variance from FAA, moving runway or cutting trees."

Myers, John. "Effort Under Way to Save Trees, Meet Safety Regs," Duluth News-Tribune (MN), January 25, 2007.

Old Growth Threatened in the Daniel Boone National Forest

In the Redbird District of the Daniel Boone National Forest (Clay and Leslie Counties), the US Forest Service intends to log forty-five acres that the agency itself in an action notice identified as Possible Old Growth (POG). The logging will take place as part of a 1459-acre logging project, which will include building five miles of road. M, embers of Kentucky Heartwood hiked to the POG and found slow-growing, dry forest with trees 100 to 125 years old on steep hillsides. USFS wants to convert the area to early successional habitat to support Ruffed Grouse.

Kentucky Heartwood has appealed the decision of USFS. The Redbird District was originally purchased to protect water sheds. Clay County has the highest level of poverty in Kentucky , and USFS has done little to inform residents of its logging project. Heartwood has therefore made environmental justice a basis for its appeal. For further information, contact Kentucky Heartwood, 606-780-1336; kyheartwood@alltel.net

Sources:

Kentucky Heartwood, Newsletter, Spring 1997.

Lovelace, Paul , Kentucky Heartwood. Personal communication.

Osborne, Doug , Kentucky Heartwood. Personal communication.

--Posted May 22, 2007

Zoar Valley : Protection and an Old-Growth Definition

The final management plan for state-owned land in Zoar Valley in western New York (Erie and Cattaraugus Counties) divides the Zoar Management Unit into two management areas: 1) a “’protection area’ comprised of the gorge and a 300’ buffer zone along the rim of both the north and south sides of the main gorge and east and west sides of the South Branch of Cattaraugus Creek” and 2) a Multiple Use Area, comprised of the balance of the unit. The New York Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC), which developed the management plan, promised to ask the state legislature to declare the protection area a Nature and Historic Preservation Trust, which would afford it the highest protection available for state land outside the Adirondacks and Catskills. Both areas will be managed for passive recreation. In the protected area trees will be cut only “to develop access for persons with disabilities, for hiking trails and for maintenance of parking lots.” The use of motorized vehicles “by the public” will be prohibited, “except for safety and emergency reasons.”

In the plan the DEC defines old growth forest. Old-growth forest, DEC states, is characterized by the combination of certain factors, “including an abundance of late successional tree species, at least 180-200 years of age, in a contiguous forested landscape that has evolved and reproduced itself naturally, with the capacity for self perpetuation, arranged in a stratified forest structure . . ., featuring (1) canopy gaps formed by natural disturbances, creating an uneven canopy, and (2) a conspicuous absence of multiple stemmed trees and coppices.” Old-growth forests typically have (1) an irregular forest floor; (2) “show limited signs of human disturbance since European settlement; and (3) have distinct soil horizons . . . . “ They also have well developed and diverse herbaceous layers. This definition, it should be noted, does not equate old growth with primary forest, because of its requirement for old, late successional species and an uneven canopy. In a primary forest trees may all be young because of a natural disturbance regime.

DEC will use the definition to evaluate forest in Zoar Valley . The agency will also use the definition in future management plans. Bruce Kershner and colleagues identified 400 acres of old growth in the Zoar Valley Management Unit and an additional 250 acres on nearby private land.

Sources:

Bonfatti, John F., “State’s Final Plan Keeps Zoar Area Undisturbed” The Buffalo News, February 2, 2007 .

Davis, Mary Byrd, Old Growth in the East: A Survey, available online in the supporter’s portion of this web site.

New York Department of Environmental Conservation, Zoar Valley Multiple Use Area Unit Management Plan: Final, December 2006 (released February 1, 2007 ), pp. 19 and 26. --posted May 16, 2007

In searching a database for articles about old growth today, we were saddened to find obituaries of Bruce Kershner, who died February 16 of esophageal cancer, and Jim Jontz, who died April 14 of colon and liver cancer.

Bruce Kershner was a founding member of the New York Old-Growth Forest Association, an author or co-author of numerous books on old growth, including the Sierra Club Guide to Ancient Forests of the Northeast, which he co-authored with Robert Leverett, and an ardent discoverer and defender of old-growth forest. He played a key role in securing protection for numerous sites, including Zoar Valley in New York and Marcy's Woods in Ontario.

Jim Jontz served in the U.S. House of Representatives, where he fought for environmental causes, from 1986 to 1992. Protection for the old-growth forests of the Pacific Northwest and the East were among the issues on which he worked there. He later led a coalition of labor unions, environmentalists, and others working against the North American Free Trade Agreement. This writer can attest that without the encouragement of Jim Jontz the book of essays, Old-Growth Forests, Prospects for Rediscovery and Recovery , would likely never have been written. When we met at an eastern old-growth conference, he suggested that, using his name, I contact Island Press about their publishing a book on old growth. The press agreed to do so.

Bruce Kershner's and Jim Jontz's enthusiasm and leadership will be greatly missed.

"Bruce S. Kershner, Environmentalist, Nature Author." Buffalo News, February 18, 2007.

The battle by environmentalists to prevent mining under Dysart Woods in Belmont County, Ohio, has ended in defeat. The Seventh District Court of Appeals refused to overturn a mining permit granted to Ohio Valley Coal Company by the chief of the Division of Resources Management in 2003. The permit allows the company to conduct long wall mining to within 300 feet of the fifty-seven acre old-growth woods and to carry out room and pillar mining under the woods. The permit was appealed by Buckeye Forest Council, Dysart Defenders, and Chad Kister, who fear that the mining will cause a chronic water shortage and possibly subsidence. The deadline for filing a petition asking the Supreme Court to review the case has passed. The woods are owned by Ohio University, which did not appeal the permit.

Buckeye Forest Council, "Court Upholds Permit to Mine Ohio Ancient Forest," available online at <www.buckeyeforestcouncil.org>.

"Ohio Valley Coal Applauds Appeal Court Decision to Uphold Dysart Woods Permit," The U.S. Coal Review, March 12, 2007.

The U.S. Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee has before it a bill that, if passed, would designate as Wilderness or Wilderness Study Areas 43,000 acres, and as Scenic Areas, 12,000 acres of U.S. Forest Service Land in Virginia's Jefferson National Forest . The Virginia Ridge and Valley Act of 2007 (S. 570) was introduced February 17 by Senators John Warner and Jim Webb. Representative Rick Boucher introduced the same legislation in the House (HR 1011). The bills are the same as legislation unsuccessfully introduced in 2004. Two new Scenic Areas would be created, Seng Mountain and Bear Creek. The Kimberling Creek Potential Wilderness Area would be created for eventual incorporation in the Kimberling Creek Wilderness. For further information on other land included go to the Web site of the Southern Appalachian Forest Coalition. Progress of the bill in Washington can be followed on the GovTrack.us Web site.

Update: The U.S. House of Representatives passed the bill October 23, 2007. It is in committee still in the U.S. Senate.

Quang-Tuan Luong visited and photographed Congaree National Park in November 2006 as part of a project to publish a book on U.S. National Parks. Many of his photographs of the Congaree, which are spectacular, can be seen at his web site, <<http://www.terragalleria.com>> Luong, a native of France, came to the United States to study at the University of California at Berkeley in 1993. He was so attracted to the U.S. National Parks that he stayed in this country after finishing his work at Berkeley, in order to visit all of them. John Cely guided him through the Congaree.

Sources: Joey Holleman, "Nature Photographer Points His Lens at Congaree," The State [Columbia, S.C.], January 5, 2007; http://www.terragalleria.com/parks/np.congaree.html>>.

The Kentucky Old-Growth Society (a temporary name) will hold its first meeting June 15-16 at Pine Mountain State Resort Park in eastern Kentucky. Among the speakers will be Lee Frelich, Robert Leverett, and Neil Pedersonn. The conference will include a field trip. Sponsors include the Eastern Native Tree Society and the Kentucky State Nature Preserves. Everyone interested in old growth, whether living in Kentucky or not, is welcome to attend. Additional information can be found at http://people.eku.edu/pedersonn/kyOGentsmeet.html . This site will be updated as plans develop.

The Asian hemlock woolly adelgid has reached the one large area of old growth that has survived in Kentucky, the 2350-acre Blanton Forest in Harlan County. To determine the status of the infestation, the Kentucky State Nature Preserves Commission has asked hikers to volunteer to search for signs of the insects on February 24. The adelgid has reached a total of sixteen states, was first seen in the state last April. The adelgid kills hemlocks in five to ten years by gradually sucking the sap from trees. Kentucky has treated some infested trees with an insecticidal soap and with a chemical that was injected into the soil. Beetles that are being raised in laboratories to kill the adelgid are another possible means of defense. However, the state lacks the funding and the staff to treat all infected trees. Furthermore, the presence in Blanton Forest of the Blackside Dace (Phoxinus cumberlandensis) a species of fish listed as threatened by the US Fish and Wildlife Service, means that officials would have to be particularly careful not to use any tactics there that could harm aquatic life. Hemlocks in Blanton Forest have diameters of up to four feet and may be well over 100 feet in height. .

Source: Mead, Any. "Help Sought to Find Insect Threat to Trees." Lexington Herald-Leader, Feb. 23, 2007

The Natural Areas Association, in partnership with the Cleveland Museum of Natural History, will hold its 34th annual conference October 9-12, 2007, in Cleveland. The theme will be "preserving nature in a fragmented landscape." Abstracts of presentations for the conference must be submitted by April 2. For details go to www.naturalarea.org/conference.asp . The Cleveland Museum has an active program of land acquisition for preservation purposes,, and the conference field trips can be expected to be well worthwhile.

In non-profit circles, at least, the more things change the more remain the same. While visiting the Kentucky Fish and Wildlife Department's Salato Wildlife Education Center today, I came across a small exhibit on Kentucky old growth which included a letter from E. Lucy Braun as executive secretary of the Save Kentucky's Primeval Forest League. The League was inviting people to a "mass meeting" at the Phenix Hotel in downtown Lexington the afternoon of January 4, 1936. The letter explained that Kentucky's remaining primeval forest should be purchased and protected. In the exhibit, text accompanying the letter stated that the eminent biologist and her sister had organized the society after they found magnificent primeval forest in Perry County, Kentucky, that was threatened with logging. They received support from Governor Chandler and other prominent Kentuckians. Nevertheless, the organization did not succeed in saving the Kentucky forests it aimed to protect, and its name is now known only to historians. Braun did, however, assist the Ohio Chapter of The Nature Conservancy in developing the Edge of Appalachia Preserve System in Ohio, a system that is not only alive and well, but still growing.

The National Arbor Day Foundation has posted on the Web a map showing current hardiness zones and an animated map showing the shift of warm zones north between 1990 and 2006. Type www.arborday.org/media/zones.cfm into your browser.

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In "Old-Growth Forests Can Accumulate Carbon in Soils" Guoyi Zhou et al. present the results of their research on the top 20-cm of soil in old-growth forests in southern China between 1979 and 2003. During this period the concentration of soil organic carbon increased "from about 1.4% to 2.35% at an average rate of 0.035% each year." Scientists have taken for granted that the level of soil organic carbon in old-growth forests does not change. Guoyi Zhou et al.state that their research shows the need for further study of below-ground processes and their relation to climate change (Science, vol. 314, 1 December 2006, p. 1417). ( On the growth of trees in old growth, see below.)

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Louisana Preserve Increases in Size

Through a donation and a land purchase, The Nature Conservancy has increased the size of its Persimmon Gulley Preserve in southwestern Louisiana to almost eight hundred acres. The preserve is the site of a wet Longleaf Pine Savanna. Because the wetland is highly saline, the Longleaf are small, but the savanna exhibits old-growth characteristics, with mixed age classes and some trees three hundred years old.

Sources:

Nature Conservancy, vol. 56, no. 4, Winter 2006, p. 56.

Old Growth in the East: A Survey. Online edition. 2003-2006..

--posted November 29, 2006

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New England Wilderness Bill Passes House

November 15 the House of Representatives passed the New England Wilderness Act of 2006, which establishes 34,500 acres of wilderness in two parcels in New Hampshire and 42,000 acres in six parcels in Vermont. The 42,000 acres was a compromise. The bill as passed by the Senate would have set aside 48,000 acres of wilderness in Vermont. See "New England Wilderness Legislation on Hold" below. President Bush is expected to sign the legislation. A compromise based on a compromise, the bill is weaker than conservationists had initially hoped that it would be.

--posted November 19, 2006 _________________________________________________________________________________________

Growth in Old-Growth Forests

In a widely circulated op ed in the Washington Times, January 22, 2006, Patrick Moore, chairman of a company that assists the forest industry with public relations, stated, “Old growth forests often have a large ‘balance’ of carbon that has built up over time in wood and soil. They don’t add much new carbon because they decay at about the same rate they grow.” The implication of the article is that in terms of climate change we are better off planting fast-growing trees than preserving old-growth forests.

Neil Pederson has pointed out to us an article that provides a partial answer to Moore by furnishing data on growth in an old-growth forest. Researchers S. L. Galbraith and W. H. Martin found that at Lily Cornett Woods, an old-growth mixed mesophytic forest in southeastern Kentucky , mean density and mean basal area “significantly increased” between 1971 and 1992. Overstory density went from 284 to 347 trees per hectare and basal area from 26.4 to 29.9 m2 per hectare. The major factor in the increase in density was the “smallest overstory diameter-class (12.5-30.0 cm).” Pederson has observed through his own work in dendrochronology that tree age has little bearing on growth rates and that at present all classes of trees, including the old trees, are accelerating their growth.

Sources

Galbraith, S. L. and W. H. Martin. “Three Decades of Overstory and Species Change in a Mixed Mesophytic Forest in Eastern Kentucky .” Castanea, June 2005, pp. 115-128.

Moore, Patrick, Greenspirit Strategies, Ltd. “Forestry in the Name of Climate Change.” Washington Times, January 22, 2006 .

Pederson, Neil. Climatic Sensitivity and Growth of Southern Temperate Trees in the Eastern US: Implications for the Carbon Cycle. Ph.D. Thesis. Columbia University, New York, NY, 2005.

Pederson, Neil, Eastern Kentucky University. Lecture at the University of Kentucky's School of Forestry, November 8, 2006.

posted November 19, 2006

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Late-Successional Forest in Northern New England

Andrew Whitman and John Hagan at Mahomet Center for Conservation Sciences in Maine have developed an index that foresters can apply in less than half an hour “to quantify the degree to which a stand is in a late-successional condition. Writing of the forests of northern New England, they classify as late-successional, stands that contain “a dominant canopy cohort of trees between about 120 and 200 years of age” and as true old growth, stands around 200 years of age or older. The late successional stands have experienced logging, but exhibit some old-growth characteristics. Whitman and Hagan found that the most important indicator of late successional condition, is the density of large-diameter trees, living or dead. Another, less important indicator, is the presence of easily-identified lichens: Collema and Leptogium species for northern hardwoods and Usnea species for upland spruce-fir. Their index is thus based largely on the diameters of trees but also incorporates the lichens.

They developed the index in the hope that if foresters can recognize late successional stands, they will find ways to conserve them. They judged that as of 2004 when they developed the index, only 4-6% of the forest in northern Maine might be late-successional and that, because late successional stands have grown past their age of greatest financial value, they could be logged out of existence within five years. The situation has not improved..

The loss of the stands would mean a major loss in biodiversity, though scientists do not know enough about biodiversity in late-successional forest to list all the species that would disappear. Species that depend on large trees, living or dead, tend to be small, inconspicuous species such as lichens, mosses, fungi, and insects. Forest continuity, whether large trees have been present in the forest over a very long period of time, is key to the continued presence of these species. (See, under Wildlife Sidelights, “Previously Undescribed Species Reported in the Adirondacks ” for related research.) .

Sources:

Hagan, John M. and Andrew A. Whitman, “ Late-successional Forest : A Disappearing Age Class and Implications for Biodiversity” and Andrew A. Whitman and John M. Hagan, “A Rapid-Assessment Late-Successional Index for Northern Hardwoods and Spruce-Fir Forest” in Forest Mosaic Science Notes, May and December 2004, available at www.mahometmaine.org .

Whitman, Andrew A. Personal communication.

--posted November 3, 2006

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Boundary Waters Canoe Area Doomed?

Lee Frelich, director of the University of Minnesota ’s Center for Hardwood Ecology and an old-growth researcher, predicts that a combination of forces will devastate the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness (BWCA) and other forest along the Minnesota-Quebec border during the next fifty to one hundred years. “Existing forests just aren’t going to be there,” he told reporter Dennis Lien of the St. Paul Pioneer Press. European earthworms are moving into the forests, where they consume the leaf litter and cause the soil to become hard and dry. Overly abundant deer are consuming the seedlings that survive the earthworms and the slugs that accompany them. Global warming threatens to eliminate the northern conifers. Emerald ash borers, Asian long-horn beetles, garlic mustard, and European buckthorn are advancing toward the forest. Meanwhile, fires, needed to regenerate certain tree species and to allow the forest to adapt to changes naturally, are not taking place on a sufficiently large scale.

Alan Ek, head of the University of Minnesota ’s Department of Forestry is not quite as pessimistic as Frelich, but admitted to Lien that changes are going to happen rapidly and is not sure that they can be stopped. Barb Sonderberg of the US Forest Service says that the agency will not take such drastic steps as starting fires to promote tree regeneration, but will let the natural processes prevail.

According to Frelich, the BWCA is the site of more than 400,000 acres of never-logged forest. At present the forest looks much as it did when American Indians inhabited it.

Sources

Davis, Mary Byrd. Old Growth in the East: A Survey. Online edition. 2003-2006.

Lien, Dennis. “Last Stand for Our Forests?” St. Paul Pioneer Press, October 1, 2006 .

--posted October 27, 2006

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New Listing of Tree Ages

Neil Pederson , a dendrochronologist and professor at Eastern Kentucky University, has created a listing, on the Web, of the maximum ages of tree species in eastern North America as documented through tree-ring analysis in the last few decades. The list can be accessed at http://people.eku.edu/pederson/oldlisteast . Pederson welcomes submissions of new data.

--posted October 18, 2006

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New England Wilderness Legislation on Hold

September 19, the U.S. Senate unanimously passed the New England Wilderness Bill, which combined the wilderness bills for Vermont and New Hampshire . The bill would have designated 34,500 acres of wilderness in New Hampshire and almost 48,000 in Vermont . However, the governor of Vermont inserted a monkey wrench. He wrote to Republican leaders in the House asking them to oppose the bill, because it designated too many acres in Vermont . His letter caused an uproar in Vermont. In an attempt to save the bill, the Vermont delegation, Senator Patrick Leahy (D), Senator Jim Jeffords (I), and Congressman Bernie Sanders (I), proposed removing 6,066 acres in the northern part of the proposed Glastonbury wilderness from the bill. The designated new wilderness acreage would then total almost 42,000 acres. (See Vermont Wilderness Bill below). Governor Douglas accepted the compromise and agreed to write to the people whom he had previously contacted, this time asking them to support the new version of the bill. The damage, however, had been done. Congress has adjourned without the House having passed the New England legislation.

--Posted September 30, 2006

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Inventory Inventory of Limestone Bluff Forests in Vermont

Eric Sorenson and Robert Popp have compiled an inventory of Limestone Bluff Cedar-Pine Forests of Vermont, which was published earlier this year by the Nongame and Natural Heritage Program of the Vermont Fish and Wildlife Department, in Waterbury, Vermont. The community that they trace occurs on "bluffs and outcrops found primarily along the shore of Lake Champlain and is dominated by northern white cedar (Thuja occidentalis)." Trees tend to be "stunted, twisted, and wind-swept." Cedars more than three hundred years old were identified at several locations. Sorenson and Popp mapped seventy-five sites and visited twenty-seven of them. Out of the twenty-seven, they identified twenty-one sites that are significant at the state level. The twenty-one total 360 acres. Many of the sites visited are on private land. The highest quality site on public land is at Kingsland Bay State Park and is ranked "A," indicating little anthropogenic disruption, The report, without the appendix describing the sites visits, is available on the web site <www.vtfish and wildlife.com>,

--posted September 15, 2006

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A Threat to Old Growth in Pisgah National Forest

The US Forest Service (USFS) is currently considering whether to move ahead with plans for the Globe Timber Sale in the Grandfather District of North Carolina’s Pisgah National Forest, despite the opposition of environmentalists and many other concerned citizens, in particular residents of Blowing Rock. USFS released its environmental assessment June 30, and ended the period for public comment August 18, after it had briefly extended the comment period because of a request from Senator Elizabeth Dole. The Globe Project involves a large number of stands, totaling more than 231 acres, in two distinct areas : the Upper Johns River (south of Blowing Rock) and along Franklin Branch Road on Globe Mountain .

The Southern Appalachian Biodiversity Project hired Rob Messick to take a preliminary look at stands in the Upper Johns River area before USFS released its environmental assessment. He found two stands with old growth in or directly adjacent to them. Environmental organizations asked USFS to drop these two stands from the proposed sale. When USFS failed to do so, the Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC) hired Rob Messick and Josh Kelly to quantitatively verify old growth in or near the two stands. They studied four plots, 20 x 50 meters in size, and found that three out of four had old growth that fit USFS’s Region 8 Guidance for Old Growth (1997). The plots were in Chestnut Oak Forest, Dry Oak Heath, Montane Oak Hickory and a type transitional between the latter and Acidic Cove. Trees up to more than three hundred years old were growing in the Chestnut Oak Forest and Dry Oak Heath in and near the stands. At the request of SELC, four prominent scientists examined and verified Messick's and Kelly's methodology and advocated protecting at least two stands in or near existing old growth..

In 1995 researchers entered the Lower Thunderhole Creek Area four times and made a Best Approximation delineation of class B old-growth forests there. After USFS released its environmental assessment on the Globe Project, researchers re-entered the Thunderhole Creek Area, and doing repeatable plot and core sample work (Greater Precision work), identified within a large stand proposed for logging, ten acres of old growth that fit USFS’s Region 8 Guidance. Apart from its old growth, the Thunderhole Creek area is significant for having high quality trout waters and an unusual occurrence of Montane Alluvial Forest along a significant section of its banks.

USFS states that its objectives in proposing the Globe Sale include providing habitat for turkey, grouse, deer, and bear; using herbicide on exotic species; and creating a network of old growth. The old growth to which the agency refers is future old growth, not existing old growth. One of the stands to be so designated was cut only twelve years ago. USFS refuses to discuss the actual old growth and claims that it is not an issue, since the agency is setting aside forest that it promises to allow to grow old.

If USFS in its decision on its environmental assessment continues to plan to log actual old growth, the decision will be appealed. SELC "will make sure that USFS complies with the law," Gerken promises.

Meanwhile, a move is afoot to obtain permanent protection for the forest from Congress. Residents of the Blowing Rock area have on hand a draft bill to designate a Grandfather National Scenic Area, and are seeking Congressional sponsors for it.

Sources:

Eason, Jeff. “Globe Debate Warms Up.” Watauga Democrat. Available online at www.wataugademocrat.com. Posted August 14, 2006.

Gerken, D. J. Personal Communication. 2006.

Messick, Rob. Personal communication. 2006.

”Old Growth Timber Sale Proposed Just Outside Blowing Rock, NC.” in “Front Porch Blog,” Appalachian Voices. Available online at www.appvoices.org. Posted July 26, 2006 .

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[We have enlarged this story and moved it to Alerts, because we have been informed of a campaign in need of support.

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8/13/06 Old Growth in the Chattahoochee (Georgia) Wilderness Bill

Jess Riddle, who conducted field research on Georgia old growth for Georgia Forest Watch, tells us that the Chattahoochee Wilderness Bill (HR 5612), if passed, will protect at least 700 acres of old growth. The proposed 13,382-acre Mountaintown Scenic Area includes four old-growth sites, two of which, Betty Mountain and Rich Knob, have “large, commercially valuable Tulip Trees and diverse herb layers.” The Betty Mountain old growth is 141 acres in extent; Rich Knob has two smaller old-growth stands: 26 acres and 17 acres. Old growth in the proposed 8,448 acres of additions to existing wilderness areas includes sites at Eagle Mountain and Tate Branch in the Southern Nantahala Wilderness Extensions; Old Rocky Knob and Tarkiln Ridge in the Brasstown Wilderness Extensions; Glade Mountain in the Ellicott Rock Wilderness Extension; and Oak Ridge in the Raven Cliffs Wilderness Extension. Riddle singled out the 137 acres of old growth at Eagle Mountain in the Ben Gap addition to the Southern Nantahala Wilderness as having “exceptional diversity for a Georgia old growth stand.” At the site are “extensive rock outcrops” and “young but apparently undisturbed mixed mesophytic forests,” as well as “more typical dry oak forests.” Riddle and co-workers did not have the opportunity to study several of the proposed additions to wilderness.

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Ben Dobbin in an Associated Press article celebrates the creation of the 14,000-acre Letchworth State Park by William Pryor Letchworth, a Quaker who made a fortune in manufacturing. The park, in Livingston and Wyoming Counties, runs 17 miles along a gorge cut by the Genesee River. Letchworth first glimpsed the gorge in 1858 and by his death in 1910 had pieced together 1000 acres. He bequeathed the acreage to the state, which subsequently obtained additional land. Although the article does not mention old forest, the park has at least 75 and probably about 200 acres of old growth.

Davis, Mary Byrd. Old Growth in the East: A Survey. Online edition. 2006. Available in the supporters' section of this web site.

Dobbin, Ben. "100 Years of Vastitude," Lexington Herald, August 6, 2006. Available through www.kentuckyconnect.com .

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The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR) has opened several of its Scientific and Natural Areas (SNAs) in northern Minnesota's St. Louis, Cook, and Itasca Counties to recreational activities not normally permitted in SNAs. To combat damage to vegetation by a large deer population, DNR is opening Moose Mountain SNA to regulary archery and firearm hunting during firearms season and Chisholm Point Island SNA to archery hunting. Snow mobiles will be allowed in Moose Mountain along an existing power line right of way. Spring Beauty Northern Hardwood SNA and Myhr Creek Ridge SNA will be open to hunting and dogs to "make them consistent with other SNAs in northern Minnesota. . . ." Hovland Woods and Lutsen, which are already open to hunting and dogs, will be opened to berry picking for non-commercial purposes and picnicking, as will Moose Mountain, Spring Beauty, and Myhr Creek Ridge. The SNAs include old growth. For more information on the sites, see Old Growth in the East in the supporters' section of this web site.

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An article by Janet Eastman in the Los Angeles Times (July 6, 2006) describes the intense competition among companies that salvage, refinish, and sell wood from old structures. As sales increase by as much as 50% a year, dealers scramble to identify and obtain the right to dismantle property with aged timber, in particular paneling, flooring, and framing. "'If you were to try to get wood of that quality from new trees, you would be cutting old growth . . .," Nadav Malin, editor of GreenSource is quoted as stating.

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The state of Illinois has acquired Bohm Woods, 92 acres of "original forest," on a bluff above the American Bottom floodplain east of Saint Louis. The purchase money came from Dynegy, Inc., as part of a settlement of a suit in regard to air pollution from coal-fired power plants. The site will be preserved by the Illinois Department of Natural Resources. (See Online Survey for additional details.)

Office of Lisa Madigan, Illinois Attorney General. "Madigan: Environmental Benefits from Landmark Clean Air Settlement Becoming Reality." [Press Release.] May 17, 2006.

Jadhav, Adam. "92 Acres Near Edwardsville Will Become Nature Preserve." St. Louis Post-Dispatch, May 18, 2006.

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The New York Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) has released its draft management plan for Zoar Valley Multiple Use Area. Zoar Valley, in Erie and Cattaraugus Counties, is a complex of 630 acres of old growth in four canyons of Cattaraugus Creek. Four hundred of the 630 acres are within the 6000-acre Multiple Use Area. The draft plan would allow no logging in the old growth, a stipulation that environmentalists have fought had to obtain.

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A New Map of Forest Regions

In “Revisiting the Deciduous Forests of Eastern North America,” (Bioscience, April 2006, pp. 341-42), J. M. Dyer publishes a new map of forest regions in the eastern United States based on data from 100,000 Forest Inventory and Analysis plots monitored by the US Forest Service on public and private land. He compares his map with the map of patterns of “original” forest, which E. Lucy Braun based on her field research and published in Deciduous Forests of Eastern North America in 1950.

Dyer’s map splits Braun’s hemlock-white pine-northern hardwoods region into northern hardwoods-red pine and northern hardwoods-hemlock regions; and combines her maple-basswood and beech-maple regions into one beech-maple-basswood region. It groups into a single mesophytic region what are essentially Braun’s western mesophytic, mixed mesophytic, and oak-chestnut regions, plus part of her oak-pine region. To the south, it makes Braun’s oak-pine region a section within a southern mixed region (a renaming of Braun’s southeastern evergreen forest) and it creates a separate Mississippi alluvial plain region.

Nevertheless, Dyer points out, given the differences in Braun’s and Dyer’s methods, the fact that Braun was looking at old growth and Dyer at forest in general, and the many disruptions that eastern forests have suffered since Braun carried out her research, there is a surprising degree of similarity between the two maps.

--posted July 17, 2006

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June 14, Representatives Nathan Deal and Charles Norwood introduced in Congress the Chattahoochee National Forest Act of 2006 (H.R. 5612), which would establish a 13,382-acre Moutaintown National Scenic Area and add 8448 acres to existing Wildernesses in the Chattahoochee. The proposed Scenic Area lies just southeast of the existing 35,000-acre Cohutta Wilderness, the largest and most used Wilderness in the Southern Appalachians. Apart from the Scenic Area, 692 acres of Wilderness would be added to the Cohutta. Brasstown Wilderness, the Southern Nantahala Wilderness, Ellicott Rock Wilderness, Tray Mountain Wilderness, and Raven Cliffs Wilderness would also be enlarged.

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June 21, Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns approved petitions from the governors of North Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia to begin the rule-making process to set aside permanently the roadless areas in the three states' National Forests. (For background, see "Good News from the Southern Appalachians," posted April 21, below. and the Web site of the Southern Appalachian Forest Coalition, www.safc.org).

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Minnesota’s North Woods under Attack

Timber and mining companies in northern Minnesota are in the process of selling their forest lands to investment companies that, within a few years, log it, divide it, and sell it in small tracts to private parties. The individual owners are likely to build cabins on their new property and eventually may subdivide it. Ecologically valuable forests are thus being fragmented, causing harm to wildlife and degrading water quality. Also, the new owners usually put up no trespassing signs. Therefore the public loses possibilities for hiking, canoeing, and camping.

Boise Cascade sold 309,000 acres in Minnesota in May as part of a national deal that put 2.2 million acres into the hands of a Timber Investment Management Organization in Boston that sees the land in terms of real estate value. Almost one million acres in Minnesota are currently in danger of being split up and made the site of second homes.

The sale of forest land by timber companies, which began in the north eastern United States and spread to the south east has come as a surprise to Minnesota . The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, The Nature Conservancy, the Trust for Public Land, and other entities have now joined forces to try to stem the tide by purchasing or putting easements at risk land, but they have catching up in fund raising to do. Forty-six percent of the forest land in Minnesota is owned by private parties, large and small.

Source: John Myers, “Vanishing Forest .” Duluth News Tribune, posted June 14, 2006 .

--posted June 20, 2006

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Battle over Old Growth in Quebec

The government of Premier Jean Charest in Quebec has filed a bill that would put up for sale 600 hectares of the 5200-hectare Mount Orford provincial park. On the land to be sold are a golf course, a ski area, and 85 hectares of old-growth forest. The old growth would likely become the site of between 700 and 800 new condominiums. Money from the sale would be used to buy for the park 4,800 hectares of lowlands, where logging is reportedly taking place. In fact, the proposed legislation, Bill 23, is entitled “An act to ensure the enlargement of Parc national du Mont Orford, the preservation of the biodiversity of adjacent lands and the maintenance of recreational tourism activities.” However, conservationists are not buying it, and objections to the bill have been raised from within Charest’s own Liberal party.

Sources:

“Charest Tries to Stem Anger over Sale of Park Land ,” CTV.ca, Updated May 6, 2006.

Dougherty, Kevin, “Public Hearings Will Be Held by Invitation Only,” The Gazette [ Montreal ], May 4, 2006 , p. A3.

--Posted May 17, 2006

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Law on Conservation Easements Passed in New York State

New York State has enacted an incentive for conservation that will give New York State landowners an annual refund of 25% of the value of property taxes paid on land on which the government or a land trust holds a conservation easement. The date that the easement was created makes no difference to eligibility, but the easement must have been wholly or partially donated. The benefit will stay with the land, so successor owners as well as the original owner will receive the tax credit. The credit does not reduce local property tax revenues. Now the Department of Taxation and Finance must draft regulations to implement the tax credit.

Source: Website of the Land Trust Alliance, www.lta.org

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Enlargement of Maine’s Baxter State Park

The Maine legislature has consented to a land exchange that clears the way for the purchase of 6015 acres of land, surrounding Katahdin Lake and adjacent to Baxter State Park. The state also appropriated $2.5 million in public funds toward the purchase of the northern 1975 acres. Why specifically the northern acres? They will be bought by the Maine Department of Conservation, Bureau of Parks and Land Management and managed according to the Bureau’s Integrated Resource Policy, which permits hunting. The remaining 4040 acres will become part of Baxter State Park and will be managed by the Baxter State Park Authority as a non-motorized wilderness and wildlife sanctuary. The catch is that $11.5 million must be raised from private sources by July 1 to complete the purchase. The Trust for Public Land (TPL), which, with the Maine Department of Conservation, holds the option on the 6015 acres, is organizing the fund raising and has so far raised one third of the sum.

As a result of the legislation, if the complex deal goes through, 7400 acres of public lots will go to the Gardener Land Company, which owns the 6015 acres. The Gardener Land Company, a logging company, has expressed its intention of maintaining the 7400 acres as a source of timber.

Governor Percival Baxter, who purchased and donated to the people of Maine the 200,000 acres that comprise Baxter State Park , had attempted to acquire the Katahdin Lake parcel, from which he first saw Mount Katahdin , but never succeeded in doing so. The Trust for Public Land describes the parcel, which is to the east of the park, as containing the “wild” eastern side of the Turner Mountain Range and old-growth forests extending from “the cedar seepage forests southwest of the lake to the remote Wassataquoik Stream.”

TPL holds an option on an additional 8000 acres east of Katahdin Lake , which are also owned by the Gardner Land Company. The organization hopes that the state will decide to purchase this acreage as part of its Land for Maine ’s Future program.

Sources:

Gilman, Kim, Trust for Public Land . Personal Communication. 2006.

“ Katahdin Lake Deal a Victory for All of Maine ” [Editorial]. Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram, April 17, 2006 . Available on the web at http://pressherald.mainetoday.com .

Trust for Public Land . “Campaign to Conserve Katahdin Lake .” Posted April 6, 2006 . Available on the web at www.tpl.org.

--Posted April 29, 2006

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April 20, 2006 Governor Mark Sanford of South Carolina petitioned the federal government to issue rules that would restrict road construction and timber harvesting on designated roadless areas within Sumter and Francis Marion National Forests. Governor Sanford is the third governor and the first Republican to petition for full protection of roadless areas in his state. The governors of Virginia and North Carolina had already filed similar petitions.

In July, 2005, the Bush administration lifted the federal protection on roadless areas within national forests and called for individual governors to petition for greater or less protection than existing forest management plans require. The protection on roadless areas had been established by the Clinton administration. It is to be hoped that other governors will follow the lead of the three from the Southern Appalachians.

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The old-growth forest at the New York Botanical Garden is described in two articles in Newsday (April 2) as "essentially falling apart." See the Literature Survey in the Supporters' Section of this web site.

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Senators and representatives from Vermont have introduced in Congress legislation to designate 48,000 acres of additional Wilderness in Green Mountain National Forest. The legislation (S. 2565 and H.R. 5157) would create two new wildernesses, 28,500 acres around Glastenbury Mountain and 12,500 acres around Romance and Monastery Mountains. Monastery Mountain may be the site of old-growth forest. Also, additions would be made to Breadloaf, Lye Brook, Peru Peak, and Big Branch Wildernesses. Author Bill McKibben has published an eloquent essay on the proposal, the positives and (due to its relatively small size) the negatives, in the Boston Globe..

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Climate Change: Louisiana and . . .

March 26, 2006 Time magazine published as its cover story an article headed “Polar Ice Caps Are Melting Faster Than Ever... More And More Land Is Being Devastated By Drought... Rising Waters Are Drowning Low-Lying Communities... By Any Measure, Earth Is At ... The Tipping Point
The climate is crashing, and global warming is to blame. Why the crisis hit so soon--and what we can do about it.” The article, by Jeffrey Kluger, follows “Cloudy with a Chance of Chaos,” published in Fortune Magazine, January 17, 2006, carrying the same message but with an emphasis on the economy. The media is catching on, but, as the articles themselves ask, will the growing concern be translated into action?

Meanwhile, The Nature Conservancy has published estimates of damage to its preserves in Louisiana from Hurricanes Rita and Katrina, which, are increasingly regarded as having been a product of climate change. Among the impacted preserves with old growth are White Kitchen Preserve, where much of the marsh was ripped out, and Abita Creek Flatwoods, where up to 50% of the trees in a 300-acre bayhead swamp are down. For more information, go to Nature Conservancy Magazine, Spring 2006, pp. 12-13, www.nature.org, and the old-growth survey on www.primalnature.org .

--Posted April 4, 2006

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The New Hampshire Congressional delegation has filed legislation in the U.S. House and Senate that would increase the wilderness acreage in White Mountain National Forest from 114,000 acres to 149,000 acres by adding 10,500 acres in the Sandwich Range and 24,000 acres in the Wild River area in the northeast White Mountains. The bill numbers are S. 2463 and H.R. 5059.

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3/21/06 The Outlook for Forests Worldwide

A report released at the eighth biannual meeting of the United Nations Convention on Biodiversity in Curitiba , Brazil , assesses the status of biodiversity, explains the importance of biodiversity for countries fighting poverty, and outlines a five-point strategy for reversing the decline. The second edition of Global Biodiversity Outlook finds that saving the globe’s biodiversity from continued decline is possible but will require increased effort worldwide.

Among the severe problems that it cites is deforestation. Since 2000, 6 million hectares of primary forest, the best for supporting biodiversity, have been lost annually. In countries where records are kept, some 35% of mangroves have been cleared in two decades.

Optimistically the report finds that developing management plans for at least 100 major alien species is “achievable.” Some goals such as conserving wetlands and other areas that ensure supplies of fresh water will be more difficult to accomplish.

The recovery strategy which will be put before ministers from a hundred countries next week includes protecting areas of high biodiversity; drastically reducing wasteful use of natural resources including energy, food, and timber; and investing in the protection and restoration of ecosystems that deliver “essential services,” for example, coral reefs and mangroves, which protect the coasts.

The report in its entirety and in summary can be found at www.biodiv.org/GBO2 .

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3/13/06 Climate Change in the Boundary Waters

In an interview with Lorna Benson of Minnesota Public Radio, the University of Minnesota ’s Lee Frelich states that recent mild winters and wet summers are already changing the composition of the forest in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. Native pine and birch are decreasing in numbers; Red Maple and oak are increasing. The pine need fire to reproduce. Frelich, who is a researcher at the Center for Hardwood Ecology, expects Minnesota ’s climate to continue to become warmer, but says that the actual impact on the forest will depend on whether the climate also becomes wetter or drier. If it is wetter, the woods could come to resemble those in Ohio now; if it becomes drier, the forest will give way to grassland. The Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness is the site of an estimated 400,000 acres of never logged forest.

Sources: Laura Benson, “ Forest Changes Linked to Global Warming,” March 8, 2006 . Available at http://minnesota.publicradio.org/dispay/web/2006/03/03/globaltrees/ ; Mary Byrd Davis. Old Growth in the East: A Survey. Online Edition, www.primalnature.org

The city of Orono , in Hennepin County just west of Minneapolis , has closed on a purchase of Big Island Veterans Camp, 58 acres with small areas of possible beech-maple old growth. The city intends to preserve the land, on Big Island in Lake Minnetonka, as a natural park . . . (See Literature Review).

Sources: Ben Steverman, Star Tribune ( Minneapolis ), June 8, 2005 and January 18, 2006 ; Lili McMillan, Orono City Council, Personal Communication, 2006.

2/03/06 Tree Ages

The paper abstracted below is to be presented at the Central Hardwood Conference in Knoxville at the end of February. We are printing the abstract here with permission, because of the important implications of the findings for the age of trees. The average ages listed in reference books on silviculture may, at least for certain species, be understatements.

Natural History from Dendrochronology: Maximum Ages and Canopy Persistence of Rarely Studied Hardwood Species

Neil Pederson*, Anthony W. D'Amato, and David A. Orwig

Abstract--Tree-ring research has made significant contributions to our understanding of environmental change and forest stand dynamics. Its application to understanding natural history, however, has been limited. Biodiversity of the central hardwood forest offers many opportunities for tree-ring based, natural history research. Recent tree-ring research examining several rarely studied hardwood species has yielded ages well beyond maximum expectations. For example, a sampling of 20 Magnolia acuminata trees in one population included two individuals 315 and 348 years, respectively, which are nearly two centuries more than the average life expectancy reported for this species. Also, research in recently discovered old-growth stands in western Massachusetts has illustrated the common occurrence of Betula lenta in Tsuga canadensis dominated old-growth forests with individuals frequently living beyond 320 years in these systems. These studies illustrate that tree-ring research can expand our knowledge of the natural history of central hardwood species.

*Neil Pederson, formerly a graduate research assistant at the Lamont-Doherty Tree Ring Laboratory at Columbia University and now assistant professor at Eastern Kentucky University, can be reached at neil.pederson@eku.edu .

Mont St. Hilaire . . . was privately owned and not readily accessible. As of 1971 it had many trees more than 150 years old and some more than 450 years old. Today it is considered to be “the largest remnant of primeval forests in the St. Lawrence River Valley ” and is an International Biosphere Reserve. . . .

Source: Arii, Ken, Benoît R. Hamel, and Martin J. Lechowicz. “Environmental Correlates of Canopy Composition at Mont St. Hilaire , Quebec , Canada .” Journal of the Torrey Botanical Society 132, no. 1 (2005), pp. 90-102. (This article is summarized in our Literature Review..)

1/24/06 Adirondack Inventory

Since 1999, an All Taxa Biological Inventory (ATBI) has been underway in the Great Smokies, as part of the of the Discover Life in America program. Scientists and volunteers from various vocations have worked together to add 2500 species of plants and animals to those already catalogued there. Inspired by this project, the Association for the Protection of the Adirondacks, Paul Smith’s College, and several other private and public organizations and agencies are initiating the Adirondack ATBI. Its goal is nothing less than “to eventually inventory all species of all taxonomic groups within the park.” Through a web site to be developed, the public will be able to monitor the progress and discoveries as they occur.

1/22/06 Ohio Developer Donates Easement

A Hunting Valley developer has donated an easement with old growth on the Chagrin River to the Chagrin River Land Conservancy (Old Growth in the East, Ohio, p. 8).

The Wisconsin Chapter of The Nature Conservancy has purchased Tenderfoot Forest Reserve, protecting newly identified old growth. (See the online edition of the Old Growth in the East, Wisconsin, p. 10.)

We have created a Supporters' Section of this web site, accessible to donors. Henceforth, for details about news items relating to specific sites, readers may be referred to the online edition of Old Growth in the East: A Survey, posted in that section. For further information about the Supporters' section go to www.primalnature.org/supporters.html. (If a log-in notice appears, click "OK" without filling in a name or password.)

An illustrated trip report on Fall Branch by Josh Kelly has been posted under Examples of Old Growth on this web site.

December 22, the city of Duluth, Minnesota, inaugurated a city natural-areas program with the designation of the 1800-acre Magney-Snively Natural Area. The Natural Area contains old growth but reports on its extent vary, perhaps because of varying definitions of old growth.

According to reports from Kurt Rusterholz of the Minnesota Natural Heritage Program, the former Magney-Snively Park, which is included in the new Natural Area, harbored approximately 175 acres of old-growth northern hardwoods (trees greater than 160 years of age). On the other hand, an article in the Minneapolis Star Tribune about the new Natural Area states that it is “an old-growth hardwood forest loaded with maple and basswood.” Bob Bruce, city director of planning and development, described the Natural Area to the article’s author as unlogged, in part because the forest is on steep terrain with rock outcrops. One major road, the West Skyline Parkway , traverses the area.

The property owned by the city, which comprises the natural area, is part of a forest complex of approximately 2600 acres. Tom Duffus of The Nature Conservancy has written that at least 250 acres of the entire complex meet the state of Minnesota’s definition of old growth (long-lived tree species, not having suffered catastrophic natural or man-made disturbance for at least 120 years).

The Nature Conservancy provided legal and technical advice to the city, as it developed its Natural Areas program, and also bought and donated to the city 65 acres for the Magney-Snively Area. The city of Duluth hopes to designate additional Natural Areas, although none will be as large as Magney-Snively.

Sources:

Duffus, Tom. Personal Communication, July 14, 2004 .

Meersman, Tom. “ Duluth Moves to Protect Its Forest-in-the City.” [ Minneapolis ] Star Tribune, December 24, 2005 .

Rusterholz, Kurt. Personal communications. 1993.

--Posted December 28, 2005

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In November lawyers for Buckeye Forest Council filed their initial briefs in the Council's appeal of the Ohio Reclamation Commission's May decision to uphold Ohio Valley Coal Company's permit to mine under and adjacent to Dysart Woods. After both sides have filed their briefs and received replies, a hearing before the Seventh Court of Appeals for Belmont County will be scheduled. The Council will need people to attend the hearing.

Before judicial review, the case had to be reviewed by a state commission appointed by Governor Bob Taft. The Ohio Valley Coal Company is owned by Robert Murray who was the second highest individual contributor to Taft's 2002 election campaign. Taft nominated the mother of the head of the mining industry's lobbying association to be the only "citizen" representative on the review commission, but a finding by the Ohio Senate Ethics Committee led to her appointment's being withdrawn. The commission, to nobody's surprise, voted to uphold the mining permit.

See 7/23/05 "The Struggle to Preserve Dysart Woods" below, and the website of Buckeye Forest Council, www.buckeyeforestcouncil.org .

Source: Susan Heitker, "BFC Appeals Decision Upholding Dysart Mining Permit," Martha's Journal, Fall 2005, p. 6.

The Eastern Native Tree Society, the University of Arkansas, and the USDA Forest Service have announced that the seventh Eastern Old-Growth Forest Conference will be held in the Peabody Hotel in downtown Little Rock, Arkansas, March 24-25, 2006. The subject of the conference is the ancient forest ecosystems and endangered species of Arkansas and the surrounding south-central United States. The conference will include a half-day visit to the ancient cypress-tupelo forests of Bayou deView in the Dagmar Wildlife Management Area. Space on the field trip is limited so reservations should be made as early as possible. There is no open call for oral presentations, but participants are invited to submit entries to a small poster presentation. Details of the conference are available on the meeting's website: http://www.srs.fs.usda.gov/4106/meetings/EOGC2006/EOGC2006.htm

Fossilized Old Growth in New Brunswick

The oldest old-growth in Canada may be in the form of fossils in New Brunswick . A rock face showing fossils of more than seven hundred trees 345 million years old was exposed as a result of highway construction outside Sussex in the 1990s. The forests, at various levels in the face, are composed of lycopsids of the Protostigmaria-Lepidodendropsis type. The woody plants, some twenty meters tall, are related to the club mosses (Lycopodium). The trees have long been extinct, although the herbaceous plants of their time have living representatives.

The forests were located in delta wetlands where floods periodically killed entire stands of trees, buried them in sandstone sheets, and prevented the formation of climax forests. The vegetation was extremely dense with as many as 10,000 to 30,000 trees per hectare.

Randall Miller, a geological creator with the New Brunswick Museum discovered the trees six years ago when he was looking for fossils of fish. Fossils of trees in growth position from the Mississippian era are rare.

Sources:

“ Highway Construction Reveals Ancient Forest in New Brunswick ,” CBC Health and Science News, Updated October 27, 2004 . Available at http://www.cbc.ca/story/science/national/2004/10/27/nbforest_fossils041027.html .

J. Falcon-Lang, “Early Mississippian Lycopsid Forests in a Delta-Plain Setting at Norton, near Sussex, New Brunswick, Canada,.” Journal of the Geological Society, vol. 161 (2004), pp. 969-981.

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Continuity and Regeneration in Adirondack Park

In “Composition, Structure, and Disturbance History of Old-Growth and Second-Growth Forests in Adirondack Park, New York,” Susy Svatek Ziegler compares three old-growth hemlock-dominated forests (Ampersand Mountain, Gill Brook, and Roaring Brook) with nearby second-growth forests that regenerated after logging-related fires some ninety years before her study (Physical Geography, vol. 25, no. 2 [2004], pp. 152-69). Using tree ring analysis, she found that the two types of forest had similar rates of canopy turnover between 1930 and 1979. However, the two types differed in species composition and in structure. Although Eastern Hemlock dominated the canopy in the old-growth forests, it was rare in the second growth. The canopy of one of the second-growth forests was dominated by shade-tolerant Sugar Maple; those of the other two were co-dominated by Sugar Maple and shade-intolerant Paper Birch. Furthermore, the old-growth forests had more large trees and few small trees per 0.1 ha than the second-growth forests.

She concludes that logging-related fires markedly changed the hemlock-dominated forests in the Adirondacks . It is unlikely, for various reasons, that in the current century Eastern Hemlock will again dominate the canopy of the forests that suffered post-logging fires. However, like Bill McKibben, whom she cites, she finds “hope for the future” in the fact that the forests that experienced logging and fires have regenerated without management after suffering major anthropogenic disruption.

--summarized by Mary Byrd Davis, posted November 5, 2005

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Tionesta Scenic and Research Natural Areas

The September/October issue of Pennsylvania Magazine (vol. 28, no. 5) includes an article by Cindy Ross, on the old-growth Tionesta Scenic and Research Areas in Pennsylvania’s Allegheny National Forest . In “Among the Old Growth” she describes at some length the ecological value of downed trees and her own reaction to the forest: “This rare remnant of Eastern old-growth forest . . . exudes a sacredness that I’ve never experienced before. It reminds me that when the natural cycle of life is allowed to occur without any interference, our planet still thrives.” She notes that the U.S. Forest Service will revise its resource management plan for the Allegheny in 2006.

Under the leadership of Kirk Johnson, Friends of Allegheny Wilderness put forth in 2003 a “Citizens’ Wilderness Proposal” for the Allegheny,” which identified 54,460 acres of potential wilderness in eight tracts. The largest proposed area is the 14,960-acre Tionesta Wilderness, which centers in the 4110-acre Tionesta and Scenic and Research Areas. The Scenic and Research Areas, largely hemlock-beech forest, are virtually unlogged. Songbirds and amphibians are more abundant in these areas than they are in the surrounding forest. The additional forest, however, meets Wilderness qualifications and would serve as a valuable buffer to the old growth.

As reported in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (September 28, 2005), the Forest Service has already ruled out three of the eight tracts originally proposed for Wilderness on the basis of a 1997 directive of the Forest Service's Eastern Region that states that a half-mile-wide buffer between roadless areas and unnatural features like power lines must be deducted from the official acreage of the roadless areas. The buffers make the three tracts too small to be considered for Wilderness. The Friends have substituted three other tracts but will lobby Congress to consider the original areas.

To learn more about the Wilderness proposal, visit the Web site of Friends of Allegheny Wilderness, www.pawild.org . The September issue of the Friends' newsletter, which reprints Ross's article. is also posted on this site.

--posted October 28, 2005

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Two Contrasting Old-Growth Sites: Keystone and Zoar Valley

Natural Areas Journal earlier this year published articles characterizing in detail two very different old-growth areas. In the April 2005 issue (vol. 25, no.2, pp. 165-175), Stacy L. Clark et al. published “Characteristics of the Keystone Ancient Forest Preserve, an Old-growth Forest in the Cross Timbers of Oklahoma, USA.; and in the July 2005 issue (vol. 25, no. 3, pp. 219-227), Thomas P. Diggins and Bruce Kershner published “Canopy and Understory Composition of Old-Growth Riparian Forest in Zoar Valley, New York, USA.”. Study of the Oklahoma site stretches traditional definitions of old growth; the Zoar Valley site conforms to these definitions, which were largely based on forests, like the terrace forests of Zoar Valley, dominated by shade-tolerant species that maintain themselves without frequent large-scale disturbances.

Clark et al. describe three areas at varying elevations within 50 hectares of the Keystone Ancient Forest Preserve, alongside Keystone Reserve in Osage County , Oklahoma . Dense stands of Post Oak and Blackjack Oak dominate all three stands, with 150-391 trees per hectare in the overstory. Post Oak appear to be replacing themselves in each stand and have, in fact, been continuously recruiting for more than two hundred years. Eastern Red-cedar (Juniperus viriginiana) is abundant in the mid-story of the lowest stand, where it appears to be increasing in density, but is seldom present in the overstory of any of the stands. Specimens of this species are more than four hundred years in age. Fire appears to have occurred approximately every eight years. Therefore, the stands contain little coarse woody debris. The Keystone Reserve is managed by The Nature Conservancy.

Diggins and Kershner analyzed the canopy and midstory of five streamside terraces in Zoar Valley on Cattaraugus Creek (Erie and Cattaraugus Counties), where more than 300 hectares of old growth have been identified. They found in the midstory and overstory nineteen broadleaf and two coniferous species with a diameter at breast height of over 20 cm. Sugar Maple accounted for 27.3% of the basal area of the canopy, Tulip Tree for 16.5%, and American Beech for 13.6%. Five species were represented by individuals more than 40 meters tall (American Beech, American Sycamore, Bitternut Hickory, Red Oak, and Tulip Tree). The oldest trees cored were Eastern Hemlock (210-242 years). Other species represented by trees over 180 years in age were American Basswood, American Beech, American Sycamore, Red Oak, and Tulip Tree. The State of New York owns at least 175 hectares of the Zoar Valley old-growth, which lies within New York State Zoar Valley Multiple Use Area. Conservationists are working to have the old growth declared off limits to logging in the state's unit management plan for the area, now under development.

--Articles summarized by Mary Byrd Davis and posted October 23, 2005

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Historian Affirms Value of Old Growth

Early in 2005 the Lexington Herald-Leader asked the eminent Kentucky historian Thomas Clark to draw up a list of the ten places in Kentucky that he thought every Kentuckian should see and to write a story about them for the newspaper. Clark, who was 101 years old, began work on the project immediately, but he became seriously ill and died before he could write the story. He did, however, leave a list of places, some with notations. Second on the list was Lilley Cornett Woods, “which give a glimpse of what the forests of Eastern Kentucky were like before settlement was begun.” (The first item was Cumberland Gap and The Narrows through which settlers reached Kentucky .)

The 554-acre woods in Letcher County include 260 acres of largely uncut mixed mesophytic forest. A coal miner called Lilley Cornett pieced together the tract in five purchases shortly after World War I. He and his descendents refused offers to sell the woods until 1969 when the state acquired them. They are now managed by Eastern Kentucky University and have been the subject of numerous scientific studies. The state later acquired a much larger old-growth area, Blanton Forest , but Lilley Cornett Woods was the first old-growth purchase.

For further information on the woods go to www.naturalareas.eku.edu .

Sources:

Davis, Mary. Old Growth in the East: A Survey. Revised edition. Mt Vernon , Ky. : ASPI, 2003, pp. 147-48.

Warren, Jim. “A Historian’s Landmarks.” Lexington Herald Leader, October 13, 2005 , pp. D1 and D3.

Posted October 15, 2005

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New Jersey's Bear Swamp West Preserved

The Natural Lands Trust has acquired 800 acres of Bear Swamp West, including a hundred acres of old-growth broadleaf swamp forest, from U.S. Silica Co. The land is located in Cumberland County , New Jersey . The old growth is dominated by Black Gum, Sweetgum, Red Maple, and Sweetbay Magnolia. The Black Gum are 400 to 600 years old; the Sweetgum, up to 300 years old.

In Old Growth in the East: A Survey, the old growth in Bear Swamp West is described as threatened by sand mining. The mining, though not being carried out in the old growth itself, was lowering the water table and might eventually have allowed salt water to seep in. An adjacent area known as Bear Swamp East, which also includes old growth, was already within a state forest.

The Natural Lands Trust’s acquisition of the 800 acres of Bear Swamp West was a part of a total purchase of 1550 acres. The trust has added the swamp to the adjacent Glades Wildlife Refuge. Two other areas, totaling 253 acres that were part of the purchase, have also been added to this refuge, which encompasses some 6000 acres of tidal marshes, wooded uplands, and beaches along Delaware Bay . Funding for the purchase was provided by the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection’s Green Acres program, The William Penn Foundation, and the North American Wetlands Conservation Act program.

Sources:

--Jacqueline L. Urgo, “Purchase Preserves a Prized Old Forest ,” The Philadelphia Inquirer, June 28, 2005 .

--Mary Byrd Davis, Old Growth in the East: A Survey ( Mt. Vernon , KY : ASPI, 2003), pp. 25-26.

--Natural Lands Trust. “Major New Jersey Acquisitions” [Press Release]. 2005. Available at www.natlands.org/projects/project.asp?fldProjectId=19 . Downloaded October 1. 2005.

--Posted October 2, 2005

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Ancient Northern White-Cedar, Door Peninsula , Wisconsin

Old-growth researcher Lee Frelich of the University of Minnesota reported to members of the Eastern Native Tree Society (ENTS) that in early September he viewed ancient Northern White-Cedar at three sites on Wisconsin ’s Door Peninsula . Door Peninsula is a ridge of dolomite limestone that is a part of the Niagara Escarpment. Cliffs characterize the west side; swamps are found on the east side.

One of the three old-growth sites described by Frelich is Ellison Bay County Park (which includes the former Ellison Bluff County Park ), described in Old Growth in the East: A Survey. A second is Death’s Door Bluff County Park, better known as Deathdoor Bluff Park. Both parks are on the west side of the peninsula and both include high bluffs a mile long. Large, ancient Northern White-Cedar grow on terraces on the cliffs. On the steep slopes between the terraces are small white-cedar that have grown, been broken, and regrown into bizarre shapes.

The third site is Ridges Sanctuary at Bailey Harbor , a privately-owned non-profit preserve on the east side of the peninsula. Here parallel ridges up to 15 miles long are separated by water-filled swales 100-150 feet in width. The ridges range in age from 75 years, nearest the beach, to 4000 years in age, a mile inland. On the ridges is forest in which White Spruce and Balsam Fir predominate. Most of the forest was cut and burned in the 1870s. However, Frelich found large ancient white-cedar lining the swales. Other white-cedar had fallen into the swales but had turned upwards individual branches that became new trees. These new trees may later have fallen. Thus the white-cedar gradually formed tangled masses that may be as much as a thousand years in age.

Both Ellison Bay County Park and Ridges Sanctuary are State Natural Areas, the former known as Ellison Bluff State Natural Area.

Sources: Web sites of ENTS, wwwuark.edu/misc/ents/, and Ridges Sanctuary, www.ridgessanctuary.org .

Posted September 24, 2005

09/14/05 Results of the Hoover Creek Sale in Virginia

Conservationists have made public a report on the logging of old-growth forest in the Hoover Creek Timber Sale in George Washington National Forest ( Alleghany County , Virginia ). The US Forest Service had claimed prior to the sale that the logging would have little impact on old growth, although conservationists had estimated that 100-200 acre of old growth existed in the area. The agency had classified many of the units to be cut as dry mesic oak, a category that receives little protection in the George Washington, because it is widespread; but conservationists had feared that the cut would include rich cove forests. Examination of stumps after the logging confirmed their fears. Ring counts showed that trees as old as 230 years were downed as a result of the sale. The Forest Service was not forthright with the public, the report charges.

Five groups sponsored the report, “And Still They Fall: A Report on Old Growth Logging on the George Washington National Forest .” The groups are the Sierra Club, Virginia Forest Watch, Wild Virginia, Wildlaw, and the Southern Appalachian Biodiversity Project. The report was released in conjunction with a hike to see threatened old-growth areas in the George Washington (the Tour de Cut) in June. A press release and the report are available at www.virginiaforestwatch.org. Printed copies are not available at this time. Sherman Bamford (540-343-6359) can provide further information about the Hoover Creek sale..

We have no direct knowledge of how old-growth forest fared in Hurricane Katrina. However, sites with old growth or near old growth presumably hit hard include Talisheek Wetlands and Abita Creek Flatwoods Preserve, both across Lake Pontchartrain from New Orleans, in Saint Tammany Parish, Louisiana; Grand Bay Savanna in both Jackson County, Southeastern Missisissipi and Mobile County, southwestern Alabama; and Gulf State Park and Bon Secour National Wildlife Refuge, both on the Gulf Coast in Baldwin County in southern Alabama. Given the apparent link between the increasing severity of storms and global warming, we cannot regard the hurricane as a completely natural disturbance..

On May 26, 2005, the Ohio Reclamation Commission upheld the granting of a permit to Ohio Valley Coal Company to mine beneath Dysart Woods, 57 acres of mixed mesophytic old-growth forest. The old growth, which is in three tracts, is part of a 506-acre research farm owned by Ohio University. The Buckeye Forest Council had challenged the granting of the permit during a six-month hearing by presenting expert witnesses who stated that the claim by the coal company and the Ohio Division of Mineral Resources Management that the mining would not damage the forest is untrue. Buckeye Forest Council asserts that the opinion upholding the granting of the permit did not address the substantive issues raised at the hearing. It filed an appeal June 7 in the 7th District Court of Appeals. For further information, go to the web site of Buckeye Forest Council, www.buckeyeforestcouncil.org/dysart/ .

The Northeastern Research Station of the U.S. Forest Service released an Invasive Plants Field and Reference Guide: An Ecological Perspective of Plant Invaders of Forests and Woodlands in January 2005. It contains extensively documented descriptions and colored photographs of 15 invasive species. Unlike the southeastern guide, which is printed as a report on large-sized sheets of paper, the guide is made to be carried into the field. It consists of narrow sheets of water-resistant "paper" held together by large metal rings. The Forest Service hopes to enlarge the guide by furnishing information pages on up to 35 additional species. The document number is NA-TP-05-04. For a copy contact the Forest Health Protection Department, U.S. Forest Service, 271 Mast Road, Durham, NH 03824.

The spring 2005 issue of Compass (Vol. 1, no. 2), published by the Southern Research Station of the US Forest Service, is largely devoted to invasive plants of southern forests. The issue notes the continued availability of Nonnative Invasive Plants of the Southern Forests: A Field Guide for Identification and Control by James H. Miller, first published in 2003 and recently reprinted for the third time. The guide has excellent colored photographs of each invasive species at different periods of the year, along with facts about the species, and range maps. Whether or not a reader agrees with all the methods advocated to eradicate the invasives, the guide is definitely worth acquiring for identification purposes. The guide can be obtained free of charge by requesting publication GTR-SRS-062 from pubrequest@srs.fs.usda.gov or by calling 828-257-4830. To be put on the mailing list for Compass, which is published quarterly, use the same contact information.

06/25/05 A New Guide to Plants That Highlights Old Growth

A new book from the University Press of Kentucky, Plant Life of Kentucky: An Illustrated Guide to the Vascular Flora, by Ronald L. Jones, a professor of biological sciences at Eastern Kentucky University , is significant beyond the boundaries of the state. The hefty volume is the first guide to all the ferns, flowering herbs, and woody plants of Kentucky (2600 native and naturalized plants). Because it includes 250 additional species from outside the state (in the category of “to be expected” species), it covers most plants from northern Alabama to Southern Ohio to the Mississippi River and almost all the plants of eastern and central Tennessee.

The book’s lengthy introduction includes a summary of the vegetation of Kentucky , the history of plant life in Kentucky , and the history and current status of floristic studies in the state. One section of the introduction is a judicious discussion of “The Status of Old-Growth Forest in Kentucky ,” with a summary of and quotations from historical reports and an overview of the current situation. Like the other sections of the book, the discussion of old growth is thoroughly documented so that readers can obtain additional information.

In the section, Taxonomic Treatment, the bulk of the book, plants can be identified through a set of keys, which constitute “the first comprehensive set of published keys designed specifically for the south-central United States .” Eighty percent of the species are illustrated with black and white drawings. For each species, Jones gives the common name, flowering period, habitat, distribution, and rarity. He also notes uses by humans and wildlife. If a plant is poisonous, he states the fact.

Jones, a member of the editorial board of the Kentucky Native Plant Society, writes from the point of view of a conservationist. In the introduction and in an epilogue that conclude the taxonomic descriptions, he laments the loss of the magnificent forests that once covered much of Kentucky and also the more recent and ongoing damage to Kentucky ’s plant life; and he calls for readers to work to conserve what remains.

Our only reservation about the highly valuable volume is whether the hard-cover binding will stand up. The book has more than 830 pages. Although it is obviously not a field guide, its wealth of information means that it will receive heavy use. Publication in two volumes might have produced a more enduring product, but would have meant a loss of convenience in the use of features like the indexes.

Manitowish River Press recently sent the Clearinghouse a copy of Heartwood by Mary E. Burns, in which a twelve-year old girl in northern Wisconsin learns that white pines are in danger and discovers what she can do to restore them. At the request of a tree-spirit, she and her grandfather travel across the upper Midwest and back into time in order to obtain and bring back essential elements of life that have been lost. The book was intended for the juvenile/young adult reader, but the press has found that many adults enjoy it. Numerous black and white illustrations by Peggy Grinvalsky add to the book's appeal. At the close is a list of sources of white pine seeds and of organizations working to protect and restore old growth, also a packet of actual white pine seeds. Heartwood can be purchased directly from Manitowish River Press, 4245 Highway 47, Mercer, WI 54547, www.manitowish.com, e-mail: manitowish@centurytel.net .

A conference entitled "Moving towards Sustainable Forestry: Lessons from Old Growth Forests" will be held September 23-26, 2004, at the Geneva Point Conference Center in Moultonborough, NH. For information go to www.oldgrowthconference.org .

The April 2004 issue of the magazine Our State North Carolina includes "Finding the Ancient Forest," an excellent article by G. Leigh Wilkerson about Rob Messick, old-growth researcher in the south-eastern United States. Messick, who learned how to identify old growth by working in the field "with master practitioners" compiled the report "Old Growth Forest Communities in the Nantahala-Pisgah National Forests," released in 2000. He is now searching for and compiling information on old growth in other areas of the Blue Ridge Province as well as in parts of the Nantahala-Pisgah not studied for the report. The article includes Messick's basic criteria for old-growth or primary forest, "'For a forest to be labeled primary,' Messick explains, 'it must be naturally regenerating, have representative trees in the 150-year-and-up range, and very importantly, have no evidence of past human disturbance such as logging.'"

A developer is attempting to build a 2000-acre resort on Belleayre Mountain in the Catskills. Plans call for clearcutting 529 acres of high elevation forest and blasting on the mountain to make way for two golf courses, parking lots, and tennis courts. Michael Kudish of Paul Smith’s College describes Belleayre Mountain as supporting 1.5 square miles of "first growth," ie old growth. He states, "Only the two northernmost peaks [of the Eagle Mountain Range], Belleayre and Fleischmann Mountains, are entirely hardwood at their higher elevations. From the Belleayre-Balsam col almost to Winnisook Lake is continuous first growth forest for about nine miles . . . Fleischmann Mountain has been selectively logged to its summit, while the upper elevations of Belleayre are unique in the Catskills with residual blocks of first growth forest dissected by ski slopes" (The Catskill Forest: A History (Fleischmanns, NY: Purple Mountain Press, 2000, pp. 84 and 101).

Whether or not the 529 acres to be clearcut are old growth, Belleayre Mountain is not a suitable location for a resort which would include two hotels, more than seventy condominiums, and more than one hundred other buildings in addition to the golf courses and tennis courts. Not only would the resort fragment the existing forest but it would greatly increase traffic on Route 28, preventing wildlife from crossing, and endanger water quality in a watershed that supplies millions of people well beyond the Catskills.

In December of 2003, the New York Department of Environmental Conservation accepted the developers’ Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) and opened the public comment period on the proposal. For more information on the issue, go to http://www.catskillheritage.org/issues/resort/ . An online petition to be signed by those opposed to the project is at http://www.petitiononline.com/Mega/petition.html . If you have influential contacts who might be helpful in trying to stop the development, call Seigei Michelle Spark at 845-688-2893.

This alert is based on an e-mail from Ryushin, a member of Zen Mountain Monastery, at ryushin@dharma.net , forwarded by David Yarrow and on The Catskill Forest: A History (see above).

The following opinion piece from the Seattle Post-Intelligencer came to us from Virginia Forest Watch via Rob Messick. We believe that it is significant enough to warrant printing in its entirety.

We write as former chiefs of the U.S. Forest Service with combined experience of more than a half-century dealing with national forest issues. For three decades, an increasingly acrimonious debate over old-growth forests has raged. It is time to declare old growth off-limits to logging and move on. Why?

First, although no one knows exactly how much old growth remains, what's left is but a small fraction of what once was and will ever be again. And what remains did not survive by accident. Most remaining old-growth stands occur in rugged terrain where the economic and environmental costs are simply too high.

Second, scientists increasingly appreciate old-growth forests as reservoirs of biodiversity with associated "banks" of genetic material. Most stands are protected as habitat for threatened or endangered (and associated) species -- to meet the purpose of the Endangered Species Act "... to provide a means whereby the ecosystems upon which endangered species and threatened species depend may be conserved. ..." It's time to stop fighting over what little old growth remains unprotected.

Third, a large and growing number of people want old-growth forests preserved for posterity. Values associated with "beauty," "spirituality" or "connection with the past" are expressed in other terms applied to old growth such as "ancient" or "cathedral" forests. These values are as real as those determined for commodities in the marketplace and clearly exceed the values as timber.

Fourth, if the past is prologue, harvest of old growth will be publicly resisted in sequential and predictable steps -- appeals, legal actions, protests and, in the end, civil disobedience. In the Pacific Northwest, where most old growth remains, costs of making old-growth timber sales are disproportionately high with very low chance of ultimate success given environmental constraints and process requirements. Ten-year-old plans that envisioned some old-growth harvest have been overcome by events -- legal, political, social, scientific and economic.

Fifth, few sawmills remain in business that can process large old-growth logs. The mills that have survived are geared to efficiently process smaller second-growth trees.

Sixth, and most important, the never-ending fight is draining time, money, energy and political capital needed to address more pressing problems. Forest management should focus on restoring forest health and reducing fire risk, initially in areas where risk to human life and property are greatest -- the so-called wildland/urban interface. Then, appropriate management practices should be strategically targeted in the right places and at the right scales across the landscape. The knowledge gained in the wildland/urban interface should then set the course for any expanded management actions. That's a prescription that draws on pragmatic combinations of economic need, political reality and the application of adaptive management based on research and experience.

Meanwhile, younger trees -- some quite large -- now inhabit old-growth stands as a result of a century of fire suppression that prevented periodic low-intensity ground fires that naturally thin the forests. Such trees provide "ladder fuels" that can carry fire into the crowns of old-growth trees. These are the trees that should be thinned and harvested to reduce the potential fire mortality of the old-growth trees. Redwood and sequoia stands in northern California are particularly vulnerable.

Those who have won the past fights to protect old growth should now support forest management -- including thinning -- to address forest health problems, reduce susceptibility to fire and provide a sustainable supply of wood in the spirit of the multiple-use mandate. As our demands for wood increase, is it ethical to import more timber from nations with weaker environmental protections and less technical capabilities and ignore our own sources of supply? We think not.

Several decades ago, the Forest Service struggled to meet targets to harvest more than 10 billion board feet a year from the national forests. Most now agree that was unsustainable. Today, circumstances have reduced harvest levels to below 2 billion board feet a year -- considerably below what could be sustained while meeting multiple-use mandates.

It is time to move beyond the "board feet of timber debate." The performance standard should be "acres treated" based on state-of-the-art science and in compliance with the law. In the spirit of multiple use, all applicable values should come into play, including cultural/archaeological, water, timber, biodiversity, recreation, fish and wildlife habitat, wilderness, non-timber forest products and grazing. The work of improving forest health and restoring watersheds on national forests has great potential to provide jobs and economic opportunities to many of the same communities caught up in the "cut vs. no-cut" battles of the past.

Should we protect remaining old growth? We say yes. In turn, should we expect agreement on the mandate of the Organic Administration Act of 1987 that states: "No national forest shall be established except to protect the forest within the boundaries, or for the purpose of securing favorable conditions of water flows, and to furnish a continuous supply of timber for the use and necessities of the citizens of the United States." Again, we answer yes.

A saying common in India comes to mind. "When elephants fight only the grass suffers." Rural communities, and the forests, have suffered enough from strife too long sustained and management too long delayed. It is time to move on. Recognizing that harvest of old growth from the national forests should come to an end is a good start.

- Mike Dombeck is professor of global environmental management at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point

- Jack Ward Thomas is professor of wildlife biology at the University of Montana.

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August 22-24 the Bert Miller Nature club in cooperation with the naturalist community in southern Ontario sponsored a four-day voyage across Lake Erie and Lake Ontario with two 35-foot war canoes to help ensure the protection of Marcy's Woods. The 260-acre property on the north shore of Lake Erie, at Point Abino, 8 miles east of Buffalo, includes a 65+ acre old-growth Black Maple forest. The site also has an unusually high concentration of endangered flora and fauna. The activists presented a petition to preserve Marcy's Woods to government officials in Toronto. The Woods are in danger of being sold to a developer who owns Planet Hollywood and Casino Niagara. For more information contact Rob Eberly, Bert Miller Nature club, 905-894-5850, eberly@inter-pc.com .

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According to a US Forest Service spokesperson old growth in the Hoover Creek Timber Sale in the James River District of the George Washington National Forest has been logged. The old growth, which was on the northwest side of Little Mountain (Allegheny County), represented five natural communities and four important variations of these types: rich cove forest (var. rich cove on talus bench and rich cove on steep talus slopes); mesic oak on talus slopes; montane oak-hickory (submesic) (var. montane oak-hickory [submesic] on talus slopes); montane oak-hickory (dry) (var. montane oak-hickory (dry) on talus slopes); pine-oak heath (Messick 2002). Conservationists appealed the sale without succcess. According to USFS, none of the stands in the sale were old growth throughout (Brennan 2002). However, as Neas noted, the stands are arbitrary units and that boundaries could have been redrawn to set apart the old-growth stands (2001).

Brennan, Shannon. 2002, Feb. 24. Sale of ‘Old Growth’ Irks Forest Activists. The News and Advance.

Messick, Rob. 2002. Site Specifics Regarding Old Growth Forests on Little Mountain, George Washington National Forest. [An unpublished report.]

Neas, Aubrey O., Jr., Biologist/Naturalist. 2001, Nov. 6. Letter to Ted Harris, President of The 500-Year Forest Foundation.

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The USDA Forest Service Southern Research Station and the Southern Regional Extension Forestry Office are developing an online encyclopedia to make the results of forestry research available to the public. As a pilot project, they are developing an encyclopedia on the ecology and management of Southern Appalachian forest ecosystems. The first stage of this encyclopedia can be seen at <http://www.forestryencyclopedia.net>. In a quick look at the site, the Clearinghouse has found that some of the information on old growth is woefully inaccurate. The Forest Service invites comments, which can be made with an online comment form.

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A 65-acre tract of apparently little-logged longleaf and loblolly pine in Wilkinson County, Mississippi has recently attracted attention. December 12 The Natchez Democrat published recollections of 90-year old Cletus McCurley whose father and a coworker asked the Crosby Lumber and Manufacturing Company, which employed them, to set aside the tract. They wanted to save "a small area of virgin timber for people to see in later years." At that time the area was named the Flat Rock Reserve. St. Regis Lumber Company acquired the reserve in 1965 and Georgia-Pacific Corporation in 1985. Both St. Regis and Georgia-Pacific agreed orally with the seller to protect the reserve. In 2001 Plum Creek Timber Company, which owns 88,000 acres of forest in Wilkinson County, acquired the reserve from Georgia-Pacific. Kit Hart, Plum Creek Environmental Affairs Manager, told The Democrat and, later, the Old-Growth Clearinghouse that the company is trying to learn more about the history of the reserve before deciding whether to cut down any of the trees.

Sources: Don McCraine, "Man recalls father’s hand in creating forest," The Natchez Democrat, December 12, 2002; Kit Hart, Plum Creek Timber Company, Personal Communication, January 6, 2002.

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In late December, the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR) announced that it will protect as old growth almost 40,000 acres of forest on state land . About 22,000 of the acres are in state forests where they were subject to logging; about 18,000 are in state parks and natural and scientific areas where they are already off limits to loggers. In Minnesota a forest must support trees 120 years of age or older in order to be considered for old-growth status. The DNR found 70,000 acres of forest that fit its definition.. Forests of jack pine, aspen, and birch, which do not normally reach 120 years, were not considered. The protected acreage is less than 1 percent of state-managed land and less than 0.3 percent of the state's forested land. Minnesota has extensive acreage on federal land, in particular the 375,000 acres in Superior National Forest's Boundary Waters Wilderness. The DNR will make its plan available on a Web site in January.

Sources: Associated Press, Minneapolis Star Tribune, December 25, 2002; Lee E. Frelich, University of Minnesota, Personal Communication, December 27, 2002.

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David Coon, policy director of the Conservation Council of New Brunswick, tells us that the abstracts of the papers and posters given at the conference "Old-Growth Forests in Canada--A Science Perspective" (Sault Ste-Marie, October 2001) are now available on the web. The abstracts include "Genetic Diversity as the Basis for Evaluating Forest Management Options, with Implications for Old-Growth Forests" by A. G. Gorden et al. and "Using Lichens to Asses the Ecological Continuity of Forests in Maritime Canada--A Science Perspective" by Steven Selva. The papers were originally to be published as part of a book, but now may be published in journal form instead. The URL for the abstracts is http://www.atl.cfs.nrcan.gc.ca/OG/home-e.htm.

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The Conservation Council of New Brunswick has embarked on an effort to ground-truth possible old-growth sites on Crown land. They have selected some 30 potential sites based on the provincial government's forest resource inventory. Ten of these have been chosen for ground-truthing. The first site they visited in the Upsalquitch watershed turned up a nice site with 180 year old white pines, plenty of coarse woody debris and downed logs. No older individuals were present as the area appears to have suffered from a forest fire in the early 19th Century.

Source: David Coon, Policy Director, Conservation Council of New Brunswick, 180 St. John Street, Fredericton, New Brunswick E3B 4A9; Phone: (506) 458-8747; Fax: (506) 466-2911; e-mail: ccnbcoon@nb.aibn.com

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Conservationists in Maryland have scored a tremendous victory. The Maryland House and Senate have unanimously passed a bill to create two new Wildlands in Maryland: the South Savage Wildland and Savage Ravines. Governor Glendening will sign it April 25. Wildlands are Maryland's equivalent of Wilderness. The South Savage Wildland will cover 1500-2000 acres, within which are patches of old growth totaling more than one hundred acres. Savage Ravines is mature forest with one to five acres of old growth. Mark Diehl led the led the campaign for the new Wildlands. Ken Hotopp assisted in the role of science advisor. (Source: Mark Diehl and Ken Hotopp, Personal Communications)

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The Nature Conservancy of Canada and the owner of Casino Niagara have both made offers for approximately 275 acres of undeveloped Lake Erie shoreline in Ontario, known as Marcy's Woods. A significant portion of the 275 acres is of natural and scientific interest. Within this portion is marsh and about 60 acres of high, forested dunes. The dunes are the only undeveloped dunes overlooking the lake; the forest is old growth with an abundance of Black Maple. On the site is every species of trillium found in North America.

The past owners of the land, Dr. George Marcy and his wife, valued its natural treasures. They invited members of the public to walk on the land, and treated them as their guests. Visitors were invited to sign the guest book and given milk and cookies when they left. Thus many residents of the area became familiar with the land and love it. Dr. Marcy wanted the site preserved after his death and talked to The Nature Conservancy. However, he died before he had taken formal steps to secure the land. His heirs are expected to accept the offer of the owner of Casino Niagara rather than of the Conservancy.

The owner of Casino Niagara says that he plans only to build one house on the land and will otherwise leave it intact. However, conservationists are afraid that his children will take other measures. The Bert Miller Nature Club, which was created in the mid 90s with the primary purpose of ensuring that Marcy's Woods is preserved, is ready to take steps. If the heirs accept the offer of the owner of Casino Niagara, club members will ask the Province of Ontario to find out whether it can expropriate the land and will ask the new landowner to sell The Nature Conservancy a conservation easement. They hope to put pressure on the province and on the owner by engaging in activities that will gain the attention of the media.

(Sources: Personal communications from Bruce Kershner, Western New York Old Growth Forest Survey and Tim Seburn, Bert Miller Nature Club)

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Invited by Mark Dill and the Newton Creek Riverkeepers, arborist Matthew Largess visited Haddon Township (Camden County), New Jersey February 12 to evaluate thirty acres of possible old growth. He found a forest composed of "many large, climax species," including massive oaks, and American beech, "impressive" tulip trees ,and red maple, with a native understory of American hornbeam, spice bush, and other species. The abundant wildlife included mosses and mushrooms, bats, yellow salamanders, red foxes, and red-tail hawks. The stand is "surrounded by concrete," including three schools and high-rise apartment buildings; and is threatened with clearing for the creation of athletic fields. (Source: Matthew Largess, e-mail to Trees List, February 15, 2002) _______________________________________________________________________________________________________

The 729,000-acre Big Cypress National Preserve includes some 158,000 acres of unlogged scrub cypress and 23,000 acres of unlogged slash pine. It is also home to the highly endangered Florida panther, only fifty of whom remain in the world, and to the endangered red-cockaded woodpecker. When the National Park Service (NPS) purchased the lands in the preserve, they did not acquire the mineral rights. Collier Resources Company, which owns the mineral rights, has offered to sell them to NPS, but the offer has been refused. The company has now petitioned NPS to act on a sweeping plan for oil and gas exploration. NPS is considering approving the plan based on an Environmental Assessment rather than on an Environmental Impact Statement, which would be more thorough.

The plan would allow the drilling of 14,700 wells using high velocity seismic explosives. Eight miles of new roads would be built through panther habitat. Wetlands would be filled and destroyed; surface water would be contaminated with oil and gas from spills and leaks from machinery; 47,000 acres of vegetation would be cut down or driven over.

The Park Service announced that it was accepting comments only through February 25.

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Eminent biologist and author E. O. Wilson puts it succinctly: "Cease all logging of old-growth forests everywhere." This prescription is the third of five strategies that Wilson names in his brief article "How to Save Biodiversity" in the Spring, 2002, issue of Nature Conservancy. Wilson advocates replacing logging of old-growth forests with the harvesting of tree plantations.

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The Ontario Government will permit logging, as April 1, up to the edges of ancient red and white pine forests in Temagami. The logging threatens the old growth. "Research shows that old-growth forests surrounded by uncut wilderness areas regenerate better than small islands of old-growth surrounded by logging roads and clearcuts," said Dr. Peter Quinby, Research Scientist with Ancient Forest Exploration & Research. "Any further damage from logging around these old-growth stands could be irreversible."

Less than 1% of old-growth white and red pine forests remain in North America and the remaining forests are most highly concentrated in the Temagami region of central Ontario. The ancient pines, some up to 400 years old, are home to such 'area sensitive' species as the pileated woodpecker, pine marten and bald eagle.

Forest operations are covered under the 1999-2019 Temagami Forest Management Plan. Over 3,000 hectares of Temagami Forest is scheduled for logging operations in the next year. The area to be logged (the wilderness heart of Temagami) borders on the old-growth Obabika River Provincial Park south of the Red Squirrel Road and is approximately 35 kilometres west of Highway 17 and the village of Temagami. The Canadian conservation organization Earthroots is demanding that the government set up well-defined no-logging protection zones around old-growth stands in Temagami.

Earthroots is also asking conservationists to contact the Ministry of Natural Resources to oppose the clearcutting of Blocks 30, 46, and 29.
Write, fax, or call David Payne, Ministry of Natural Resources District Manager, 3301 Trout Lake Road, North Bay, Ontario P1A 4L7, Canada; Fax: 705-475-5500; Tel: 705-475-5599

For more information contact: Richard Brooks, M.F.C., Earthroots Co-Director: 416-599-0152, 416-819-7424 (cell) or Dr. Peter Quinby, Assistant Dean, Paul Smith's College, New York: 518-327-6272 . Earthroots is at (401 Richmond St. West, Suite 410, Toronto, Ontario, M5V 3A8
(Source: Alerts from Earthroots)

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Rob Messick of Asheville, North Carolina, has received the Olaus and Margaret Murie Award from The Wilderness Society "in recognition of his tireless efforts to document and protect old-growth forest land in the mountains of western North Carolina." The award was presented at a meeting of The Wilderness Society in Washington, DC, February 7. Originally, Messick was to receive the honor September 14 during a Wilderness Society meeting in Little Switzerland, North Carolina. That meeting was canceled because of the attack on the World Trade Center. The organization's Governing Council presents the award annually to a conservationist, "usually unheralded, who has shown dedication to protecting the nation's natural heritage."In 2000, Messick and his colleagues produced a study that identified 77,000 acres of old growth in the Nantahala-Pisgah National Forests of western North Carolina. (Source: The Wilderness Society, Press Release and Award Ceremony

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Kruger Inc. is planning on cutting the last remaining old growth boreal forests left in the Main River
watershed in Newfoundland. Most of the harvest will go into pulp and paper, to be shipped
to the East coast of the US. You can send an email to the Newfoundland Premier to let him know that Americans and others are not interested in buying the last remaining old growth of Newfoundland by going to www.earthisland.org/bfp .
More information is available at the Web site of the Main River Coalition: http://www.wolverinecom.nf.ca/mainriver/mainriver.html
(Source : Alert from the Boreal Footprint Project of Earth Island Institute)

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1/6/02 Stopping and preventing logging of old growth

The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) and the center for Tropical Forest Science at the Smithsonian Institution released last October the report Logging Off: Mechanisms to Stop or Prevent Industrial Logging in Forests of High Conservation Value, which assesses fifteen tools for greatly reducing or eliminating industrial logging in high conservation forests. The tools range from purchasing timber concessions and cracking down on illegal logging through conservation easements to international timber boycotts and import bans. The authors, Ted Gullison, Mary Melnyk, and Carmen Wong, review case studies of their application in temperate and tropical forests. They define "forests of high conservation value" simply as forests that have been identified as high priorities for conservation by environmental organizations. Those they list are World Resources: frontier forests; Conservation International: biodiversity hot spots; The Nature Conservancy: last great places; World Wildlife Fund: critical ecosystems.

However, final documents from a November meeting of a commission of the international Convention on Biological Diversity recognized the "critical value of primary forests for the conservation of biodiversity" and the "alarming rate of loss of such forests." Greenpeace political advisor Gudrun Henne noted that "This is the first time a meeting of international delegates has formally recognized that protecting the world's remaining ancient forests must become an international priority." The meeting was that of the Convention's Subsidiary body on Scientific, Technical and Technological Advice (SBSTTA), which is to advise the ministers and diplomats who will attend the sixth session of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention, at The Hague from April 8-26, 2002. The Convention was opened for signing at the Rio Summit in 1992.

Forests.org, Inc. (an internet-based forest and climate advocacy organization) restated the title of the UCS/Smithsonian report as "Logging Off: Ending Industrial Logging of Primary & Old-Growth Forests" when announcing the report. "There is no such thing as environmentally sustainable commercial forestry in ancient primary forests," Forests.org appropriately states.

The UCS/Smithsonian report can be requested from pubs@ucusa.org , 617-547-5552. The Forest.org Web site is, as would be expected, www.forests.org .

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Geologist Drew Coleman and graduate student Michael Bulleri from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill have announced that black oak appears to preserve a record of uranium pollution. By coring, they found depleted uranium in the bark of black oaks nearly a mile from the Starmet plant in Concord, Massachusetts. This plant, now a Superfund site, made depleted uranium weapons. Because of the position of the trees, water could not have carried the depleted uranium to them. Apparently air carried the uranium, possibly in smoke from fires at the plant. The trees therefore appear to provide evidence of contamination no longer present in the air. (Catherine Clabby, Scripps Howard News Service, 12/6/01)

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Conducting field work for the University of Arkansas Tree-Ring Laboratory during 2001, Alynne Bayard, Mike Mangione, and Dan Griffin have been active in Oklahoma. After field-testing a remote sensing model to find old Cross Timbers, Bayard estimates that Eastern Oklahoma is the site of at least 162 square miles of ancient Cross Timbers. Mangione has found that in the old-growth stands, recruitment of post oak, the dominant tree, is not a problem. About 15% of the trees with a DBH of over 10 cm are older than 150 years. The oldest are over 300 years. Photographing areas photographed in the early twentieth century, Griffin has discovered that on level ground below ridgelines, the Cross Timbers have been invaded by trees and shrubs and have given way to reservoirs. The ridgelines themselves have hardly changed, however. Dr. David Stahle, director of the laboratory, believes that Cross Timbers is likely the most-extensive type of old-growth forest remaining in the East. Watch for an article by Stahle on old growth across the country in the February 2002 issue of Natural History. (Drawn from a report by David Stahle to the Eastern Native Tree Society, Dec. 18, 2000)

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Kirk Johnson has formed a new organization, Friends of the Allegheny Wilderness, for the purpose of gaining new federal wilderness designations in the Allegheny National Forest. Wilderness Protection for the old-growth Tionesta Scenic and Research Natural Areas will be the organization's highest priority. Johnson described the proposed Tionesta Wilderness in an article in the October 2001 issue of Natural Areas Journal. The designated Wilderness would protect 8000 to 13,000 hectares, including the 1670 hectares in the Tionesta old-growth areas. It would thus provide a wilderness buffer for the old growth. Friends of Allegheny Wildernesss have a Web site at www.pawild.org .

The Friends received publicity in Pittsburgh in December, with an article in the Post Gazette, December 24 (www.postgazette.com/healthscience/20011224wilderness1224p2.asp) followed by an editorial in the same newspaper, not altogether favorable but nevertheless helping to spread the word, December 27 (www.postgazette.com/forum/2001227edforest1227p1.asp).

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Biologist Aubrey O. Neas, Jr. has determined that units 4 and 9 of the proposed Hoover Creek Timber Sale on Little Mountain in the James River District of George Washington National Forest support old-growth dry mesic oak forest that "could exceed a hundred acres" in total. The US Forest Service has not addressed the question of how these small to medium old-growth areas fit into plans for old growth on the George Washington, nor, most importantly, how they fit the "stepping stone" concept outlined in the Service's Guidance for old growth in the Southern Region (USFS Forestry Report R8-FR62). Neas notes that Mike Donahue and Steve Croy of USFS identified old growth within and outside of units 4 and 9 and points out that the lines for the units in the timber sale are arbitrary and that the boundaries of units 4 and 9 could be redrawn to exclude areas that are not old growth. (Source: Letter from Aubrey O. Neas, Jr., Biologist/Naturalist, to Ted Harris, President of the 500-Year Forest Foundation, November 7, 2001)

October 21, Kentucky will open to the public a new nature preserve, its largest, some 2500 acres of old growth on Pine Mountain in Harlan County (see Kentucky's Blanton Forest below). The preserve has one 2.4-mile trail that ends at an outcrop, Knobby Rock, from which visitors can see for miles. On their way they pass through oak-hickory forest, huge hemlocks, and rhododendrons. To reach the preserve, go east from Corbin on US 25E; turn left toward Harlan on US 119; and turn left on Ky 840. The preserve is open every day during daylight hours. (Source: Andy Mead, Lexington Herald, Oct. 19, 2001)

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The week of June 11 the Kentucky State Nature Preserves Commission completed the purchase of the 2350 acres of old growth that compose the core of Blanton Forest. The Commission acquired the land from the daughters of Grover and Oxie Blanton. Grover Blanton had protected the land from logging. The purchase, which has taken place in two stages, was made possible by gifts from foundations, corporations, and individuals. The Commission is now raising money to buy, as buffer, 4350 acres that surround the old growth. The purchased land is now the Blanton Forest State Nature Preserve. For more information or to donate online, go to www.knlt.org.

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Two outbreaks of the hemlock wooly adelgid have unfortunately been spotted in Nantahala National Forest. They are located in Graham County in western North Carolina. Nantahala National Forest supports spectacular old-growth hemlocks, as does Great Smoky Mountains National Park, which is just ten miles from the outbreaks. The hemlock woolly adelgid was introduced to this country from Asia in 1924. An aphid-like insect, it sucks sap from young twigs of hemlock trees, thus slowing or stopping the growth of the trees. (Asheville CitizenTimes, 4/16/01)

The following are excerpts from comments on the adelgid, recently posted to a Trees list serve

The 'problem' with hemlock is that the professional forestry community doesn't
care, because they view hemlock as a nuisance (although there certainly are
exceptions among foresters). Another aspect of the hemlock adelgid problem is the necessity to document
exemplary stands of hemlock now, and collect seeds from them, so that
hemlock forests throughout the range can be restored with local genetic
sources after the insect has gone through.--Lee Frehlich, University of Minnesota

Mark McClure, at the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station,
is testing several oriental lady beetles as possible controls. One
species of beetle has been approved for release, is being bred in
quantity, and will be released in other locations this season.
Some concerns have been raised regarding potential negative secondary
effects of introducing yet more nonnative species to combat a problem
species. There is a rare butterfly, the Harvester, whose caterpillars
feed only on native wooly aphids (which feed on alder) and the question
has arisen whether introduced lady beetles might harm this rare speciesD
(our only carnivorous caterpillar in MA). Testing in the lab indicates
the beetles have a strong preference for hemlock wooly adelgid over
other potential food items including the alder wooly aphid the
caterpillars rely on..--Heidi Roddis, Massachusetts Audubon Society
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The Western Maryland Chapter of the Sierra Club has launched a Save Our Savages (SOS) campaign to convince Maryland’s Department of Natural Resources to protect two areas within Savage River State Forest: 1500 acres on the southern end and east side of Big Savage Mountain and the 3200-acre Savage Ravines. The agency is revising its ten-year management plan for the forest this year. Roads run through parts of these areas, and logging has taken place; but they are largely mature forest, and include as much as 200 acres of old growth, Mark Diehl, the chapter’s conservation chair, reports. For more information or to become involved, go to www.saveoursavages.org .

January 8, US Forest Service Chief Mike Dombeck concluded a speech at the Landscape Legacies Conference at Duke University by setting forth a new policy to identify and preserve old growth on the National Forests:

For too long, we allowed the issues of old-growth forests and roadless areas to serve as poster children for both sides of the conflict industry. In the not-so-distant past, old trees were viewed as “overmature” or “decadent” and targeted for cutting because of their high economic values. Today, national forests contain our last remaining sizable blocks of old-growth forest — a remnant of America’s original landscape. In the future, we will celebrate the fact that national forests serve as a reservoir for our last remaining old-growth forests and their associated ecological and social values.

In 1989, Chief Dale Robertson issued an old-growth policy statement. Chief Robertson’s policy, issued in the midst of a controversial debate over spotted owl protection in the Pacific Northwest, called for standard definitions and inventories of old growth by forest type. The definitions were largely completed, although some might need revision based on new science and new information. New science and technology allows us to map and inventory the remaining old-growth forests with more accuracy and precision.

It is time we revised and strengthened Chief Robertson’s old-growth policy. In the future, the Forest Service will manage old-growth forests specifically to maintain and enhance old-growth values and characteristics. We will develop manual direction that directs individual forests to:

I will anticipate the critics’ charge that protecting old growth somehow translates into an abandonment of multiple use and active management.

In fact, the opposite is true. In 2000, we had our worst fire season in years. In response, we developed a strategy to demonstrate how appropriate active management — prescribed fire, thinning and other mechanical treatments — can enhance ecosystem health and resiliency in fire-adapted forests where fire has been excluded. Many million acres of already roaded areas in national forests are at risk from uncharacteristic fire effects that can threaten communities, water quality, soils and habitat. This is where we must focus our work.

What we do not need to do to accomplish our stewardship responsibilities is to harvest old-growth trees. In some cases, when old-growth resources and values are threatened by the risk of uncharacteristic fire effects, we might choose to carefully thin and burn understory vegetation while leaving older, larger trees intact. Restoration will focus on the already roaded and managed portions of our landscape. That is where the risk is greatest to communities, municipal watersheds and habitat for threatened and endangered species.

We will work with local communities to prioritize and implement restoration projects. That means local jobs. It also means a new way of doing business, a changing focus for our timber program. In the future, timber harvest on national forests will serve as a tool for protecting watersheds, for creating habitat for threatened and endangered species, for restoring our ailing ecosystems to health, for protecting communities.

Taking the long view, our central challenge in the coming millennium will be to demonstrate our resolve to protecting roadless areas and old-growth forests while building support for the need to restore fire-dependent landscapes. In the process, we can diminish the controversy surrounding national forest management, provide more jobs and more wood fiber through restoration, and build a constituency for active management based on scientific and ecologically conservative principles.