Utilizing and preserving our national forests

Part Two in a Series

After graduating Yale and studying forestry in France, Gifford Pinchot embarked on a crusade that would not only make him one of Teddy Roosevelt’s closest advisors, but would set the stage for the creation of the United States Forest Service.

Roosevelt and Pinchot began a quest for conservation in a time when clear-cutting was the norm and “robber-barons” were clear cutting the vast forests of the west. But through the efforts of Pinchot and the authority of Roosevelt a new era of “practical forestry” began.

Pinchot instilled the principles of “practical forestry” into the first USFS Rangers, known as “Little GP’s,” in the nation through lectures and a series of books including “A Primer on Forestry.”

Part two of that primer lays out just what Pinchot meant by “practical forestry:”

“The object of practical forestry is precisely to make the forest render its best service to man in such a way as to increase rather than to diminish its usefulness in the future. Forest management and conservative lumbering are other names for practical forestry. Under whatever name it may be known, practical forestry means both the use and preservation of the forest. (emphasis added)”

…

Rather than being a document of bureaucratic and legalese nature, the Cedar Thom Environmental Impact Statement is written in the same spirit and passion for the forest that Pinchot himself had. It is a statement written by USFS employees with a combined 131-years of experience working amongst the vastness that is Lolo National Forest.

The Cedar Thom Project EIS was completed in 2011 by a team of USFS employees with a wide variety of knowledge as well as a collaborative group of individuals that volunteered their time to help develop the action steps proposed in the document.

However almost three years since the completion of the EIS, the area encompassing the Cedar Thom project remains the same as it did when action was first proposed and a formal inquiry into its current status has been launched by the Mineral County Commissioners.

“We just want to find out why it’s being held up,” Commissioner Laurie Johnston said. “The last thing we have heard about it was that it was being held up by the fisheries and we’d like them (USDA Forest Service representatives) to explain why.”

A “Priority 1 Area”

Under the Northern Region Integrated Restoration and Protection Strategy (a policy adopted in 2011 as a tool to be used by local USFS agencies in the identification and development of integrated projects), the Cedar Thom Project is classified a “Priority 1 area.” This classification puts the project at the top of the priority list for projects in the USFS Northern Region.

According to a Northern Region overview, the Northern Region IRPS uses spatial mapping to “prioritize areas that are regionally significant” for the purpose of developing projects “which address land and water restoration needs and respond to community protection plans.”

“The Cedar-Thom area ranked high because it contains opportunities to restore high value winter range for deer and elk, priority bull trout streams, resilient forest vegetative conditions; and opportunities to reduce fuels within wild land urban interface areas adjacent to the community of Superior that could be affected by large scale wildfire,” the environmental impact statement reads.

The document elaborates on the community protection plan created by Mineral County in 2005, which identified the northeastern end of the project area as “a high priority for fuels reduction treatment due to hazardous fuel conditions on the heavily timbered slopes of National Forest Service land located above the residential subdivisions that lie between Interstate 90 and the Cedar Thom project area.”

“Many homeowners have implemented fuel reduction activities on their own land to do what they can to reduce their risk from wildfire,” the environmental impact statement reads. “The CWPP identified this area as having the highest community values at risk to wildfire within Mineral County.”

According to the EIS, less than two percent of the project area has burned in wildfires since 1920, which is “far less area” than burned prior to 1920 “over a similar time frame”.

“Tree density has increased, which has resulted in a higher susceptibility to insects, disease, and drought as trees compete for sunlight, water, and nutrients. Past and on-going tree mortality is evident in the project area,” the environmental impact statement reads. “Within areas that would have historically burned at low to mixed severity, the combination of dead fuel and continuous live vegetation has created a complex of fuel that will likely burn at a high severity that may leave little surviving above ground vegetation.”

The Superior Ranger District also pinpointed the Cedar Thom area as a location that “presented numerous opportunities to make improvements toward achieving desired conditions for several different resources.”

“Based on the existing conditions in the watershed, the local consensus was that management activities in this area could result in important gains to wildlife and aquatic habitat, vegetative conditions, recreation opportunities, and community protection,” the environmental impact statement reads.

After coming to this conclusion, the Superior Ranger District engaged in discussion with members of the community ranging from residents who live and recreate in the area to county commissioners and a state legislator.

A Need Identified, A Project Created

After conducting preliminary research using the Northern Region IRPS and engaging the public discussion on the area, the Superior Ranger District began work on a series of proposed actions for the areas.

The EIS lays out the purposes for the proposed actions (the complete EIS as well as the list of proposed actions can be found at http://www.fs.fed.us/nepa/nepa_project_exp.php?project=29614) as follows:

-Restore vegetative conditions that are resistant to undesirable effects of fires, insects, disease, and drought; resilient in response to those natural disturbances; and responsive to fundamental environmental shifts so ecological processes will sustain composition, structure, species, and genetic diversity in the future.

-Reduce forest fuels in wildland urban interface (WUI) and non-WUI areas and re-establish fire as a disturbance process on the landscape.

-Improve and maintain big game winter range.

-Enhance watershed health.

-Enhance recreation opportunities and establish trail travel management designations consistent with land management objectives.

Through both public and internal comment on the project several “key” issues were identified, which resulted in the drafting of several proposed action steps on the projects.

One of the major issues included in the EIS is that Cedar Creek was identified as a “priority bull trout watershed” and as such the proposed activities in the project area “may affect threatened and sensitive fish species within the watershed.” Several other issues were identified in the report and the Superior Ranger District also received comments regarding the fact that suppression of lighting fires is a primary reason why the area is of such high priority. These comments suggested the best course of action would be to let naturally ignited wildfires burn without human intervention.

“While philosophically this may appear to be an easy restoration tool, it is important to remember that much of the landscape has been altered by fire exclusion,” the environmental impact statement reads. “The 80 years of fire suppression have caused unusually high live and dead fuel accumulations in many stands that, when ignited, would create a fire that would be abnormally severe and kill most of the trees. Fire spread, which typically follows the prevailing wind patterns from southwest to northeast, means that large, uncontrolled fires could threaten Superior and the surrounding community located northeast of the project area.”

An Explanation for the Delay

The Cedar Thom project has not yet been initiated and is still “under analysis” according to the Superior Ranger District website.

Further detail on the state of the project shows that a “Final Environmental Impact Statement” is estimated to be published on January of 2014.

On July 31, county commissioners sent a letter to Regional Forester Faye Krueger requesting her presence at an August 30 meeting due to concern of the “apparent suspension” of the forest management program in Mineral County.

This concern came primarily from the status of the Cedar Thom project and stated that since 2011 “no projects have been completed and forest management in our area has been non-existent.”

Krueger responded to the letter stating that she would not be available to attend a meeting until late September and recommended Forest Supervisor Debbie Austin attend the Aug. 30 meeting in her place.

On Friday Austin will be in Mineral County and will be asked by county commissioners what the status of the Cedar Thom project is as well as what the status of county forest management projects in general are.

Austin’s answer to the question, as well as the future action of the USFS will tell whether or not Pinchot’s definition of practical forestry still exists today.

Part three of the series on timber in Mineral County will focus on the future of forest management in the county as well as the often fiery consequences of a forest not managed.