In Trashing Land, The EPA Has Nothing On The Forest Service

Americans now comprehend fully the disdain the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has for truth-telling, the rights of others, and the environment. Forget the last six spiteful years; the Colorado mine disaster suffices. The EPA’s wanton malfeasance — experts warned of a catastrophic blowout — unleashed three million gallons of orange arsenic-, cadmium-, and lead-laden wastewater into an Animas River tributary trashing public, private, and tribal lands and waters in Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and the Navajo Nation. Even so, the EPA has nothing on the U.S. Forest Service.


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Time to scrap the Blue Mountains Forest Plan Revision

Earlier this year, we sent out information about the Blue Mountains Forest Plan Revision (BMFP) for the Malheur, Umatilla and Wallowa-Whitman National Forests. Barring a congressional solution promoting active management of federal lands, the updated forest plan would have a major impact on how our forests and its resources will be managed in the future.

The proposed Blue Mountains Forest Plan Revision is available at this web site (click here).

Over the past few months, many of you have taken the time to review the planning documents and provide thoughtful comments. But as the BMFP moves towards its next phase, it has become clear that the proposed Forest Plan is deeply flawed. The documents suggest the U.S. Forest Service is not interested in active, multiple-use management we need to restore forest health, keep our forest accessible or protect our remaining forest products jobs and infrastructure.

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Road closure plan for Oregon's largest national forest targets a nearly 4,000-mile network

LA GRANDE (3/15/2012) -- Starting in June, passenger cars, ATVs, dirt bikes and four-wheel-drive rigs can no longer travel on almost 4,000 miles of roads in Oregon's largest national forest.  ✧ The final plan for Wallowa-Whitman National Forest -- to be entered today into the Federal Register -- is already drawing opposition. People have 45 days to appeal.  ✧ Earlier versions of the policy triggered one of the most vocal resistance efforts in the state, with more than 6,000 people signing petitions urging the U.S. Forest Service to leave all the forest's roads open. Read more: OregonLive.com Read More......

Oregon humans in peril but spotted owl safe (or not)

CORVALLIS GAZETTE-TIMES, 7/17/2009 by Jeff Barnard (AP Environmental writer) - Obama administration scraps Bush logging plan

The Illustrated Owl: Barn, Barred, & Great Horned by Denny Rogers, Lori Corbett
Page 84 - BARRED OWL FACTS - Diet and Habitat
[Excerpt] "The barred owl is abundant in the deep woods and swamp forests of the Southeast but is slowly expanding its range westward. Its counterpart in the West is the spotted owl, however, the more aggressive barred owl is gradually taking over the territory of the spotted owl, as well as interbreeding. The genetics of these two owls are so similar that many believe the spotted is merely a subspecies of the barred."

Related:
Posted 7/8/2009 - Judge overturns Bush administration logging rule
National Center for Conservation Science & Policy: The Spotted Owl's New Nemesis Read More......

Judge overturns Bush administration logging rule

SEATTLE TIMES, 7/1/2009 by Jeff Barnard, AP Environmental Writer: GRANTS PASS, Ore. — A federal judge has struck down the Bush administration's change to a rule designed to protect the northern spotted owl from logging in national forests. ∴ U.S. District Judge Claudia Wilken ruled from Oakland, Calif., on Tuesday that the U.S. Forest Service failed to take a hard look at the environmental impacts of changing the rule to make it easier to cut down forest habitat of species such as the spotted owl and salmon on 193 million acres of national forests. ∴ "I am hopeful that this is the last nail in the coffin to (President George W.) Bush's assault on our public forests," said Pete Frost, an attorney for the Western Environmental Law Center in Eugene, which represented plaintiffs in one of two cases challenging the rule. Read more at the Seattle Times... Read More......