184 – Earth’s Trees

Today for you 43 news items about Earth’s trees. Location, number and subject listed below. Condensed / abbreviated article is listed further below.

Can be viewed on the web at http://www.livejournal.com/users/olyecology or
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–British Columbia: 1) Logging beetle killed pine ruins land’s hydrology,
–Washington: 2) Weyco action, 3) Another Weyco action, 4) budget cuts hit fed refuges,
–Oregon: 5) restoring prairie and oak, 6) Reflections on forest activists, 7) Closed doors, 8) Owl wins loggers lose,
–California: 9) 75 get naked to save oaks, 10) High court backs enviros in Eldorado, 11) Apple branch thieves sued for $2 million,
–Montana: 12) Save Swan River State Forest,
–Missouri: 13) Escanaba city forest will be logged, 14) Logger trainings for old timers,
–Arkansas: 15) LIDAR-ing the Ozark National Forest, 16) heritage of funky trees,
–North Carolina: 17) Flowering ephemerals and the logging economy
–South Carolina: 18) losing 200 acres of forest per day, 19) Redbay ambrosia beetle,
–USA: 20) Reckless lending and reckless logging, 21) Teak-wood salvage,
–Canada: 22) Protect Ontario’s intact boreal for the climate, 23) Boreal info,
–North America: 24) “Thrillcraft” book
–UK: 25) Logging makes a new view of Sussex Lunatic Asylum, 26) Cutting with no permit, 27) Save historic Elms, 28) Scottish forest industry,
–Germany: 29) Biodiversity, alongside climate change, at the top of G8 agenda
–Africa: 30) 9% of all that remains lost in only 15 years?
–South America: 31) Lapacho tree bark can heal eye tumors
–Guyana: 32) Akawini Village gets swindled by loggers, 33) Ancient Human Fires,
–Brazil: 34) Environmental geographer who specializes in tropical deforestation
–Pakistan: 35) Massive cutting of trees by city government
–Bangladesh 36) Bombing range = loss of 2 villages, more than 500 acres of Sal forest
–Brunei: 37) More deception about being a good role model in forestry
–Borneo: 38) Save the Sebangau peat swamp forest,
–Indonesia: 39) Just lie then up the cut, 40) forked tongue leadership, 41) World record,
–Australia: 42) Rayonier-Forest Enterprises log deal is reviewed
–World-wide: 43) Acid Rain

British Columbia:

1) A new study is set to be released Monday warning of the affects timber salvage of pine beetle wood has on river flows in the Quesnel region. The study, conducted by University of British Columbia for Forest Practice Services, will claim excessive timber harvest of pine beetle wood is creating a problem with peak flows in the Baker Creek water system. Steve Chatwin, manager of special projects for Forest Practices Board, wouldn’t give all the details of the study, but said it found significant changes in Baker Creek’s flow. Using a computer simulation model, UBC researchers could simulate peak flow as far back as 1970. “It’s the first study and only study that’s been done in the province on a whole large watershed,” Chatwin said. Chatwin said hydrological changes have to be taken into consideration when harvesting timber from pine beetle areas. “To simply have a plan to salvage an entire water shed in a short period of time, has to be balanced with the changes that are going to take place in the stream flows,” Chatwin said. http://www.quesnelobserver.com/portals-code/list.cgi?paper=27&cat=23&id=854869&more=

Washington:

2) BOTHELL – Sheriff’s deputies arrested two protesters for deliberately trespassing at a new housing development Wednesday evening, officials said. A man, 24, and a woman, 25, both of Seattle, chained themselves together on top of a model home in the 19100 block of 13th Avenue SE, sheriff’s spokeswoman Rebecca Hover said. About 16 people protested on the ground. The protesters told deputies they were upset with Weyerhaeuser Co.’s use of lumber from Canadian forests, she said. The housing development is being built by Quadrant Homes, a Weyerhaeuser subsidiary. Deputies were called to the area just after 3 p.m., Hover said. The arrests were made just before 6 p.m. A Bothell Fire Department ladder truck was used to bring the protesters off the roof. Protesters from the same organizations were outside the Everett Events Center on Tuesday. http://www.heraldnet.com/stories/07/03/15/100loc_b2protest001.cfm photos: http://weknowhowitends.livejournal.com/11711.html

3) With every good action, you need an audience, media, passion, and a clear message. My friend and I, dressed to blend in with the business crowd. I went in lookin’ like Dolly Parton as the banner was stuffed in the chest of my jacket. The event had attracted sustainable builders (“green” builders)and designers from all over the Northwest. Somehow Quadrant Homes, a greenwashing housing developer subsidiary of the much despised Weyerhaeuser was not only invited to the conference, but was also supposed to be given an award! After listening to awesome speeches on sustainability and how we needed to go green or go extinct my friend with the camera set herself up so she could see the stage perfectly, while I made my way to the front. With more than 500 people in the audience, Quadrant was announced to receive the award. From my place in the front row near the stage, my heart beat pounding wildly in my ears, my love for fellow people in a struggle, my passion for protecting the natural environment, I got up from my seat unfolding the banner. I turned to the audience and with my loudest clearest voice, yelled: “Quadrant Homes is stealing from indigenous lands!” The security guards had started rushing towards me as soon as I left my seat…I stood my ground and held up the banner made out to be a professional looking award for being the Quadrant Home Green Impostors. “The only award that Quadrant deserves is for Eco-Fraud! The security guards had surrounded me, they pushed me towards the back door away from the stage. I wasn’t done, though. I told one guard, looking him straight in the eyes in a calm serious voice,” Do not touch me, get your hand off me!” He did, and I turned back to the audience “QUADRANT HOMES IS CLEAR CUTTING ENDANGERED FORESTS! THEY DO NOT DESERVE THIS AWARD! PLEEEASE DO NOT GIVE THEM THE AWARD.” My last words lingered in the room as some of the audience booed the Quadrant representative to the stage. I felt pleased and satisfied that I reached so many of Quadrants peers and hopeful that my message would persuade quadrant to stop logging on Grassy Narrows lands and all endangered or indigenous lands thereafter. –Tyga http://www.quadranthomes.com/contactus/

4) Faced with a $2.5 billion budget shortfall, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is eliminating hundreds of jobs, cutting back programs and even closing some national wildlife refuges. In all, the agency is planning to cut 565 jobs from wildlife refuges by 2009, a 20 percent reduction. Environmentalists say the staffing cuts will leave an already lean work force depleted and result in a decrease in habitat management, restoration projects and education projects. More than 200 wildlife refuges across the country will be unstaffed. The cuts go deep at Washington’s 22 refuges, which include the popular Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge. Washington refuges are losing 26 of 93 positions. The Nisqually refuge has lost two of nine positions, manager Jean Takekawa said. The refuge is cutting habitat management, native plant restoration, educational programs and control of nonnative plants, Takekawa said. “Going down to seven positions really does have an impact,” Takekawa said. “When you lose this much staff, you must do less with less.” Nisqually manages two other areas, Black Lake and Grays Harbor, but those units usually don’t have staff on site. Nisqually is going ahead on a project to tear down man-made dikes and restore parts of the refuge, which was once a farm, to an estuary of the Nisqually River. The Nisqually Tribe is a partner in the estuary restoration. The estuary restoration is considered a key element to improving the Puget Sound web of life and helping struggling salmon runs. The refuge is looking for grants and other funding for estuary restoration. http://www.theolympian.com/107/story/70676.html

Oregon:

5) The couple is helping restore natural upland prairies and oak stands on their 40 acres near Wren. “You don’t need to produce a tree on every acre,” Ken said. Ken is helping Benton County develop its habitat conservation plan and also assisted the state a few years ago when it created a wildlife conservation plan. Since the 1980s, he and Karin steadily purchased land, even as they were working for other people. Now their own business is their sole gig. Besides land near Wren, they have 115 acres near Monroe and another 160 in Douglas County that they share with friends.Until 2003, though, the Faulks never lived on the timberland they worked, and that meant an hour’s drive to do any pruning or thinning. That year, they finished building their Wren-area house. Now all Ken has to do is walk out the door and he’s among Douglas fir trees. The house is a gorgeous place, and not just because of the siding and flooring from timber on the property. There’s also a magnificent view from the back porch. “On a clear day, we can see all the way south to Spencer’s Butte in Eugene,” Ken said. http://www.gazettetimes.com/articles/2007/03/16/news/focus/focus06_faulk.txt

6) I visited the tree-sitters at Fall Creek and have listened to stories from tree-sits in other locations. These people love the ancient forest and are grief-stricken and angry about the ecological consequences of its destruction. They are putting their lives on the line to save old-growth trees. I deeply admire their committed, long-term effort, their hard and sometimes dangerous work. I watched a video of a small group in California chained together and to a tree. Instead of cutting the chains, the police pepper-sprayed each one, including their eyes, as they sat there silently. I have been happy to redirect some of my federal military taxes to support tree-sitters. I wish that more of us were more informed about what they’ve been doing. I disagree with many of the attitudes and strategies that have been used by some groups in the very diverse movement that rose up in the ‘90s. I want to participate in actions that express firmness and commitment to a goal but that are also friendly, respectful, and open. I want to listen to all points of view and to understand my adversaries as human beings. I believe that we in the nonviolent movement for peace and justice must be willing to make sacrifices as great as those of our men and women in the military. I have disagreed with the underground movement that has engaged in property destruction – from SUVs to logging trucks to various buildings. However, the actions of these people – as far as I know – have not killed or injured a single person. When I was serving my brief three months as a prisoner of conscience in a federal minimum-security prison, another inmate was a young woman who had participated in the burning of a logging truck serving her sentence of several years with dignity. She also received a huge fine that will follow her most of her life. Her punishment is excessive, but far less so than that of Jeffrey Luers, who is serving 22+ years in a maximum-security prison. Excessive sentencing is one reason that we have more prisoners per person than any other industrialized country. http://breakallchains.blogspot.com/2007/03/eco-what-ists-rantings-of-long-term.html

7) “Behind closed doors, the biomass energy and timber industries have been lobbying Gov. Ted Kulongoski, legislators such as Sen. Vicki Walker and Oregon members of Congress.” Wilson further asserts, “This is being done without soliciting diverse input from grass-roots conservation groups, scientists or the public.” Let’s directly address those assertions of “behind closed doors” and “without soliciting diverse input.” The working group has been working to identify both bioenergy and biofuels opportunities to simultaneously reduce the fuel loading, to increase the use of renewables for both electricity and biofuels needs, and to improve the economic conditions of rural communities. The group produced a 60-page report in January that can be found at this same Web site. The report has been presented publicly to Gov. Ted Kulongoski’s Renewable Energy Working Group, state legislators and a public forum sponsored by the Oregon Forest Resources Institute in January that attracted more than 250 participants. Let’s focus on Wilson’s key point, that, “With global climate change looming, we need to apply the precautionary principle or the do-no-harm principle. … Native and natural forests on public lands should not be treated as a fuel source for the profit of the timber, biomass or utility industries.” http://www.registerguard.com/news/2007/03/16/ed.col.biomass.0316.p1.php

8) More than 60 million board feet of timber already sold but not cut on the U.S. Bureau of Land Management’s Medford District is on hold after the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service withdrew its biological opinion authorizing logging in northern spotted owl habitat. In letters sent Tuesday and Thursday to district manager Tim Reuwsaat, the agency stated it is taking the action to comply with a Feb. 16 decision by the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco. The appellant judges, ruling on a 2006 lawsuit filed by the Portland based Oregon Wild, the Klamath-Siskiyou Wildlands Center in Ashland and other environmental groups, invalidated the agency’s authorization to allow logging in areas that contain northern spotted owl habitat. This week’s action came after the Fish and Wildlife Service on March 1 withdrew “incidental take statements” for biological opinions on the northern spotted owl habitat lands. It has since determined withdrawal of all biological opinions pertaining to the spotted owls is warranted under the court decision, said Phil Carroll, spokesman for the agency’s Portland office. Incidental take statements refer to how many spotted owls will be displaced by planned logging. The court had agreed with the plaintiffs that the incidental take statements must not go beyond the scope of biological opinions and must be closely linked. “By withdrawing the opinions, the BLM is no longer covered” by Fish and Wildlife’s authorization, Carroll said. “We are meeting with national forest and BLM folks now to figure out what we need to do to bring everything in compliance with the 9th Circuit Court decision.” http://www.mailtribune.com/archive/2007/0316/local/stories/harvest-delay-pf.htm

California:

9) Police officers were among the bystanders in Berkeley today as about 75 models were photographed in the nude to bring attention to the planned removal of oak trees to make way for a new stadium. Bay Area photographer Jack Gescheidt’s ongoing “The TreeSpirit Project” depicts unclothed people and trees together. Media attention to the controversy over replacing the aging Memorial Stadium on the campus of the University of California at Berkeley drew Gescheidt to try a new composition at the Memorial Oak Grove, he said. “Humans are drawn to trees, they are important to us in ways that can be difficult to describe in words,” Gescheidt said. “My work is all about recognizing and capturing the power of that connection.” Activist Doug Buckwald said Berkeley police officers warned the participants that citations and arrests could follow if they carried out the photo shoot. However, no one who participated was arrested, he said. http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=local&id=5131447

10) The Supreme Court declined to step into a fight Monday between the Bush administration and environmental groups who are trying to stop logging in a national forest that was damaged by wildfires. The justices refused to review an appeals court decision that temporarily blocked logging in two sections of the Eldorado National Forest, near Sacramento, Calif., while the Earth Island Institute and the Center for Biological Diversity pursue a lawsuit against the U.S. Forest Service. Fires burned nearly 19,000 acres of the forest in 2004. At issue is whether the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals applied the proper legal standard in granting a preliminary injunction against the logging. The environmental groups claim in their lawsuit that the Forest Service used poor science to determine which trees died or are dying because of the fires and failed to compensate for the logging’s impact on the California spotted owl. http://www.mercurynews.com/news/ci_5471558

11) According to Barron, the tree is believed to be more than 75 years old and resembles a Pink Pearl apple or its parent, the Surprise apple. Higuera’s story begins in 1997 when she purchased the property at Tassajara and Carmel Valley roads from the daughter of friends who had died tragically there. In March 2001, after Higuera was injured on the job and forced to retire, she was hospitalized. When she returned on March 11, 2001, Barron said, she was shocked to find someone had “hacked the heck” out of her apple tree, which sits a short distance from her house. Higuera reported the incident to the Monterey County Sheriff’s Office, which took photographs and issued a report, but the case sat unresolved for five years. In the meantime, frightened by the intrusion onto her property, Higuera had an adobe wall constructed around her house, snuggling just beyond and under the drooping branches of the apple tree. Then, in October, Higuera was attracted to a story in Monterey County Weekly about the new popularity of heirloom apples. Her mystery, she believed, was solved. In the article, Marino talks about his first crop of pink-fleshed apples, propagated through a tip by national food guru Andrew Weil. Marino said Weil, who lived in Carmel Valley in the ’60s and ’70s, was speaking at an Earthbound-sponsored luncheon when he told him about the special tree with the pink apples in the valley. Higuera has filed suit against Earthbound and farm manager Mark Marino, charging trespass, conversion of personal property for profit and intentional infliction of emotional distress. Carmel attorney Gerald Barron is seeking compensatory and punitive damages that he said could top $2 million. http://www.montereyherald.com/mld/montereyherald/news/16929484.htm?source=rss&channel=montereyh
erald_news

Montana:

12) An environmental group, contending plans to log part of the Swan River State Forest would violate the Endangered Species Act, has given notice of intent to sue. The logging and road work planned by the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation would threaten bull trout and grizzly bears, said Arlene Montgomery of Friends of the Wild Swan. The group says it will file a lawsuit in federal court if endangered-species concerns are not resolved within 60 days. “South Lost and Soup creeks have been designated critical habitat for bull trout and deserve a higher level of protection,” Montgomery said. “Instead, this project gives them less protection than even previous timber sales.” A DNRC official said the agency looked carefully at endangered-species concerns before approving the Three Creeks Project. It calls for logging on 1,884 acres. Included are 1,222 acres of old-growth forest, 658 of which still would meet the definition of old-growth after the logging. Plans include 19 miles of new roads, 47 miles of road improvements and relocation of a road. David Groeschl, forest management bureau chief for DNRC, said the plan is not overly ambitious and meets terms of a Swan Valley conservation agreement. That agreement signed by public and private forest managers is being revised. Groeschl said he does not know whether Three Creeks would pass muster under the new version. The project must comply with the current agreement, not a version yet to come, he said. http://www.helenair.com/articles/2007/03/16/ap-state-mt/d8ntbjd01.txt

Missouri:

13) ESCANABA — A comprehensive plan to manage forests on city-owned property will serve many purposes, according to city officials. The forest plan and a timber sale agreement were approved by council Thursday. Logging operations will generate revenue for the city through timber sales as well as create roads that will aid in cleaning up trash and allow recreation trails to become reality, said City Manager Jim O’Toole. The forest management plan, submitted by NewPage Corp., identifies timber and stands on the city’s approximate 5,000 acres of forest. The report names 49 stands and suggests recommendations when to clearcut, thin or select cut each stand during the next 40 years. “By managing the city’s timber … we’ll harvest mature timber which will be revenue to the people of Escanaba,” O’Toole said following Thursday’s meeting. “There will be an initial harvest, over a two-year period, of mature and over-mature timber on 713 acres.” Before each cutting takes place, the city will conduct hearings for citizens to offer their input or concerns, O’Toole said. The forest management plan took more than a year to develop. The process began with forester Gilbert Marshall walking the property to identify the various species on the land. Cutting recommendations were made in relation to the type, age and quality of trees. Considerations were also made for wildlife, streams and threatened or endangered plant and bird species. The city entered into a timber sales agreement with Upper Michigan Land Management and Wildlife Services, Escanaba, which will manage the timber harvesting, O’Toole said. The company will work for the city in advertising for bids, awarding bids to contractors, inspecting logging operations, and performing several other duties. http://www.dailypress.net/stories/articles.asp?articleID=8946

14) Jerry Sindelar said he works in an auto-body repair shop in O’Fallon. He belongs to a rod and gun club that owns 200 acres of mostly forested land, and has a little acreage himself. He heats with wood. “I have been cutting trees for 30 years, but I’m probably not doing it right,” he said. “I ain’t hurt nothing yet, but I want to learn to do it right and take care of the woods for my grandkids.” Sue Cox is horticulturalist who does landscape design for a private golf course in Eureka. She took the class with her husband, Wayne, a retired auto worker who has been cutting his own firewood for 25 years. Like Sindelar, they own a little forested acreage, and they want to improve the quality of their timber. “I’m not in it for the money,” said Sue, “but for the knowledge. We burn wood, but I’m doing this to understand the whole ecology of the forest and how to do it correctly. I have taken down big trees, but I never knew all the things to watch for that could be a danger and how to tell for sure which way a tree is going to fall.” Bryan Martin, a retired union carpenter from De Soto, also knew a thing or two about felling trees. He learned his way around a chainsaw as a boy and still cuts firewood for extra income. Still, he admitted to having had “a few incidents with trees.” In one, his chainsaw threw back a cedar limb, and the pointed end pierced his leg. In another incident, a tree with grapevines growing in its top twisted on its stump, grinding an expensive chainsaw into useless, twisted metal. http://www.infozine.com/news/stories/op/storiesView/sid/21604/

Arkansas:

15) University of Arkansas entomology Professor Fred Stephen and geosciences Professor Jason Tullis are using airborne light detection and ranging, or LIDAR, to map a forested area of the Ozark National Forest in which many trees succumbed to red oak borers during the infestation earlier in the decade. The LIDAR instrument, mounted in an airplane, shoots about 50,000 near-infrared laser pulses per second at the ground. In the case of a typical red oak tree, return pulses originate from leaves, branches, the trunk and the ground. The location of each return pulse is computed, allowing the researchers to study a three-dimensional “point cloud” representing forest structure and terrain. That information will be used along with field studies to look for patterns that might provide insight into the origins of the outbreak. “If we could map the vulnerability of these ecosystems, we might be able to determine what areas need extra attention,” Stephen said. http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/index.php?feed=Science&article=UPI-1-20070315-10005500-bc-us-re
doaks.xml:

16) The trees with bent and knotty trunks they occasionally encountered didn’t make the cut. Only quality trees made the best railroad ties, wagon spokes and lumber to fuel Northwest Arkansas’ first building boom. A sawmill in the cleft of Van Winkle Hollow at what is now Hobbs State Park-Conservation Area east of Rogers turned out boards to construct the University of Arkansas’ revered Old Main building. The wood was used to build stately homes in the region. Ozarks’ lumberjacks had no use for the bowed and disfigured trees they found in the hills. These freakish hardwoods, most always oaks, likely prompted nothing more than a head scratch and a quizzical glance before the men sank their saw teeth into more worthy wood. That’s fortunate. Otherwise few American Indian trail trees would be standing in forests today. http://www.nwaonline.net/articles/2007/03/15/outdoors/031607trees.txt

North Carolina:

17) A group of wildflowers called spring ephemerals are integrally associated with mature deciduous woods. These plants push up through the leaf litter in late winter and soak up enough sun to last the year before the trees set their leafy canopy and block the incoming rays. Before an oak has grown leaves a trout lily will have leafed out, flowered, produced seeds and stored a year’s supply of food in an underground tuber. This winter I walked through an area that was once home to some of these species and others I hadn’t discovered yet. It had been clear-cut. The trees were gone, but only the biggest and straightest were taken. The rest lay scattered or in haphazard piles. Timber machinery had scarred the earth and allowed the rain to create rivulets of mud. I went to see foresters John Tate and Steve Gibson of the North Carolina Forest Service. They explained to me that the problem was twofold: First, to a timber company, selective cutting means taking out the most desirable trees and leaving behind crooked trees or species that aren’t marketable. If you go that route, what you’re going to have left is a forest that is never going to produce marketable trees. Second, it is expensive and sometimes impossible to find someone to selectively cut. http://www.news-record.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070318/NEWSREC0105/703180338/1021/GTCOM

South Carolina:

18) South Carolina is holding its own when it comes to forests, but might not for long. The state has had about 12 million acres of forests since the turn of the 20th century; today the acreage is more in fragments. “We’re losing 200 acres of forest per day,” said Bob Scott, president of the S.C. Forestry Association. “The biggest threat is urban development.” About two-thirds of South Carolina is forested, half in hardwood and half in pine. But what once were huge tracts of commercial pineland are being replaced with smaller private tracts of trees, and largely on farmland, because other farm crops often are no longer profitable. Forestry professionals don’t think the Lowcountry or South Carolina as a whole will be part of the trend of forest land increasing. In the Lowcountry, MeadWestvaco holds 145,000 acres of pineland but is expected to sell much of that among 1.1 million acres of its forests overall, under a “highest and best-use” policy that sells land near rapidly developing areas. In the past three years, 48,000 acres of former pineland has been sold by MeadWestvaco and other timber companies. “It’s just the way of the world. Our population is going to increase. The coastal areas are going to have a lot of demand on them,” said Dwight Stewart of Manning, a forest manager for private landholders who is chairman of the association board. http://www.charleston.net/assets/webPages/departmental/news/Stories.aspx?section=localnews&tab
leId=134531&pubDate=3/14/2007

19) A little used but ecologically important tree is dying in droves along the Southeast coast because of an insect imported through the ports from Asia. The redbay typically serves as greenery in the 15-25 foot height range in coastal forests. But it is being killed by the redbay ambrosia beetle – an Asian import that likely came to the states in redbay wood used in packing crates. The first beetle showed up in traps at Port Wentworth in Savannah, Georgia, in 2002. This year, the beetles’ handiwork is visible in South Carolina Hunting Island State Park. Last month, volunteers counted more than two-thousand dead trees near the park’s roads and trails. Experts worry the entire population could be wiped out. Damaged redbays have been found in 32 counties here and in Georgia and Florida. http://www.wistv.com/Global/story.asp?S=6243602

USA:

20) A combined surge in reckless lending and reckless logging built the housing bubble — neither lending nor logging alone can inflate construction bubbles. Now the construction bubble shows itself as a danger to the economy. This cycle repeats itself as predictably as the comings and goings of El Ninos. Yet the majority of the public is shocked, simply shocked, with each next new return of folly. lance@wildrockies.org “As reports of problems in the mortgage market build, the number of people who view a collapse of the housing market as a serious possibility is growing rapidly. At the moment, the surge in defaults is taking place primarily in the sub-prime market, which is composed of borrowers who have poor credit histories. However, the problems are likely to affect the broader housing market and the economy as a whole before the end of the year.” http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/031407J.shtml

21) Before the boards were in Ms. Howe’s living room they were in the McCloud, Calif., warehouse of Terra- Mai, a company that sells so-called “reclaimed” wood from around the world; before that, they were the floors and walls of a factory, probably near the Burmese border in Thailand, 8,000 miles from Long Island. As Southeast Asia continues to modernize, many teak-wood homes and buildings like that factory are being torn down and replaced with Western-style brick or concrete ones. While this architectural turnover has been going on for decades, in recent years American companies like TerraMai have increasingly been buying up the old-growth teak wood and selling it to homeowners like Ms. Howe, which has raised some concerns among preservationists. “In the last three years, our sales of reclaimed teak have tripled,” said Erika Carpenter, TerraMai’s co-founder. “People are becoming aware, appreciating the material and designing their projects around it.” In 2006, the company disassembled 12 structures in Southeast Asia, and this year Ms. Carpenter expects to tear down about 20. The wood, which sells in the United States for between $16.50 a square foot and $30 a board foot — slightly more than new teak from the same region would cost — is re-milled and used to make flooring, decking, countertops, staircases and cabinetry, among other things. (For teak flooring, the cost is about three times that of a typical oak floor.) Global Surroundings, a furnishings manufacturer near Phoenix, has had similar success with its Rusteaka and ChicTeak lines of outdoor furniture made from Indonesian homes. According to J. L. Jackson, the company’s founder, Global Surroundings imported six shipping containers of vintage teak furniture in 2006 and will double that number this year. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/15/garden/15teak.html

Canada:

22) TORONTO – Failure to change logging practices and protect Ontario’s intact boreal forest will dangerously accelerate climate change, Forest Ethics announced today in a new cutting edge report. The report, Robbing the Carbon Bank: Global Warming and Ontario’s Forests [pdf], details how logging the intact boreal forest is escalating carbon dioxide levels and increasing global warming. Robbing the Carbon Bank represents the first comprehensive attempt to expose the impacts of logging Ontario’s intact boreal forest on global warming. The report is expected to increase pressure on the Ontario government to deliver on its promise of protecting Ontario’s Boreal forest through planning prior to developing in the north, and through setting aside key areas of Boreal forest as both carbon storehouses as well as habitat of critical declining species such as caribou. “Protecting our Boreal forests must be a key component of any government climate plan,” said ForestEthics’ Strategic Director, Tzeporah Berman. “Logging forests in Canada releases more greenhouse gases than the use of all of Canada’s passenger vehicles. We need to stop this wholesale looting of our common carbon bank if we want to mitigate global warming.” The report’s findings include the following: 1)Logging in Ontario releases an estimated 4 Mt C (15 Mt CO2) per year, or 19 tonnes of carbon per hectare.1 That is roughly equivalent to the carbon emitted from all light-duty gas-powered trucks in the province and 7% of Ontario’s total GHG emissions. 2)Canada’s boreal forests store a whopping 47.5 billion tons of carbon — 7 times the entire world’s fossil fuel emissions- a giant carbon bank account. 3) According to the Stern report, released in Britain in November of 2006: “Action to preserve remaining areas of natural forest is urgent.” http://www.forestethics.org/downloads/globalwarming_2.pdf

23) “Logging in the boreal forest… emits as many greenhouse gases as all the cars and light trucks driven in the province [of Ontario].“ Read more on the report that warns of Boreal Forest Logging Danger http://greenclippings.wordpress.com/2007/03/13/report-warns-of-boreal-forest logging-danger/ Perhaps organizations like the Ontario Forest Business Association http://www.ofba.org/index.html may be able to spear-head adoption of technologies and practices that will reduce the impact on Climage Change and Global warming. http://atikokan.wordpress.com/2007/03/15/controlling-logging-to-reduce-climate-change/

North America:

24) The Foundation for Deep Ecology which initiated and carried through the “Thrillcraft” book, has a description of this book in the Publishing Program section of the website at http://www.deepecology.org The editor is George Wuerthner . Thrillcraft are defined as “motorized recreational vehicles such as jet skis, dirt bikes, four-wheel quads, snowmobiles, dune buggies, swamp buggies, and rock crawlers, along with old standbys like four-wheel-drive pickups and jeeps … Once no more than an annoyance, these machines and their expanding power allow motorized recreationists in ever-increasing numbers to penetrate and wreak havoc on the last wild places on the continent.” There are over 20 essayists and over 100 photographs in the _Thrillcraft_ volume. One of the essayists is James Kunstler of _The Long Emergency_ fame. I am told there are three writers who have Canadian connections. My own essay, called “Off-Road Vehicles and Deep Ecology: Cultural Clash and Alienation from the Natural World”, reflects Nova Scotia experience. Basically I tried to show how a deep ecology perspective could be applied to the off-highway vehicle situation. Those for and those against their use have competing visions of how humans relate to each other and the natural world. It is, at heart, a clash between an industrial society–generated lifestyle of human self-centeredness and an emerging Earth-centered, socially responsible consciousness. –David Orton: greenweb@ca.inter.net

UK:

25) Walkers, drivers, and cyclists approaching from Rocky Lane and Wivelsfield Road can clearly see the buildings for the first time since the former ‘Sussex Lunatic Asylum’ opened in July 1859 on land at Hurst House Farm. When the felling Destruction of woodland is signaling the start of a traffic relief route and the end of the road for campaigners who tried to save a centuries-old copse. The dramatic swathe of tree-felling has also opened up views of the old St Francis Hospital site in Haywards Heath that have not been seen for nearly 150 years.is finished later this year the barren landscape will be transformed into a roundabout, part of a relief road, about 90 houses, and local estate roads. Only a small clump of trees next to Wivelsfield Road remains standing and campaigners who fought hard to avoid the destruction of ancient Anscombe Wood have acknowledged that the new views signal the end of the campaign. They will now concentrate on ensuring that the remaining woodland, about 25 per cent, survives for future generations. http://www.midsussextimes.co.uk/ViewArticle2.aspx?SectionID=516&ArticleID=2123384

26) South Winds Development Co. is to go to court April 2, charged under the bylaw with chopping down about nine hectares of trees without a needed permit from the city. The huge rural site, along Colonel Talbot Road in the city’s southwest, falls within an environmental protection area. If found guilty, the company could face a maximum $10,000 fine and possibly an order to replace chopped-down trees. It’s the most serious action the city can take beyond issuing a ticket. “It’s a flagrant violation of te bylaw and I’m pleased the city is going to take action,” Ward 9 Coun. Susan Eagle charged yesterday. “We have to get the message out to property owners that this kind of activity is unacceptable.” The company’s lawyer, Beth Cormier, declined comment. Eagle had first raised the alarm last month, after concerned calls from neighbours. The charge was laid after inspectors showed up at the site and ordered the tree-cutting halted. An aerial service, Eyes in the Sky, was called in to photograph the damage. http://lfpress.ca/newsstand/News/Local/2007/03/17/3770155.html

27) HISTORIC elm trees face the chop to make way for a multi-million pound cinema and restaurant complex. The trees survived the Dutch elm disease which swept the country more than 30 years ago. But now some of them are set to go if councillors approve the scheme in Haverhill. Suffolk Wildlife Trust has expressed concern at the potential loss of the rare trees, as has the town council. Elm tree expert Brian Gotto, of Haslingfield, near Cambridge, said: “This row of trees is remarkable and it would be tragic if any of them were to go. They are pretty unique.” St Edmundsbury Borough Council, a partner in the scheme proposed by Parkway Securities, is due to decide whether to grant planning permission in early April. The town council has made its concerns clear in a response to the planning application and has said it will “resist” the felling of up to five of the 12 trees. One of the oldest trees, thought to be about 200 years old, will be preserved. But five others are set to go. Dr Simone Bullion, senior conservation officer of the Suffolk Wildlife Trust, said the trees had been inspected in 2005 as part of a wildlife audit. http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/news/newmarket/2007/03/15/b4d1ec6e-09cd-48e9-bd47-64e009de55a
b.lpf

28) The Scottish forestry industry is a major contributor to employment in Scotland, with more than 40,000 jobs relying on the sector, according to a unique study undertaken by Forestry Commission Scotland. This is one of the initial findings in the Valuation of Forestry for People interim report, which provides evidence for the first time in one study of the benefits that Scotland’s economy and society receive from the nation’s forest and woodlands. Other studies of forestry-related employment have focussed on the timber production and processing sector. The new study has also looked at the contribution of tourism and recreation. While the timber sector remains an important supporter of jobs, woodland-based recreation and tourism is also a major contributor, supporting up to 20,000 jobs. http://www.forestry.gov.uk/newsrele.nsf/AllByUNID/3126767E914DA3C98025729D00383DAE

Germany:

29) Germany has put biodiversity, alongside climate change, at the top the agenda for its G8 presidency. In this week’s Green Room, Environment Minister Sigmar Gabriel says failure to address the loss of species will make the world a poorer place – both naturally and economically. Global biodiversity policy is therefore a fundamental component of global economic policy. Some might ask why biodiversity should be an issue on the G8+5 agenda. Well, there is a clear answer. The G8 nations, together with the five major emerging economies of China, India, South Africa, Brazil, Mexico, use almost three-quarters of the Earth’s biocapacity – the capacity of the world’s ecosystems to produce natural resources and to reduce harmful substances. The loss of global biological diversity is advancing at an unprecedented pace. Up to 150 species are becoming extinct every day. As well as their uniqueness and beauty, their specific functions within ecosystems are also irrecoverably lost. The web of life that sustains our global society is getting weaker and weaker. That is why Germany has chosen both biodiversity and climate change as top priorities for this year’s environment ministers’ G8+5 meeting. ‘Dramatic decline’ The participating countries have the capabilities needed to move a step closer to solutions to these two fundamental issues, which are so vital to a sustainable global future. Biological diversity constitutes the indispensable foundation for our lives and for global economic development. The production of natural resources in agriculture, forestry and fisheries, stable natural hydrological cycles, fertile soils, a balanced climate and numerous other vital ecosystem services can only be permanently secured through the protection and sustainable use of biological diversity. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6432217.stm

Africa:

30) Africa lost nine per cent of its trees between 1990 and 2005, according to a UN survey of the world’s forests. This represents 0ne half of the earth’s forest loss, this despite the fact that the continent accounts for just 16 per cent of the earth’s forests. In a news release this week (13 March) by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, it was reported that the highest losses occurred in countries with the densest forest cover: Angola, Cameroon, DRC, Nigeria, Sudan, the United Republic of Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe, all in Africa. Although forests are obtaining greater political support and commitment in Africa, the report says “implementation and law enforcement remains weak in most countries”. http://veggierevolution.blogspot.com/2007/03/african-forests-at-risk.html

South America:

31) The South-American lapacho contains a natural plant product that shrinks eye tumours by causing cancerous cells to commit suicide. Lab tests show the compound called beta-lapachone works at low doses – making it an ideal treatment for child patients with retinoblastoma, a malignant tumour of the retina. The uncommon disease accounts for abount 3% of cancers in children and remains fatal in the developing world although is one of the most curable cancers in developed countries. But one problem that exists with the traditional approach of radiotherapy is the association of long-term ill health and even death in some cases. Dr Heeral Shah and colleagues at California University found beta-lapachone was effective in inhibiting the growth and spread of retinoblastoma cells – and actively induced their destruction. Their findings, published in the medical journal Eye, are consistent with those from studies of the effect of the product in other human cancers – including breast, colon and lung tumours. Lapacho Colorado or red lapacho – so called because of its scarlet flowers – grows in the warmer part of South America such as Brazil, northern Argentina, Paraguay and Bolivia. It was commonly used by the medicine men of the Indian tribes long before the advent of the Spanish in the New World. The natives use the wood to make their bows for archery. http://www.lse.co.uk/ShowStory.asp?story=KG1635154B&news_headline=rainforest_bark_could_zap_rar
e_child_cancer

Guyana:

32) The Amerindian People’s Association (APA) and the Akawini Village Council are protesting what they call an “exploitative” logging agreement that they were made to sign with a company calling itself Interior Wood Products Inc (IWPI), which is a sub-contractor to Barama Company Incorporated. At a press conference held at the Raddisson Suites Hotel in Queenstown yesterday, the Village Council said that with the support of the APA, it is considering legal action. According to Wilson, the village agreed to sign the pact based on the representation made to them by the officials present. “We were placed into groups and given about five minutes to study the agreement though we did not understand the legal language in the agreement,” he said. Stabroek News sought an explanation from IWPI and Barama but was not able to establish contact with the former or elicit a response from the latter. “We the residents of the Akawini Amerindian Village, Pomeroon in Region Two are facing the destruction and loss of our forest resources that have sustained our people for generations,” Rudolph Wilson, Deputy Captain of Akawini said. Wilson said shortly after the meeting and the signing of the agreement, the Minister of Amerindian Affairs sent the Council a letter stating that she had never seen the agreement that Basdeo Singh claimed had her approval. “The minister also made contact with the GFC which said that they also had never seen that agreement,” Wilson said. He said the villagers are calling on the President, the Minister of Amerindian Affairs, the Government and the citizens of Guyana to support them in their effort to end the agreement, which they say was negotiated in bad faith. http://www.stabroeknews.com/index.pl/article_general_news?id=56516165

33) Fires are nothing new to the Amazon reports a study published in the journal Biotropica. Analyzing soils in the interior of Guyana, South America, a team of scientists led by David S. Hammond of NWFS Consulting, has found evidence of forest fires dating back thousands of years. While the origin of these fires is unclear, the authors propose intriguing scenarios involving pre-Colombian human populations and ancient el Niño events which could have so dried rainforest areas that they became more prone to forest fires. “Ubiquitous charcoal from numerous sites indicates that closed canopy forests throughout the Guiana Shield region have been subject to fire events of unknown intensity over the last several millennia,” the authors wrote. “Pre-Colombian land-use, climate-induced drought, or a combination of these factors must be responsible.” http://news.mongabay.com/2007/0314-hammond.html

Brazil:

34) Eugenio Arima, an environmental geographer who specializes in tropical deforestation and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) technology, had his work published in the February issue of the Journal of Regional Science in an article titled “Road Investments, Spatial Spillovers, and Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon.” As part of a team of researchers supported by grants from NASA, Arima studied the impact that building roads has on deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon. The study found that roads, whether paved or unpaved, increase the deforestation rate for that area as well as neighboring census tracks that do not have roads. The new road appears to increase the demand for products within that area and a spillover effect occurs in these regions. http://www.hws.edu/news/update/showrelease.asp?id=26477

Pakistan:

35) KARACHI: Nasrullah Shaji, Hameedullah Advocate and Muhammad Younus Barai on Sunday showed deep concern over massive cutting of trees by the city government and alleged that instead of making the city green, the CDGK was busy in its desertification. They said that trees were ornaments of the earth and its lungs to clean air and added that in Karachi the environmental pollution had already been on the rise due to no check on vehicular traffic and factories. They said that criminal act of cutting trees was further aggravating environmental problems of Karachi. They said that the city government had done nothing to lift the pile of garbage from the city. They demanded that the process of cutting trees should be stopped at once and necessary steps be taken to end the environmental pollution from Karachi. http://www.thenews.com.pk/print1.asp?id=47517
Bangladesh:

36) Target practice for Bangladesh Air Force resulted in the eviction of two Mandi villages and loss of more than 500 acres of sal forest. Air-to-ground bombing practice, that is a routine affair, has scared off wildlife from the area and killed a few Mandi bystanders in recent times. “So defense means wiping out the sal forest and bombing life out of it. How’s that? We don’t understand why they could not go and do as much as bombing needed in the Bay of Bengal,” a Mandi schoolteacher (name withheld on request) questioned. http://www.tasneemkhalil.com/modhupur

Brunei:

37) With a bit of tweaking of its national forest policy, Brunei stands a chance to become “a good role model in forestry management”, a government official said yesterday at the start of a series of activities to assess the sultanate’s rainforest management blueprint. “We do not have a problem with deforestation” but Brunei has to help ensure the dissemination of information on effective forest management, said Mahmud Yussof, the Acting Deputy Director of the Forestry Department. “We want to become a good role model in forestry management,” he said. An Asean assessor team is in the country to look closely into Brunei’s forest policy. This is done to pilot the Asean Peer Consultation Framework (PCF) in Forestry. The country assessment mission which will conclude on Saturday kicked off yesterday at the Riverview Hotel and is hosted by the Ministry of Industry and Primary Resources. http://www.brudirect.com/DailyInfo/News/Archive/Mar07/200307/nite18.htm

Borneo:

38) The latest reports make it clear; Borneo is one of the top five places on earth where wildlife is most endangered. If nothing is done, most of Borneo’s natural habitat will be gone by 2010. One area that screams out for help is the Sebangau peat swamp forest in Kalimantan where the world’s largest population of orang-utans is dwindling fast. Ten years ago there were 15,000 orang-utans; now there are only 7,000. Illegal logging robs them of their home; illegal pet trading robs the young orangs of their mothers. And the worst thing is, these are not even the greatest threats right now. What’s really going to put paid to the peat forest of Sebangau is a vast network of canals that’s draining the whole swampy area. http://www.savetheorangutan.co.uk/?p=280

Indonesia:

39) Indonesia’s Minister of Forestry announced that the harvest quota for natural timber for 2007 would be increased to 9.1 million m3, up almost 12% from 2006. However, sources close to the Ministry of Forestry indicated that the quota for 2007 could be revised up to 12.4 million m3. The harvest quota was reduced between 2001 and 2005 to achieve sustained yield and reduce over-capacity in lumber and plywood mills, which, the government believes, has been achieved to a certain extent. The Indonesian wood industry has shrunk in the last years with the declining availability of logs. The number and production capacity of lumber and plywood mills have plummeted over the period. The declining supply of Indonesian plywood contributed, in fact, to the sharp increase of plywood prices in 2006. According to some analysts, the logging quota in 2006 (8.13 million m3) was not fully used by local mills due to the reduced production capacity and financial difficulties. Some analysts thus believe that the logging quota for 2007 would not necessarily lead to the revival of the Indonesian wood industry. http://www.ihb.de/fordaq/news/Indonesia_harvest_quota_14668.html

40) A few years ago, the Indonesian government and sections of the palm oil industry united in the Indonesian Palm Oil Commission (IPOC) to undertake efforts to restore the atrocious public image that the palm oil industry had earned abroad for its role in the demise of Indonesia’s tropical rainforests, the massive forest fires and haze in 1997-1998, and for the widespread conflicts between plantation companies and local communities. If IPOC succeeded in restoring the palm oil industry’s image abroad, it was shattered again after June 2005 when the Indonesian Minister of Agriculture revealed details of a government plan to develop the world’s largest oil palm plantation in a 5-10 kilometer band along the border of Kalimantan and Malaysia. The oil palm mega-project, launched in Indonesia under the banner of “bringing prosperity, security and environmental protection to the Kalimantan border area”, turned sour when a business plan developed by the Indonesian State Plantation Corporation (PTPN) began to circulate. This document contained a map that showed beyond doubt how the 1.8 million hectare oil palm project would trash the primary forests of three National Parks, cut through rugged slopes and mountains utterly unsuitable for oil palm cultivation and annihilate the customary rights land of the indigenous Dayak communities in the border area. The Minister of Agriculture acknowledged that the lion share (>90%) of the immediate border area is indeed unsuitable for oil palm plantations. Late March, the Indonesian government declared its support to the Heart of Borneo Initiative, an effort led by WWF aiming to preserve the biological diversity and wildlife species in the border area of Kalimantan, Sabah, Sarawak and Brunei. President Yudhoyono has yet to make a formal and public statement to assure the public that the border oil palm project, as proposed by PTPN, is now cancelled. The planned upgrading and construction of over 5,000 km of roads across Kalimantan may bring about a new wave of illegal logging, mining and forest conversion in relatively intact areas. http://www.savetheorangutan.co.uk/?p=298

41) Greenpeace said it had written to the Guinness World Records to nominate Indonesia as the fastest destroyer of forests, based on its deforestation rate. Indonesia is the world’s fastest destroyer of forests, eradicating 300 football fields’ worth every hour, environmental group Greenpeace said Friday as it staged a demonstration. Activists dressed as loggers chain-sawed a 20-metre (65-foot) wooden wall in the capital, Jakarta, to symbolise the destruction, saying industrial and illegal logging were mainly to blame. Greenpeace said data from the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation showed Indonesia destroyed nearly 1.9 million hectares (4.6 million acres) of forest annually between 2000 and 2005. But the official Indonesian figure was higher at 2.8 million hectares, it said. Greenpeace Southeast Asia campaigner Hapsoro said a series of recent Indonesian natural disasters, such as floods, landslides and droughts, were all linked to the “unprecedented destruction” of forest cover. “The government must realise that massive forest degradation in Indonesia is responsible for major disasters that killed a lot of Indonesians,” he said. Only Brazil destroys more forest annually, but Indonesia’s smaller forest area puts its deforestation rate at 2 percent against Brazil’s 0.6 percent, the group said. http://www.france24.com/france24Public/en/administration/afp-news.html?id=070316073743.hemmgc02
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Australia:

42) A PARLIAMENTARY committee will quiz all key players in the controversial Rayonier-Forest Enterprises Australia log deal in an open hearing in Launceston on Monday. The joint house Environment, Resources and Development Committee met with Solicitor- General Bill Bale and Auditor- General Mike Blake yesterday to clarify a number of issues before the hearing. The committee’s terms of reference focus on whether Forestry Tasmania adhered to the Forestry Act 1920 and the Government Business Enterprises Act 1995 in making the deal, and the process that led to the deal. Section 12A of the Forestry Act states that Forestry Tasmania must have considered employment levels when allocating wood, but the issue is complicated because Forestry Tasmania only owned half the resource, while the other half was privately owned. Chairman Greg Hall said the hearing would start open but sections of it may be closed to the public if they were deemed commercial in confidence. http://www.examiner.com.au/story.asp?id=389682

World-wide:

43) They are rising in many parts of Asia and in Europe the damage done by acid rain is still a problem. In the mid-to-late-1980s the insidious threat of acid rain crept into news headlines. Even children came to be terrified about the killer rain wiping out fish and forests. Sulphur and nitrogen dioxide emissions were drifting hundreds of miles from industrial centres and chewing up great stretches of countryside. The offenders were industry, power generation and motorists. Although much of the worst damage was in parts of Germany and central Europe, in a cruel irony, the lesser polluters of Scandinavia also saw forests damaged and “dead” lakes. As with so many eco-scares, a link between emissions and damage had been made many years before, as early as the 60s. And even as the general public learned of this deadly threat to the environment in the 80s, work was well underway to combat it. By 1979, the first international treaty had been signed and by the time UK newspapers had got hold of the issue, there was a momentum towards change. The use of catalytic converters in cars, of flue gas desulphurisation – a process whereby sulphur is turned into neutral calcium sulphates – in power plants, and the switch to low-sulphur forms of coal and to natural gas, were cutting emissions. In 1990, headlines about acid rain were a near-daily occurrence. Now mentions are few and far between, with many stories referring to programmes to revive stretches of freshwater systems by neutralising them with lime. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/6449059.stm