Oregon: Wallowa-Whitman proposes logging 70 million bd. ft. off of 30,000 acres

A project up for public comment in the Snow Basin north of Richland
calls for cutting Douglas-fir and other trees to reduce the threat of
wildfire and improve growing conditions for native ponderosa pine,
lodgepole pine and western larch. The Wallowa-Whitman National Forest
project is in the Little Eagle Creek and Eagle Creek Paddy
subwatersheds. The project area includes 27,680 acres of national
forest lands, 281 acres owned by Baker County and 2,107 acres of
private property, according to Steve Ellis, forest supervisor.

The
Wallowa-Whitman plans to cut trees and do other work on 13,000 to
14,000 acres. Snow Basin would be one of the larger logging projects
on the Wallowa-Whitman in the past decade. The project could result in
five separate timber sales, one per year starting in 2010, according
to the notice the forest published in the Federal Register. Those
sales could produce an estimated 60 million to 70 million board-feet
of timber, according to the notice. The Wallowa-Whitman hasn’t sold
more than 30 million board-feet, from all its timber sales, in any
fiscal year since 2001. The Wallowa-Whitman will accept comments about
the Snow Basin project through Jan. 30, Ellis said. Due to the size of
the project, the Wallowa-Whitman is writing an environmental impact
statement rather than the less-detailed environmental assessment which
is typical for timber sales on the forest. The project could also be
controversial because the Wallowa-Whitman is proposing to amend its
forest plan to allow loggers to cut live trees larger than 21 inches
in diameter. The Forest Service agreed in 1994 to stop cutting those
larger trees in national forests in Eastern Oregon.A draft
environmental impact statement for Snow Basin is expected to be
available for public review by May 2009, and a final EIS is scheduled
for October. “Fire suppression and some past timber management has led
to proliferation of shade-tolerant tree species, multi-storied
structure, overstocking and small average tree diameter,” said Joe
Sciarrino, project manager. “It is this change in stand structure that
has changed the potential fire behavior from characteristic
low-intensity maintenance fire to high-intensity, uncharacteristic
stand-replacing fire.” He said the project will reduce the risk of a
stand-replacing fire by thinning overgrown stands of shade-tolerant
grand fir and Douglas-fir, which are crowding out ponderosa pine,
western larch and lodgepole pine. In a report on the project,
Sciarrino said the overgrowth of the faster-growing grand fir and
Douglas-fir trees has resulted in a major reduction in large-diameter
and late-succession ponderosa pine trees. Sciarrino said the risk of
uncharacteristic fire is measured by the degree of departure from
historical fire regimes, as measured by alterations in key ecosystem
components such as species composition, structural age of trees and
other vegetation, stand age, canopy closure and fuel loadings. “Simply
put, this is a measure of how far off fire frequency and vegetative
conditions are from historic conditions,” he said. The risk of
uncharacteristic, stand-replacing wildfire is lowest in forests rated
Fire Regime Condition Class I. Such forests are dominated by
fire-resistant, large-diameter trees, with little fuel on the ground,
a combination that usually results in low-intensity ground fires
rather than stand-replacing blazes that climb into the crowns of the
tallest trees, Sciarrino said.
http://www.bakercityherald.com/2008122478199/News/Business/Wallowa-Whitman-proposes-logging-project-near-Richland

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