Oregon: BLM can’t ‘improve’ forest health by clearcutting old growth back to a fire hazard

Whether you are a tree-hugger or a logger, just about everyone agrees that the best way to manage our public lands is to focus on thinning the millions of acres of second-growth plantations to reduce fire hazard and increase forest health. Unfortunately, rather than embrace the emerging social and scientific consensus that small-diameter thinning, as opposed to large-scale clearcutting, is the best way to responsibly manage our forests, the Coos Bay BLM is planning to turn-back the clock and clearcut over 1,400 acres of forests in the salmon-bearing Sixes and New River Watersheds.

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Click here to send automatic letters to Governor Kulongoski and President Obama asking them to oppose this egregious project and scrap the WOPR logging plan that allows it.

Currently the canopy of these mature forests help protect water quality by moderating the timing and quantity of “peak flows” and by filtering sediment that would otherwise reach the salmon and steelhead habitat in the Sixes and New Rivers.

The combination of 10 miles of road construction and clearcutting is a death sentence for watersheds that are already on the brink of collapse. Please Make Your Voice Heard. Please take a moment to send an automatic letter to the Governor and President Obama.

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