Region Archives: US West

The Joshua tree is cherished for its distinctive silhouette and singular role as a linchpin of the Mojave Desert ecosystem. Yet the iconic succulent is losing suitable habitat at a brisk clip due to climate change, worsening wildfires and development, scientists and environmental advocates say. A new plan by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife to ensure the Joshua tree’s survival calls for limiting development in certain areas, including those where the plant may be able to thrive in a future anticipated to be warmer and drier, even as other portions of its range become uninhabitable. The draft plan also calls on government agencies to develop strategies to mitigate and fight wildfires that threaten Joshua trees.

On Earth Day in 2022, President Joe Biden …uncapped his pen, preparing to sign an executive order to protect mature and old-growth forests on federal lands. …But two years later, at a timber auction in a federal office in Roseburg, this new day was nowhere to be seen. …Up for sale this September morning were the first trees from an area of forest the Bureau of Land Management calls Blue and Gold. …An Oregon Public Broadcasting and ProPublica analysis found the bureau has allowed timber companies to cut such forests at a faster pace since the executive order than in the decade that preceded it. …“We are a multi-use agency,” spokesperson Brian Hires wrote in response to questions from OPB and ProPublica. “We are committed to forest health and providing the timber Americans need.” …The BLM also has tried to avoid detailed environmental reviews as it moves to log in new areas, saying it sufficiently considered impacts in 2016.

BILLINGS, Mont. — U.S. wildlife officials finalized a recovery plan for imperiled populations of Canada lynx on Wednesday and proposed new habitat protections in the southern Rocky Mountains for the forest-dwelling wildcats that are threatened by climate change. The fate of the proposal is uncertain under President-elect Donald Trump: Officials during the Republican’s first term sought unsuccessfully to strip lynx of protections that they’ve had since 2000 under the Endangered Species Act. Almost 7,700 square miles (20,000 square miles) of forests and mountains in Colorado and northern New Mexico are covered under the habitat proposal. …Their numbers never were great in the contiguous U.S., which is at the southern fringe of the species range, but the hope is to maintain some population strongholds so they can persist in a warmer world.

State agencies say they don’t have enough money to pay for a fire season that burned almost 2 million acres. Lawmakers will step in to help next month. Oregon legislators will meet for a brief special session next month to approve emergency spending to cover bills for this year’s unprecedented wildfire season. Gov. Tina Kotek announced Tuesday she will call a session on Dec. 12 in order for lawmakers to send $218 million to state agencies grappling with the costs of fires that touched a record 1.9 million acres. “The unprecedented 2024 wildfire season required all of us to work together to protect life, land, and property, and that spirit of cooperation must continue,” Kotek said in a statement. “I am grateful to legislative leaders for coming to consensus that our best course of action is to ensure the state’s fire season costs are addressed and bills paid by the end of the calendar year.”

Oregon wildlife biologist Eric Forsman has been at the forefront of protecting the northern spotted owl for a half-century. His groundbreaking research on how logging Pacific Northwest forests impacted the raptor turned spotted owls into champions of the environmental movement. Despite his legacy, Forsman, 77, is among those questioning a plan by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) to save the imperiled birds by sanctioning the potential killing of 450,000 barred owls in Washington, Oregon and California. Like in much of Western Washington, barred owls have become a predominant predator on the Whatcom County landscape, often seen perched atop trees in  Bellingham parks, neighborhoods or soaring over farm fields. Longtime local birders say they’ve never seen a spotted owl.

Hurricane Helene wrought devastation on the Cartner’s Christmas Tree Farm in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, where the Cartner family has been growing trees for more than six decades.  The storm, which killed more than 100 people when it reached western North Carolina in late September, destroyed thousands of trees — but not all of them. First lady Jill Biden on Monday unveiled one of the surviving trees, a 20-foot Fraser fir, as this year’s White House Christmas tree. “The Cartner family lost thousands of trees in the storm, but this one remained standing,” the first lady said Monday, accompanied by grandson Beau Biden, Jr. “And they named it Treemendous for the extraordinary hope that it represents.” Read the White House Press Release here

Thanks to our state Constitution, Washington’s Department of Natural Resources manages state and county trust lands for the long-term benefit of public schools and many essential public services. These working forests help fund our libraries, schools, fire districts, public health, public works and conservation projects. Responsible timber harvesting has long been part of this work. Some are advocating for a radical shift away from this constitutional mandate. This shift ignores the unique needs of counties and diverse public service providers that depend on this revenue. It ignores the importance of forestry to the social and economic fabric of our communities and it undermines Washington’s leadership in the manufacture of green building materials. …Washington can simultaneously support high-quality timber production, sustain rural economies and conserve ecologically significant areas. Counties and their junior taxing districts that are dependent on timber revenue deserve a voice in determining the balance of revenue generation and conservation.

IDAHO — Deep in Idaho’s Clearwater Mountains, along the beautiful Lochsa River, is a stand of ancient cedar trees. These trees stand hundreds of feet tall and are hundreds of years old. They were standing long before Europeans arrived in these mountains. …It’s no accident that these old cedar trees are still standing. They remain standing because they are on public lands. Public lands, in which every American has a stake. Surrounding forests, not on public lands, tell a far different story. …Idaho sold off about one third of the land it received from the federal government upon statehood. …We in the West know what state or private ownership means for forests. Stumps, and lots of them. Both entities manage forests to maximize dollars generated. In contrast, public lands mean trees hundreds of years old, superb wildlife habitat, clear, clean water, and unmatched recreation opportunities. And our heritage. 

Madi Clark

…Federal forest managers seem to be tangled in their own hose reel as they attempt to manage escalating fire concerns. Inundated with too much federal land, overwhelmed with bureaucratic red tape, and heavily reliant on distant oversight federal forest managers are failing to adequately manage their wildfires. Idaho Congressman Russ Fulcher alongside U.S. Sens. Mike Crapo and Jim Risch recently wrote to the U.S. Forest Service Chief Randy Moore saying: “The scale and severity of these incidents can be attributed to inadequate federal preventative measures and delayed response times.” …Fires will continue to rage out of control unless the federal government learns from the Western states how to properly steward Western lands with sufficient and experienced personal, efficient, and scientific forest management practices, and finally by reappropriating land back to the citizens and communities who live and work near these resources.

IDAHO, USA — Placerville is nestled behind Bogus Basin, in the Boise National Forest. The town of 53 is known for its forest solitude – but that isn’t what home insurance companies are looking for. Resident Steve Koppes was dropped from his home insurance company a year and half ago, because his home was in a wildfire-prone area. “I didn’t get notification, I didn’t get reasons. I was just dropped,” Koppes said. Koppes had had the same insurance for years, and never had a claim of any kind. …Each city is ranked on a scale by the Idaho Insurance Ratings Bureau, and Placerville has sat at a level eight since 2010. “The higher the number, the worse off you are,” Placerville Fire Chief Andrew Bourett said. He has done everything he could to make that rating lower – to make getting home insurance easier – but it’s a challenge because of Placerville’s remote location.

A number of environmental groups filed a lawsuit in federal court Tuesday against federal land managers for a timber sale in old-growth forest north of Grants Pass. The Last Chance timber sale by the Bureau of Land Management would auction off up to 8,500 acres of forestland at the intersection of Douglas, Jackson and Josephine counties. George Sexton from the non-profit KS Wild said the agency’s continued focus on logging is hurting efforts to improve forest resiliency. “It’s unfortunate that, on one hand, the BLM is implementing some prescriptions that would reduce fire hazard, while, on the other hand, they’re implementing other logging prescriptions that would increase it,” said Sexton. The BLM did not respond to requests for comment. In its report, the agency said the commercial harvests it proposes would reduce the likelihood that wildfires can spread through the tree canopy, and would encourage growth of larger trees that are more resistant to fire.

The U.S. Forest Service has released its long-awaited proposal to update the landmark Northwest Forest Plan, but many groups said they were unsure of its future with a new administration coming to power in 2025. The document, years in the making, lays out four alternatives for future management of national forests in Washington, Oregon and California by updating a 1994 law crafted by the Clinton administration. The 630,000-acre Siuslaw National Forest along the central Oregon coast would be heavily affected by any decisions laid out in a final plan. A 120-day public comment period begins now, which the agency says will help shape a final plan. “Much has changed in society and science since the Northwest Forest Plan was created nearly 30 years ago,” said Jacque Buchanan, regional forester for the Forest Service’s Pacific Northwest Region. “We’re amending the plan to address today’s challenges [honoring the] original goals, while enhancing wildfire resilience.”

PORT ANGELES — Tree advocates have been partially successful in postponing the logging of forests owned by the state Department of Natural Resources and located within the Elwha watershed region, and they plan to continue their efforts until they achieve full success. At the November Board of Natural Resources (BNR) meeting, Hilary Franz, state commissioner of public lands and chair of the board, placed a pause on the Elwha Watershed “Alley Cat” timber sale. Franz said she pulled the sale from the agenda due to a conversation she had with Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe chairwoman Frances Charles and the desire to have “government-to-government consideration.” Despite advocacy efforts that included a petition with more than 300 signatures and a letter-writing campaign that generated more than 6,165 letters, the six-person BNR approved two other Elwha watershed sales, “Tree Well” and “Parched.” Individuals against those sales said that the “legacy forests” were the “old growth forests of tomorrow.”

OREGON — The state’s in-house banker looked at the repayment promise that the Oregon Department of Forestry offered in exchange for a $60 million loan and said, “No.” …The ODF approached the treasury for a loan last month after a record-setting wildfire season left the agency with a stack of unpaid invoices. It is often the case that the department, which leads the state’s response to wildfires, hires contractors to do the work, then bills the federal agencies that own the land where many fires occur. This year’s fire season, which saw nearly 2 million acres burn, cost $133 million—more than twice the previous high and far more than the agency budgeted. …Treasury officials worried about the ODF’s reliance on future funding from the Legislature… as one legislature cannot obligate a subsequent legislature. …Forestry spokeswoman Joy Krawczyk says her agency will now ask lawmakers for the money instead.

Irvine, California — The severity of California’s wildfires has rapidly increased over the last several decades as a result of human-driven climate change, resulting in accelerated tree losses during more intense wildfires, a study from University of California, Irvine and the University of Utah reveals. “As California’s climate has become warmer and drier, the severity of the average wildfire increased by 30 percent between the 1980s and 2010s,” said Jon Wang, a professor at the University of Utah. This means that for every acre of forest scorched by fire, the damages to tree canopy are considerably higher than what they were several decades ago. …The team wanted to find out how much of the rising tree cover loss in California is due to increases in total area burned, how much of the loss is due to increasing wildfire severity and how much is due to fire moving into new areas with denser forests. 

The gophers were grumpy, but they understood the assignment. Brought by helicopter to a barren landscape with pumice stones the size of marbles and golf balls, the animals did what they’ve always done: They started digging. Just two years earlier, a cataclysm erased life in the landscape. The explosive eruption of Mount St. Helens in 1980 blew out the mountain’s northern flank and destroyed some 135 square miles of forest. …When scientists returned to the fenced plots six years later, they were stunned to find some 40,000 plants there, while nearby patches of land remained desolate. In the decades since, the effects have kept compounding. …So, why did it happen? Part of the credit goes to the gopher’s diligent digging, which cycled fertile materials back toward the surface. But they also left things behind — from their droppings to spores and fungi.

U.S. officials would allow increased logging on federal lands across the Pacific Northwest in the name of fighting wildfires and boosting rural economies under proposed changes to a sweeping forest management plan that’s been in place for three decades. The U.S. Forest Service proposal, released Friday, would overhaul the Northwest Forest Plan that governs about 38,000 square miles in Oregon, Washington and California. The plan was adopted in 1994 under President Bill Clinton amid pressure to curb logging that destroyed habitat used by spotted owls. …But federal officials now say worsening wildfires due to climate change mean forests must be more actively managed to increase their resiliency. Increased logging also would provide a more predictable supply of trees for timber companies, helping rural economies that have suffered after lumber mills shut down. The proposal could increase annual timber harvests by at least 33%, according to a draft environmental study.

A federal hiring freeze on seasonal U.S. Forest Service workers could mean fewer people putting out abandoned campfires, constructing trails and preventing wildfires across Colorado next year. The freeze is projected to impact 156 temporary seasonal positions across Colorado. Those employees cover a wide range of critical tasks: wildfire prevention and education, campsite management and biological fieldwork as well as trail construction and maintenance. Local government leaders said the staffing reductions would be felt hard in Colorado’s central mountains, where highly trafficked Forest Service land dominates much of the area and is the center of recreation tourism that fuel economies. Several counties pay to fund seasonal positions, but the hiring freeze means those paid-for positions could remain vacant, putting years-old agreements in jeopardy. …The hiring freeze, announced in September, is the result of a potential $500 million budget cut to the agency in the coming fiscal year.

California leaders are bracing for a clash with Donald Trump on most environmental issues when he returns to the White House, but they’re surprisingly aligned with him on forest management. Since his first term as president, Trump has blamed the state for its devastating wildfires, telling leaders to thin out its forest and clear out the forest floors to lower risk. Research shows he wasn’t entirely off base. Decades of fire suppression have California left forests overgrown, making them more vulnerable to severe wildfires intensified by climate change. In 2020, the state ramped up efforts to thin forests, setting a goal of treating one million acres of forest land a year. Now it may even support a controversial timber-based energy industry. …Wood pellet biomass is often marketed as renewable. But environmentalists criticize it for releasing significant carbon emissions like fossil fuels and say it incentivizes removal of mature trees from forests.

WASHINGTON — Animal Wellness Action and the Center for a Humane Economy called on superintendents from Olympic National Park, Mount Rainier, and North Cascades national parks to resist a plan by a sister agency, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), to participate in a scheme to kill almost half a million barred owls in the Pacific Northwest over the next 30 years. The USFWS filed a Record of Decision on barred owl management in late August, and last week, AWA and the Center filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Seattle to block the overreaching and unworkable plan targeting a species protected for a century by the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. …Wayne Pacelle, president of Animal Wellness Action said, “It has a zero percent chance of success, but it will produce an unheard-of body count of a long-protected owl species.”

The U.S. Forest Service is starting a public comment period today about proposed changes to its forest management plan for Northern California, Oregon and Washington. The U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service is taking public input about a proposed amendment to land management plans for national forests in the Northwest Forest Plan area. The draft Environmental Impact Statement for the amendment gets published today in the Federal Register, launching an 120-day comment period to allow the public to offer input about how these forests will be managed. …USFS says the draft EIS focuses on balancing economic needs, ecological health, and community safety across the Northwest Forest Plan area. …The Forest Service will review and incorporate feedback to develop a final environmental impact statement, anticipated in 2025.  Comments can be submitted here.

As part of a strategy to reduce wildland fire fuels on a densely timbered tract of land surrounding Tally Lake, about 13 miles west of Whitefish on the wildland-urban interface (WUI), the Flathead National Forest issued a draft decision approving a project to thin trees and conduct other treatments on more than 40,000 acres of mostly public land. Dubbed the Cyclone Bill Project, foresters say the aim is to reduce tree densities and fuel loading on the WUI, buffering residential communities from hazardous, fire-prone sections of the forest. The project would also improve diversity and resilience of the trees and “contribute to continued timber production and economic sustainability,” according to a U.S. Forest Service proposal. On Wednesday, Flathead National Forest officials released the draft decision notice for the Cyclone Bill Project, initiating an administrative review process and setting the stage for the public to submit objections for the next 45 calendar days.

California — The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on Nov. 12 declined to halt a logging and vegetation clearing project atop Pine Mountain and Reyes Peak in Ventura County’s Los Padres National Forest. Various environmental groups, plus Ventura County, Ojai and Patagonia Works, have sued the U.S. Forest Service to halt the project on grounds that it would violate environmental laws, harm vulnerable wildlife, and do irreparable damage to intact roadless areas of the forest. “We had hoped the court would rule in favor of the planet, biodiversity and the community,” said Hans Cole, head of Environmental Activism at outdoor apparel maker Patagonia. …The ruling comes four years after the Trump Administration first proposed the project, leading to significant opposition from conservation organizations, Indigenous groups, scientists, businesses and local governments, according to Los Padres ForestWatch, one of the plaintiffs. The project’s opponents are considering their next steps, including whether to seek a rehearing.

SHASTA-TRINITY NATIONAL FOREST, California — Restrictions are now in place for people who want to visit the Mount Shasta wilderness area of the Shasta-Trinity National Forest. According to the U.S. Forest Service, from now until November of 2026 forest order restrictions to protect the habitat, soil and natural resources of the Mount Shasta wilderness area will be enforced. After those two years are up, the Forest Service will look at the restrictions to decide if they will once again be renewed or expanded upon. According to Wilderness Program Manager Nick Meyer, the restrictions will be in place for the foreseeable future and have been in place for over two decades. Meyer says these restrictions are to help reduce the impacts of the 100,000 or more visitors they receive each year.

Discussions about how to best manage Washington forests often get heated. And nothing seems to incite a more negative response than the idea of clear-cutting. In a recent Seattle Times article, there was this description of a logging site: “It still looks like a clear-cut — hashed, bashed, and slashed.” (“Meet the loggers who cut your trees,” Oct. 14). As a second-generation small-forest landowner, I’d like to celebrate the clear-cut, one stage of a working forest. For the decades before harvest, tree roots have aerated and fed the soil below, needles and leaves have replenished the ground, and softly filtered rain has nourished ferns and salal. …In one of our clear-cuts, we counted over 50 different native plants and flowers six months after the harvest. Soon, trees that need full sun to grow, including the Pacific Northwest’s iconic Douglas fir, will be planted and begin a new forest. 

On Earth Day in 2022, President Joe Biden declared the importance of big, old trees. “There used to be a hell of a lot more forests like this,” he said, extolling their power to fight climate change. …The president uncapped his pen, preparing to sign an executive order to protect mature and old-growth forests on federal lands. “I just think this is the beginning of a new day,” Biden said. But two years later, at a timber auction in a federal office in Roseburg, Oregon, this new day was nowhere to be seen. …Up for sale were the first trees from an area of forest the Bureau of Land Management calls Blue and Gold. A week after Biden’s executive order, the Blue and Gold logging project had been shelved. Now it was back on. The BLM is moving forward with timber sales in dozens of forests like this across the West.

ARIZONA — The vast ponderosa pine forest destroyed by the 468,000-acre Rodeo-Chedeski Fire more than 20 years ago hasn’t come back, and in some areas, it never might. This conclusion has emerged from a decade of study on the recovery of the centuries-old forest dominated by ponderosa pines that burned in the fire. The Rodeo-Chedeski Fire was one of the first in a succession of fires that have plagued the Southwest since. The fire came in the midst of an historic drought. It rampaged across half a million acres… 30,000 people were evacuated from Show Low and other White Mountains communities. The forest has changed dramatically across the burn scar, according to ongoing studies by Northern Arizona’s Ecological Restoration Institute and others. Some areas are covered in pine seedlings. But another intense fire in the next century or so will prevent any of those seedlings from growing into fire-resistant, old-growth ponderosas.