Category Archives: Forestry

Forestry

Canadian Forest Fires Are Losing Their Climate Cooling Power

Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam
June 1, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada, International

The natural cooling effect of snow in northern forests following forest fires is rapidly diminishing. As a result, a fragile climate equilibrium threatens to disappear, potentially leading to additional warming in one of the most climate-sensitive regions on Earth. This is the conclusion of new research by Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. …After a forest fire, the landscape in northern regions often remains open and covered with snow for a long time. This snow reflects a great deal of sunlight and makes the Earth’s surface brighter—an effect known as snow albedo. For years, this compensated for part of the warming caused by CO2 emissions from forest fires. [The study found] that the cooling effect of snow has decreased by nearly 30 percent since the 1960s. Whereas in the past almost half of Canadian forest fires eventually reached natural climate equilibrium …this now applies to only about one in four or five fires.

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Globally, fires in 2025 burned the second-lowest area on record since 2002

By Matthew Jones
Nature Reviews
June 1, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada, International

Globally, fires in 2025 burned the second-lowest area on record since 2002 and emitted the third-lowest CO2 total. Yet, a third successive year of extreme wildfire emissions prevailed in Canada, and catastrophic fires in Los Angeles, South Korea and Europe killed over 90 people and forced over 300,000 evacuations. At the global scale, land area burned by wildfire has declined in since 2002, mainly owing to reduced savannah burning in Africa. However, wildfires are expanding in extratropical forests, and show increasing intensity combined with extreme socioeconomic and environmental impacts1–3. In these areas, wildfire disasters are exacerbated by human land use and the wildland–urban interface4. Many regions are experiencing episodes of extreme wildfires with high rates of spread and intensity associated with substantial loss of life, infrastructure, or carbon stores, even in years with below-average burned area. These hallmarks define an era of declining global burned area but also of rising prominence of extreme and deadly wildfires.

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Suzanne Simard sealed paper birch and Douglas fir seedlings inside plastic bags … and found carbon crossed through fungal threads

By The Editorial Team
Make Tech Easier
May 31, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada

Suzanne Simard’s 1997 forest experiment did not show trees whispering to each other. It showed something narrower, stranger, and easier to test: carbon that began in the air around a paper birch seedling later appeared inside a neighbouring Douglas fir, after passing through roots and fungal tissue in the soil. The experiment, published in Nature in August 1997, used two carbon labels in the field. Paper birch and Douglas fir seedlings were sealed in plastic labelling chambers, exposed to carbon-14 dioxide or carbon-13 dioxide, left for a nine-day chase period, then harvested and analysed to see where the labelled carbon had gone. The result was not a fairy tale about kindness. It was a measurement. Carbon moved both ways between Betula papyrifera, the paper birch, and Pseudotsuga menziesii, the Douglas fir, with a net gain by Douglas fir in the second year of the field experiment. 

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Planting 125 million more trees in B.C.

By Ministry of Forests
Government of British Columbia
June 2, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada, Canada West

The Province is investing $155 million toward reforestation programs to plant more than 125 million trees throughout BC. The funding, which also includes investments from the federal government, will deliver both large-scale reforestation and targeted projects that restore critical habitats, conserve biodiversity and support wildfire recovery. “Since 2017, we’ve invested in planting 400 million trees in B.C. Now, we’re adding 125 million more,” said Ravi Parmar, Minister of Forests. “As we head into the Council of Canadian Forest Ministers Conference, hosted right here at home, we’re showing how B.C. continues to lead not only in forestry, but in reforestation and restoration. The Province’s reforestation investments will support: more than $56 million for reforestation, more than $1 million for B.C.’s Riparian Recovery Project, and more than $99 million for large-scale reforestation through the BC Forest Investment Program. …B.C. has secured more than $200 million in federal funding for reforestation and habitat restoration initiatives in British Columbia…

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Resources to support client conversations about sourcing wood from British Columbia

naturally:wood
June 3, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada West

Professionals in the built environment are increasingly being asked where their materials come from and how they’re sourced. To support these conversations, naturally:wood has two new resources focused on explaining forest management practices in British Columbia (B.C.).

From forest to form factsheet
Did you know just 0.3% of B.C.’s public forest land is harvested each year, while 63% of B.C.’s forests will never beharvested? And that 64% of B.C.’s forests are certified, accounting for 6.3% of the world’s certified forests? This overview uses data points like these to support conversations about sustainability, certifications and sourcing.

Video featuring the Chief Forester of B.C.
An authoritative perspective on how forest management decisions are made from the independent decision-maker responsible for long-term sustainable stewardship of Crown forest lands.

These resources are designed to equip architects, engineers and construction professionals with credible, evidence-based information they can confidently share with clients.

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Forest Grove hosting meeting on New Forest Act proposal

By Patrick Davies
The 100 Mile Free Press
June 2, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada West

…Searching online, South Cariboo resident and retired silviculturist Will van Osch came across the New Forest Act proposal, which has been developed by the Boundary Forest Watershed Stewardship Society. The BFWSS is a non-profit society that advocates for economically sustainable forestry practices to help prevent environmental disasters caused by deforestation and climate change. …Van Osch said the New Forest Act, which has been developed by project lead Jennifer Houghton, an independent forestry analyst, spoke to him. The proposed act calls for B.C. to adopt a truly sustainable forestry model that will benefit future generations, while protecting local decision-making power. After reading her proposal, van Osch reached out to Houghton and invited her to come to the South Cariboo and give a presentation on her ideas. She agreed and is now set to host a meeting at the Forest Grove Community Hall on Monday, June 8, at 7 p.m.

Related coverage in the Keremeos Review, by Brennan Phillips: Citizen-led forestry plan presentation coming to Penticton

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Chipping instead of burning: Sun Peaks and Thompson Rivers University test low-carbon fuel management

Thompson Rivers University
June 2, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada West

Sun Peaks Mountain Resort Municipality is trying a new approach to reduce wildfire risk in the forests surrounding the community — and Thompson Rivers University (TRU) is right in the middle of it. Instead of piling leftover wood and brush from fuel-reduction treatments and burning it when conditions allow, crews are now chipping and mulching the debris and spreading it in a thin layer across the forest floor to decompose naturally. The pilot project, funded by the Forest Enhancement Society of BC since 2023, aims to … improve the long-term health of these high-elevation forests. “This project shows what can be done when municipalities, universities and the private sector get together to come up with innovative ideas to address current and future wildfire risks to communities,” says John Karakatsoulis, TRU Faculty of Science. …Forsite Consultants Ltd. (Barr GeoSpatial Solutions Company), has been working with Sun Peaks to find alternatives as the burning window shrinks every year. 

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Yukon government expanding all-season timber harvest opportunities

The Government of Yukon
June 2, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada West

The Government of Yukon is taking steps to expand all-season timber harvesting opportunities across the territory and improve access for Yukon harvesters. The Department of Energy, Mines and Resources has reviewed existing timber harvest plans to identify areas where additional summer and all-season harvesting may be possible. There are currently summer harvesting opportunities available in most forest management districts. …The Government of Yukon is also working with the Yukon Wood Products Association to provide and subsidize pre-harvest migratory bird survey training for harvesters to support additional summer operations. …The Government of Yukon will continue working with First Nations, industry and the Yukon Wood Products Association to develop new timber harvesting projects and support existing operations throughout the territory.

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Suzanne Simard Speaks for the Trees

By Katie Underwood
Maclean’s Magazine
June 2, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada West

In the late ’90s, Suzanne Simard started what can only be (indelicately) described as a firestorm in the forestry world. Her Ph.D. findings, published in the renowned journal Nature, argued that trees weren’t the valiant loners scientists once believed them to be. Rather, they survived through symbiosis, communicating and even sharing carbon through a subterranean series of mycorrhizal networks (fungal root systems). Initially, Simard’s peers weren’t nearly as generous as the tree community—one reviewer rebuked her paper as “a dog’s breakfast”—but, over time, some listened more closely. Today, Simard isn’t just the tree world’s tallest poppy; she’s a global, Goodall-esque conservation icon.

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The ‘Reckoning’ Coming for BC Logging Licences

By Ben Parfitt
The Tyee
June 2, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada, Canada West

In 2024, the Tsay Keh Dene Nation and McLeod Lake Indian Band bought a logging licence near the town of Mackenzie from Canfor for $69M. …“It’s just a huge step to have some local Indigenous nations who are vested in our community step forward,” Makenzie Mayor Atkinson said. …But what if Canfor and others aren’t logging at rates close to what their licences say they can? If they sell such licences, what should those licences be valued at? And what role should the B.C. government play as the party that issues those licences and must approve any future sales? …Canfor, West Fraser and Western Forest Products alone control 39% of the timber that the government has firmly committed to logging companies. For decades, successive provincial governments granted logging licences to companies on the requirement that the public get something in return. The quid pro quo was that the companies would build mills.

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Syilx Okanagan Nation seeks emergency federal protection for Southern Mountain Caribou habitat

By Kathy Michaels
Castanet
June 1, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada West

The Syilx Okanagan Nation is calling on the federal government to issue an emergency order protecting critical habitat for Southern Mountain Caribou. In a filing under Section 80 of the federal Species at Risk Act, the Syilx Okanagan Nation is calling for immediate and enforceable protections for habitat used by the Columbia North, Frisby-Boulder and Central Selkirk herds, which occupy areas within Syilx Okanagan territory in southern British Columbia. “The current provincial and federal recovery measures have failed to address ongoing habitat destruction and cumulative effects across caribou ranges,” Chief Dan Wilson of the Okanagan Indian Band said in a media release. … “The continued logging of critical caribou habitat is inconsistent with Syilx Forestry Principles and Standards, yet the province continues to authorize logging in these core areas,” Coun. Jordan Coble, chair of the Syilx Nation Natural Resource Committee said in a media release.

Related Coverage in the Tyee, by Sarah Cox: Will Canada Issue an Emergency Order to Protect Caribou?

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British Coumbia’s caribou and the economics of extinction

By Peter Tsigaris, Thompson Rivers University
Armchair Mayor
June 1, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada West

BRITISH COLUMBIA’s caribou are disappearing, and they may be warning us about something much larger than the fate of a single species. A recent paper by former Thompson Rivers University economics student Trang Minh Phan, A Student Journal on Sustainability and Environment, examines the relationship between old-growth forest conservation and caribou recovery in British Columbia. The findings are important. Without stronger habitat protection, some caribou herds may face local extinction within decades. One herd in particular illustrates a modern ecological tragedy of the commons. The Itcha-Ilgachuz herd in the Cariboo region once numbered close to 3,000 animals in the early 2000s. By 2019, that population had collapsed to approximately 185 caribou. In one simulated scenario, strong protection of old-growth forests, allows the Itcha-Ilgachuz herd to recover above conservation targets within a decade. In another scenario involving limited regulation, recovery remains slow and uncertain. Under continued unrestricted logging, the herd eventually collapses toward extinction by 2035.

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Wildfires are destroying trees faster than we are replacing them

By Karen Pauls
CBC News
May 30, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada, Canada West

MANITOBA — A northern Manitoba tree-planting program is trying to replace trees destroyed by wildfires, but the cancellation of the federal two billion trees program is making that more challenging. In 2016, this forest in Manitoba’s Interlake region, about 300 kilometres northwest of Winnipeg, was devastated by a jack pine budworm infestation. It was starting to regenerate when wildfire ravaged the Devils Lake area in 2021. Areas just north are already burning this spring. Marley Moose says she felt sad when she returned to the forest three years ago as part of a tree-planting program through Nekoté LP, an Indigenous-owned corporation representing seven Swampy Cree First Nations in northern and central Manitoba. According to the Canadian Tree Nursery Association (CTNA), the country is losing trees faster than nature can grow them or people can plant them.

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Concerns raised as BC Timber Sales begins 4km logging road above Roberts Creek

By Jordan Copp
The Sunshine Coast Reporter
May 29, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada West

A new logging road project on the Sunshine Coast has drawn concern from local environmental advocates. At the same time, provincial officials say the work is designed to improve access and protect water resources. The Ministry of Forests confirmed to Coast Reporter that it is responsible for the road-building contract tied to Timber Sale Licence A94817. This project will see “just over 4km” of new road constructed to “move industrial traffic away from high-use public roads” and to create long-term access for multiple user groups. The ministry also said that the design has “enhanced overland techniques to minimize impacts to ground water,” along with water-quality monitoring and environmental oversight. However, Elphinstone Logging Focus’s (ELF) Ross Muirhead says the scope of the project is unusual for the region, saying four kilometres of brand new logging road is “unprecedented” on the Coast and that most projects are much shorter.

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B.C. Lions roar into Langford with assist for province wildfire program

By Ben Fenlon
Victoria News
May 30, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada West

For the B.C. Lions, wildfire safety and preparedness is a team effort. The CFL club has announced a new partnership to help champion B.C.’s FireSmart program, amplifying wildfire prevention and preparedness messaging across the province. The Lions have teamed up with Port Alberni-based aerial firefighting company Coulson Aviation for the campaign, while FireSmart has invested $17,000 to leverage the team’s extensive reach through digital and radio advertising, including live game broadcasts on 730 CKNW. During the off-season, wildfire resiliency messaging will also be delivered directly to students through B.C. Lions school visits, with the goal of empowering young people to be equipped to protect their own turf. …Minister of Forests and MLA for Langford-Highlands Ravi Parmar said the event demonstrated what can be achieved when communities work together to reduce wildfire risk.

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Wildfire activity low so far — but a hot and dry summer could change that, officials warn

By Peter Zimonjic
CBC News
May 28, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada West

The start to the 2026 wildfire season has been slow with the number of fires raging across the country well below average, but government officials warn that as the summer progresses there’s a risk things could get much worse. “Despite the fact that we’re seeing so little activity so far this year … this summer retains the potential to be a significant one right across the country,” a government official said Thursday during a technical briefing. The official said that while the wildfire risk is unlikely to result in a record-breaking year like 2023 or 2025, the federal government is forecasting above average conditions as the season progresses. Whether that happens depends, officials explained, on what happens to the weather over the next few months. If the above average temperatures predicted for across the county come to pass, B.C. faces the highest wildfire risk, particularly in July.

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Forest tent caterpillars feast in Calgary as outbreak spikes population across Alberta

By Amir Said
CBC News
May 31, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada West

Olds College entomologist Ken Fry says forest tent caterpillars are native to Alberta and relatively common, but their populations go through cycles in which they increase dramatically. Municipalities in Alberta are advising residents of an increase in the caterpillars this spring. “Roughly every 10 years populations increase enormously,” he said. The cyclical population explosion is called an outbreak. He said the causes of these cyclical outbreaks are still being studied but are believed to be influenced by weather, health status of trees, and other factors like predators, parasites and disease. Forest tent caterpillars are perhaps best known for the damage they inflict on trees. …”Trees can usually withstand a one-season munching, but when it comes to prolonged persistent defoliation over two, three years, that can result in some twig death or branch death or die back, you know, vulnerability over the winter to winter kill, things like that,” Fry said.

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Spruce budworm outbreak prompts planned aerial spraying around Whistler

By Luke Faulks
The Pique News Magazine
May 29, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada, Canada West

WHISTLER — As Western spruce budworm populations continue to spread through Whistler’s forests at historically unprecedented levels, the BC government is preparing to spray thousands of hectares around the resort municipality with a biological insecticide to blunt the outbreak. The Ministry of Forests is planning to aerially treat areas using Bacillus thuringiensis var. kurstaki (Btk)—a naturally occurring soil bacterium used for decades to control defoliating insects. Taylor Holt, the provincial resource coordinator, said… the aerial overview surveys in 2025 picked up 275,000 hectares of damage. [It’s] nearly three times as much damage as noted ever historically.” …Cheakamus Community Forest (CCF) executive director Heather Beresford, said. “So this is really the only viable treatment.” Still, she acknowledged the decision comes with uncomfortable trade-offs between wanting to prevent dead trees from posing a wildfire risk and protecting local non-budworm species who will be affected by spraying BtK.

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‘It’s an evolving relationship’: Prescribed fire gains renewed attention in B.C. ahead of wildfire season

By Amber Wang
CBC News
May 30, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada West

Prescribed burning is getting renewed attention in parts of B.C. as communities look for ways to reduce wildfire risk before summer. In Kimberley, B.C., that conversation recently took residents onto the trails near the city’s nature park. The city-led walk gave residents a look at treated areas where crews have been reducing forest fuels. They also heard from local fire officials and wildfire specialists about how planned fire can help protect nearby homes, trails and forested parkland from wildfire risk. Kimberley Fire Department Chief Will Booth says the tour was meant to help residents understand prescribed burning before more fuel management work happens in the city. The local tour comes as prescribed and cultural burning are getting more public attention after years of being less visible. …Bob Gray, a wildland fire ecologist and fire scientist, says warmer temperatures and drought are adding pressure to forests that already have too many trees competing for moisture.

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B.C. wildfire documentary draws 160K views and four Leo Award nominations

By Rob Gibson
Castanet
May 30, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada West

The independently-produced B.C. documentary, BC is Burning, has drawn more than 160,000 YouTube views and earned four Leo Award nominations in its first week of public release. The documentary, a 47-minute film released May 20, has attracted viewers from eight countries, including Canada, the United States, Australia and Finland. It has received nominations for best picture, best direction, best picture editing and best sound in the short documentary category at the 2026 Leo Awards. “We are very honoured by this recognition from the B.C.film community,” says producer and director Murray Wilson, adding the response shows “this conversation about BC forests and wildfire is resonating with many people.” …Earlier this year the documentary took home Okanagan Screen Awards for best feature documentary, best director and best cinematography. The 2026 Leo Awards take place July 4 and 5 at the Hyatt Regency Vancouver, with winners selected by industry professionals from more than 1,400 entries.

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Forest Enhancement Society of BC project updates from around the province

Forest Enhancement Society of BC
May 28, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada West

British Columbia’s forests support a diversity of trees, plants, fungi and wildlife, while also providing recreational opportunities, cultural values, and economic benefits to communities. As we recognized the International Day for Biological Diversity on May 22 and Wildfire Awareness Month throughout May, it’s an important time to reflect on the connection between healthy forests, resilient ecosystems, and the communities and wildlife that depend on them. Wildfire resilience and biodiversity are deeply connected. Thoughtful forest management activities, including strategic fuel reduction treatments and cultural and prescribed burning, can help reduce wildfire risk while also creating healthier and more diverse forest ecosystems for generations to come. …Today, FESBC is investing in treatments that reduce wildfire risk around communities, infrastructure and other resources. We are supporting the return of cultural and prescribed burning to the landscape. We are asking questions about how wildfire risk reduction treatments can also support biodiversity and other forest values, such as recreation.

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Ontario budgets just $150M for wildfires despite burning through almost double last year

By Cloe Logan
National Observer
June 2, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada East

In 2025’s budget, Ontario allotted $135 million for its Emergency Forest Firefighting fund, which Firefighter Noah Freedman describes as money that “keeps the lights on.” The province ended up spending double that: $271 million, according to this year’s budget. But that same document penciled in just $150 million again for this year. The province did not respond to requests from Canada’s National Observer asking why the budget hasn’t been increased. Not allotting adequate funds translates to real impacts on the frontlines, said Freedman, who is also vice president of Ontario Public Service Employees Union Local 703. He said last season was “riddled with logistical problems” due to a lack of available funding: not having crews and helicopters where they were needed, and scrambling to request more… “None of that is because of our leadership in our agency. It’s a result of not getting anywhere near the funding that we need to truly be decision-makers,” Freedman said.

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‘Qualified’ candidates on hand but not taking N.L. chief pilot role that oversees water bombers, says minister

By Alex Kennedy
CBC News
June 2, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: Canada East

©Gvt NF

Transportation and Infrastructure Minister Barry Petten said Monday that if pilots responsible for water bomber and air ambulance operations in Newfoundland and Labrador want their workplace situation to improve, they should tell him how to do it. “We’ve got a major [turnover] of chief water bomber pilots, and that’s a concern to me. So obviously, there’s a root cause to that,” Petten said. …Petten’s comments follow reports of the resignation of the province’s chief pilot in the Air Services branch. A letter, attributed collectively to Newfoundland and Labrador Water Bomber and Air Ambulance Pilots, highlighted issues in the sector to government last week. If a chief pilot isn’t found … Transport Canada could issue a suspension of Air Operator Certificate … which could ground water bombers without a solution. …Petten said an interim pilot could be in place as early as Wednesday — telling the House the department was “very close” to hiring a chief pilot.

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Lawmakers delve into Forest Service shake-up

By Marc Heller
E&E News by Politico
June 1, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: United States

Tom Schultz

Forest Service Chief Tom Schultz returns to Capitol Hill to field questions from House and Senate lawmakers on his agency’s policies and direction. …Schultz can expect questions on the Forest Service’s plans to consolidate research facilities and on the Trump administration’s proposal to move wildfire management out of the forest agency and into the Interior Department’s U.S. Wildland Fire Service. That’s not all that’s confronting Schultz, a former timber industry executive. Schultz is tasked with the administration’s top forestry goal of increased logging on public land to reduce the nation’s dependence on imported wood. He is managing those objectives while aiming to reduce the 193-million-acre national forest system’s wildfire risks, which officials say goes hand in hand with forest thinning and commercial logging. [to access the full story an E&E News subscription is required]

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Why Wildfire Experts Are So Worried About This Year’s Fire Season

By Peter Aldhous
Inside Climate News
May 31, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: United States

As bad as things got in Los Angeles in January 2025, when 31 people died and more than 16,000 buildings were destroyed by wildfires roaring into residential neighborhoods, many wildland firefighters look back on the rest of last year as a dodged bullet. Across the nation, according to the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC), which coordinates the federal wildfire response, the total area burned in 2025 was about two-thirds of the average over the past 10 years. This year is shaping up to be a very different prospect, wildfire experts warn. Key environmental indicators show that the nation is a tinderbox, gripped by widespread drought and with a light snowpack in the mountains that will offer little relief as its remnants melt away. At the same time, upheaval in the federal wildland firefighting effort and the loss of many staff qualified to join wildfire incident teams since Donald Trump took power for the second time have left firefighters deeply concerned about their ability to mount an effective response.

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Trump repeals rules governing off-roading on public lands

Center for Western Priorities
June 1, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: United States

President Donald Trump rescinded two executive orders on Friday evening that aimed to balance off-road vehicle (OHV) use on public lands. The 1972 and 1977 orders, signed by Presidents Richard Nixon and Jimmy Carter, required federal agencies to minimize ecological damage, harassment of wildlife, and recreational conflicts due to OHV use on public lands. Repealing the orders prioritizes motorized recreation and resource extraction over conservation, increasing the risk of widespread environmental degradation. The White House called the rescinded orders “outdated and burdensome” hurdles to energy and timber production. Without this guidance, fragile ecosystems—including national parks—are at risk of unmitigated OHV use, which can degrade streams, displace wildlife, and significantly damage soil and vegetation. …“Rescinding guidance meant to reduce conflicts in the backcountry and protect wildlife habitat isn’t popular; that’s why Trump tried to bury it by putting this order out on a Friday evening,” Center for Western Priorities Communications Director Kate Groetzinger said.

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Improve County and Forest Service Wildfire Plans in Montana

By Mike Bader, natural resource consultant
The Missoula Current
June 1, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: United States, US West

MONTANA — The US Forest Service and the timber industry have effectively lobbied Congress to enact laws based on fire paranoia that cut the public owners of these forests out of the process. They want the government to build roads at taxpayer expense to while compromising the best remaining fish and wildlife habitat and quiet spaces. Upon a molehill of truth they have constructed a mountain of disinformation. Claiming an emergency, the Forest Service is fast-tracking commercial timber sales in ways that severely limit and exempt them from environmental analysis. …They are removing the administrative review and public objection process. The bad stuff for wildlife, fish and people including ugly clearcuts, road construction and reduced water quality are being frontloaded. The good stuff including stream restoration and road reclamation are back ended. If past is prologue, the latter will not be funded or implemented as the Forest Service shifts its priority.

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Let’s Work Together For Oregon’s Forest

By Greg Ellison
NR Today
June 1, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: United States, US West

OREGON — When I arrived in Roseburg, Oregon in 1975, Douglas County was Timber Capital of the world. Four out of ten employable adults were employed directly in the timber industry. …Fast forward fifty years. Four in one hundred people in Douglas County are directly employed by the timber industry. Fifty percent of the Umpqua National Forest has now burned. Sixty five percent loss of the spotted owl. The County literally did not have enough money to keep the Cartels from moving in and trashing our watersheds. Instead of ever coming close to any level of the mandated timber harvest allowed, all logging plans are automatically challenged legally. Since 1991 environmental groups have filed over 2,000 lawsuits. …There is good news! Eleven timber companies, thirteen conservation groups, and the State of Oregon Fish and Wildlife, have joined into an agreement known as the Private Forest Accord. Everybody is working together to improve watersheds.

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Logging Project Near Yellowstone Could Threaten Wildlife Habitat and Tourist-Dependent Businesses

By Mosabber Hossain
Inside Climate News
June 1, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: US West

©NationalParkService

A proposed federal logging project in the forests bordering Yellowstone National Park is drawing growing concern from local residents, business owners and conservation advocates who fear it could have lasting impacts on wildlife habitat, recreation and tourism in one of Montana’s most iconic landscapes. The U.S. Forest Service is using emergency authority to speed the approval of the project, for which public comment closed Monday. Opponents say the agency hasn’t explained what the emergency is. Yellowstone National Park is more than a world-famous tourist destination. Established in 1872 as the first national park in the United States, it serves as the core of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, one of the largest nearly intact temperate ecosystems on Earth. The park and the surrounding public lands provide critical habitat for grizzly bears, wolves, lynx, elk, bison and many other species, as well as reducing the impact of climate-damaging emissions by storing carbon. 

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New report shows pine beetle devastation surging in Colorado’s forests

By Lucas Boland
Rocky Mountain PBS
May 31, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: United States, US West

DENVER — A longstanding specter of the Colorado mountains is gaining ground in a new conquest of ponderosa pine forests. An outbreak of the mountain pine beetle is spreading quickly and expected to continue this summer under “prime conditions,” according to a 2025 forest health report and pine beetle article by the Colorado State Forest Service. Survey flights over parts of nine Colorado counties showed a 148% increase in beetle-impacted acreage from 2024 to 2025. Observers recorded 5,544 acres of dead or dying trees during flights last year, up from 2,236 acres the year prior. …Victimized trees were observed at nearly every Colorado latitude, from the northern border to Pueblo in the Front Range, and Grand Junction to the southern border on the Western Slope. …As of May 29, the state’s snowpack stood at 15% of median, depriving forests of moisture needed to prevent both wildfires and the spread of the pine beetle.

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The US Forest Service is too important to be a political pawn

By Dan Glickman and Ann Veneman
The Los Angeles Times
June 1, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: United States, US West

While most folks think that the US Department of Agriculture focuses on farm policy, the largest agency within USDA is the Forest Service. As secretaries of Agriculture during the Clinton and Bush administrations, we spent years getting to know what this agency does: not only timber management but also stewardship of the 193-million-acre National Forest System. But now, the Trump administration has taken significant steps to dramatically change the agency, to consolidate the firefighting work of USDA and Interior. …While some changes to the service appear warranted and well-intentioned, others have been criticized as seemingly intended to dismantle this storied institution. …During our tenures leading USDA, we both worked to streamline various programs and to right-size the workforce. …When leaders undertake significant changes, they need to be driven by data, based on compelling evidence and carefully reviewed facts — not based on ideology or simply meant to “shake things up.”

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The world’s largest fungus is hiding in Oregon’s Blue Mountains — and its really big

By Rebecca Shavit
The Brighter Side of News
May 29, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: US West

©NRCan

In Oregon’s Blue Mountains, patches of dying trees once looked like separate outbreaks, scattered across ridges and drainages as if disease had struck at random. Instead, scientists found something far stranger beneath the soil: many of those distant pockets belonged to the same fungus. That fungus, Armillaria ostoyae, covered about 9.65 square kilometers, making it the largest known individual fungus on Earth at the time of the study. It had likely been growing there for at least 1,900 years, and possibly as long as 8,650. For researchers, the discovery did more than set a record. It challenged a basic biological idea: what counts as an individual. “It’s one organism that began as a microscopic spore and then grew vegetatively, like a plant,” said Dr. Catherine Parks, a research plant pathologist with the U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service and coordinator of the team.

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Forest Service and state of South Dakota sign agreement to work together on forest management

By Joshua Haiar
South Dakota Searchlight
May 29, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: US West

©USForestService

The U.S. Forest Service announced Friday that it has signed a five-year agreement to work with the state of South Dakota to carry out projects on national forest and adjacent land, possibly including timber harvesting, prescribed burning, forest thinning, grazing, and habitat and watershed restoration. …The shared stewardship agreement is between the state Department of Agriculture and Natural Resources and the Forest Service. It follows similar agreements in other states and comes after President Donald Trump’s executive order last year calling for an “immediate expansion” of American timber production. Following the initial five-year term, the agreement may be extended in increments of three years. …Specific projects involving money, services, property or other resources would require separate agreements and approvals. …“I’m suspicious that the primary reason for it is to help the Forest Service get more trees cut,” Dave Mertz, a retired Black Hills National Forest natural resource officer, said.

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University of Montana ecologist: Western forests need high-severity fire

By Laura Lundquist
Missoula Current
May 28, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: United States, US West

Richard Hutto

UM ecologist Richard Hutto frowns every time he hears U.S. Forest Service managers and others make the black-and-white comparison of wildland fire as “good” if it’s low intensity and “bad” if it’s high intensity. The Trump administration is also using those reasons to justify the elimination of the 2001 Roadless Rule. …(They say) there’s ‘good’ fire and ‘bad’ fire,” Hutto told a crowd supporting the Roadless Rule a few weeks ago. “But I’m here to tell you, they’re wrong. The story is misleading. Most western conifer forests have always harbored mixed- to high-severity fire. And by most, I mean 85%, according to Land Fire database. Only 15% – mostly in Arizona and New Mexico – is low severity.” …The wide variety of species that can be found in forests prove that wildfires of all severities have burned across the landscape for centuries, creating the ecosystems that exist today.

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U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff cosponsors bill to speed wildfire response in Georgia

By Kay Frazier
WALB News 10
June 2, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: United States, US East

Jon Ossoff

US Sen. Jon Ossoff is cosponsoring bipartisan legislation to establish faster wildfire response times on federal land in Georgia. Ossoff joined the Wildfire Response and Preparedness Act, which was introduced by Sens. Tim Sheehy and Andy Kim. The bill would create a 30-minute national standard response time for wildfires on federal land. The new standard is designed to improve response times on federal forest land across Georgia. “In recent years, the State of Georgia has seen unprecedented wildfire activity threatening lives and property. This bipartisan bill will ensure that firefighters and first responders are able to quickly respond to these emergencies and keep our communities safe.” In March, Ossoff helped secure funding for the city of Valdosta to purchase fully equipped vehicles for the Valdosta Fire Department and a burn building with an attached four-story training tower.

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Why Procter & Gamble, maker of Bounty and Charmin, hired a forester

By Heather Clancy
Trellis (formerly GreenBiz)
June 1, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: US East

Chris Reeves

When Procter & Gamble adopted an ambitious new pulp and paper pledge in early 2021, it hired a forester to convince suppliers to get on board. Officially, Chris Reeves is director of scientific communications for P&G’s family care business, which makes Charmin toilet paper, Bounty paper towels and Puffs facial tissues. That title downplays his master’s degree in forestry and 12 years of experience managing Kentucky forests, but Reeves spends at least one-third of his time among the trees with land owners or in meetings with the Society of American Foresters and nonprofits with big forestry practices. …In particular, Reeves is responsible for helping suppliers see value in becoming certified by the Forest Stewardship Council …Reeves’ first corporate job was for IKEA, where he was responsible for wood purchasing processes. …“This is a new thing in that world,” said Sarah Billig, president of FSC’s U.S. operation. 

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More than $4 million is going toward protecting Maine’s oldest trees

By Katie Delaney
News Center Maine
June 1, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: US East

NAPLES, Maine — The New England Forestry Foundation (NEFF) is giving out grants to landowners to help preserve some of Maine’s oldest trees. The organization got $4.3 million from the U.S. Forest Service in 2024 to pay loggers to put off cutting late-successional and old-growth forests, which are typically over 100 years old. The first grant was awarded to Chaplin Logging Inc. in Naples to conserve 23 acres of late-successional forest and improve other parts of their land. This type of forest is rare for southern Maine. The one on the Chaplins’ property has been mostly untouched for likely more than a hundred years. According to Brian Milakovsky, senior forester of NEFF, these trees provide a unique habitat for many important species and they’re good for the atmosphere. …Since these trees are being taken out of production, part of the grant is going toward timber stand improvement, removing undesirable trees in landowners’ other, younger forests.

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Ex-Top Scientists Reject the Science Behind Australia’s Native Forest Ban

By Jason Ross
Wood Central Australia
June 1, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: International

AUSTRALIA — The bans that have closed native forestry in Victoria and Western Australia, along with the campaign to extend them across NSW and Tasmania, rest on misinformation and a flawed promotion of science that cannot be squared with the published evidence. That is according to lead author John Raison, a former Chief Research Scientist at the CSIRO (Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization) with nearly five decades studying native forest ecology, writing in the journal Australian Forestry alongside fellow former CSIRO scientists Sadanandan Nambiar and Glen Kile and University of Melbourne hydrologist Leon Bren. As it stands, just 0.05% of Australia’s 132 million hectares of native forest is harvested in any year, the authors point out, a figure equal to about 1.5% of the net harvestable area and one that sits awkwardly beside anti-forestry campaigners’ claims of wholesale destruction. The harvested coupes are scattered and non-contiguous, and the law requires each to be regenerated and monitored.

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How carbon finance could give a boost to Japan’s ailing forestry industry

By Annelise Giseburt
The Japan Times
May 31, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: International

Japan’s forestry sector is at a crossroads. Population decline and cheap imported timber are driving down prices. Forest ownership is fragmented and small-scale, further limiting profitability. The workforce is aging and shrinking. As a result, many forests — planted decades ago, when timber profits seemed surer — are now under-managed, abandoned, or not replanted after being clear-cut. “Especially over the past few years, we have seen a lot of forest owners decide to give up their land,” says Akio Abe, associate director of the Ishinomaki District Forestry Association in Miyagi Prefecture. …Carbon credits, Abe hopes, can provide the financial backing needed to turn the Ishinomaki District woods into a boon, not a burden, for both local landowners and the environment. Together with corporate partners, the foresters are applying for credits certified by an international body, a rarity among forest carbon projects in Japan.

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Coalition makes last urgent call for changes to EU Deforestation Regulation

By Stephen Powney
The Timber Trades Journal
May 29, 2026
Category: Forestry
Region: International

European timber organisations have made a last, united call for changes to be made to the EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) before it comes into force this December. Eighteen organisations from various sectors, including timber, panels and packaging groups, called for an EUDR Information System “without flaws and technical constraints, aligned with business practice”. The coalition underlines that the Information System must be operationally workable and aligned with real business practices. The EUDR Information System, which represents the backbone of the traceability feature of the EU regulation, is aimed to prevent products linked to deforestation from entering the EU market. Particular coalition concerns relate to DDS aggregation, technical limitations of the TRACES-based system, the usability of simplified declarations for SMEs and micro-enterprises and the lack of clear procedures in the event of system disruptions or outages.

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