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Position Statement title

What's your position on preserving old growth forests?
The only constant in nature is change. It's fine to reserve old trees in areas where harvesting is forbidden, but eventually they die of natural causes. The only way to make certain there will always be old growth forests for the public to enjoy is to plan for it, to manage: to protect designated trees and stands of trees from fire and disease. Protecting these stands will likely involve periodic thinning, an excellent tool for replicating the natural disturbance patterns associated with fire, insects and disease. Amid the outcries of environmentalists who lost a bitter court fight, such a harvest was conducted on the Siskiyou National Forest in southern Oregon in the early 1990s. To protect spotted owl habitat, the Forest Service ordered the removal of several hundred old, diseased trees that were threatening nearby healthy trees that were about the same age, extending the life of the remaining forest.