Every major conservation group in our country – including the venerable Nature Conservancy - has endorsed the urgent need for the federal government to launch a large-scale, long-term thinning and prescribed fire program in the west’s national forests.
It’s a sunny late August morning here in the pastoral countryside about 15 miles northeast of Sedro Woolley, Washington. Save for the four feet of rain that fall here annually, this would be a great place to live. But here in the Land of Eternal Wet Feet, about an hour south of the Canadian border, it rains every 2 to 3 days. Too much for us.
Low elevation soil west of the Washington Cascades is deep, rich and very moist – spongy under foot in heavily shaded areas. Small wonder that ramrod straight Douglas-fir often grows five to six feet a year in western Washington – or that privately-owned forestlands here have been harvested three and four times since Frederick Weyerhaeuser and his partners bought 900,000 acres of virgin timber from railroad magnate, James J. Hill, in 1900 for $5.4 million. This is the timber industry’s Mecca.
We left home on Wednesday, drove as far as Cle Elum, Washington, overnighted in a beautiful RV park on…
Since 1986, Evergreen Magazine has been the voice of American forestry and science-based forest policy. In the ongoing pursuit of practical, sustainable and productive forests, we’ve updated our look and expanded our reach. These improvements aren’t merely cosmetic. We’ve been delighted to discover a broad audience of reasonable, cooperative people who understand the vital importance of healthy, actively-managed forests. We’ve recruited new talents, crafted new strategies, and prepared tirelessly for what our founder Jim Petersen calls “the race to a better future”.
We hope you’ll join us. It’s people like you, people who care about our health, economy and environment, that will enable us to bring about the changes we know must be made. Looking forward, we see the opportunity for rural and urban, right and left, wealthy and poor, to unite under this common cause to the greater benefit of all. Your time, your donations, your willingness to advance this noble goal, are the proof that Americans are ready to move past rhetoric and conflict to craft solutions that strengthen and empower our communities, our children, and ourselves. Thanks for coming. We’re glad to have you.
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DONATE NOWThere is nothing new, normal, natural, or inevitable about what we are witnessing... What we are witnessing is not “the new normal.” Nor is it a direct result of “climate change.” It is the downstream result of congressional/federal failure to control three decades of uninterrupted tree growth in national forests that hold too many trees for the natural carrying capacity of the land.
The western United States is on the leading edge of the worst wildfire season in a century. By any measure, a pandemic.
I was a 16-year-old member of the last graduating class from Blue Mountain School when I first met Bob Zybach through my mother, who was working with him on a project about early Coos County history.
Your tax-deductible contribution allows us to continue providing science-based forestry information with the goal of ensuring healthy forests forever.
DONATE NOWA call to action to create forest-to-community health within the WUI/Wildland Urban Interface - and an overview of the current state of the forest, wildfire risk, needed treatment, and landowner and community resources in Lincoln County.
Vicki Christiansen’s decision to retire has me thinking about the qualities the Biden Administration should look for in a new Chief of the Forest Service.
None of the Biden Administration’s climate change/carbon capture goals can be reached until our wildfire pandemic has been quieted.
Your tax-deductible contribution allows us to continue providing science-based forestry information with the goal of ensuring healthy forests forever.
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