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"Wildfire"
NASA just reported the drought in eastern Montana is so severe it is a once in a century event.
Not surprisingly, despite livestock grazing that some suggest could preclude large blazes, the drought in Eastern Montana has spawned some recent blazes including the 270,000-acre Lodgepole fire. The fire raced across grazed public and private pasture […]
Continue Reading →During the 1992 election campaign, Bill Clinton famously coined the phrase:
It’s the “economy, stupid” to admonish George H.W. Bush for his failure to understand the real problem facing voters.
Today the timber industry and Forest Service continuously advocate logging to reduce fuels and assert that this will reduce large wildfires. But fuels […]
COMMENTARY ON PAUL HESSBURG PRESENTATION
I’ve attended a number of Paul Hessburg’s “Mega Fire” presentations. The following is commentary that follows his presentation that can be reviewed prior to, during, and after his presentation to get a different perspective on the wildfire issue.
Dr. Hess burg’s wildfire presentation has some good points that are worth […]
Continue Reading →Recently I drove up the Lostine River corridor and hiked the trail in the Eaglecap Wilderness giving me a good opportunity to review a Forest Service proposal to log the river corridor.
The agency is using a stealth method of approving the proposed logging called a “Categorical Exclusion”. The CE allows the FS to proceed […]
Continue Reading →The House Subcommittee on Natural Resources chaired by Tom McClintock (R) of California is advocating more active management of our national forests based on the presumption that logging/thinning will reduce large wildfires.
A clear indication of McClintock’s perspective is found in the title of a recent hearing he chaired called “Oversight Hearing on Burdensome Litigation […]
Continue Reading →National Forests across the West are facing dire threats from politicians, the timber industry and the Forest Service. The public is currently being misled into thinking that our forests are “unhealthy”, and that they need to be “restored” due to “beetle infestations” and “insect and disease.” All of this is euphemism to drastically ramp up […]
Continue Reading →“Rather than alarming, a lack of conifer regeneration allows other vegetation its “moment in the sun” so to speak, and provides for a much more diverse forest ecosystem” . . . . George Wuerthner
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Recently researchers at UC Davis and the US Forest Service presented a new scientific […]
Continue Reading →The recent blazes that have consumed more than a thousand structures in Gatlinburg, Tennessee offers yet another lesson about wildfire. The inferno that roared across Gatlinburg was driven by extreme drought and 80 mile-an-hour winds which blew embers miles beyond the fire front. There several important lessons.
First, rural sprawl contributed to the massive fires […]
Continue Reading →The Department of Interior recently released its Integrated Rangeland Fire Management Strategy whose goal is to reduce range fires in sagebrush ecosystems critical to sage grouse. The plan correctly identifies that cheatgrass is a major threat to the bird, as well as the sagebrush ecosystems. Cheatgrass is an exotic annual plant that greens up early, […]
Continue Reading →The timber industry and its advocates continue to promote a number of myths designed to garner public support for increased logging. These myths are being repeated by many in Congress, including all western Republicans and some western Democrats who are advocating new legislation that would weaken environmental protections, reduce public review of the Forest Service timber […]
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