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A previously thinned portion of the area charred by the Dixie Fire, which despite active forest management across much of the burn area, became one of California’s largest blazes. Photo George Wuerthner The Wilderness Society (TWS), founded to promote wildland preservation, has shifted its mission and focus to promoting logging and other activities that destroy…
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“Thinning” project on the Wallowa Whitman NF in Oregon. The removal of trees by chainsaw medicine eliminates evolutionary agents that would otherwise naturally “thin” the forest. Photo George Wuerthner The Forest Service and Forestry School researchers (funded by the Forest Service) continue to promote the idea that our forests are “unhealthy.” It is an…
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Logging roads are a major negative impact on ecosystems. Photo George Wuerthner The latest attempt by the Forest Service to make timber cutting palatable is using the terms “temporary” and “closed” to describe logging roads. The implied message is that road impacts are magically eliminated if they are temporary or closed. Roads, temporary, “closed,” or…
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Thinning the forest is often less effective than eliminating human sources of ignition. Photo George Wuerthner The Deschutes National Forest wildfire policies are misdirected towards logging while ignoring the real threats that could lead to blazes on Bend’s doorstep. Anyone driving around the national forest near Bend will note the abundance of homeless camps, RVs,…
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Logging lodgepole pine on the Deschutes NF in Oregon. Photo George Wuerthner Across the West, the Forest Service and logging proponents continue to mischaracterize forest health by the standards of the Industrial Forestry Paradigm. Under this logging juggernaut paradigm, any natural evolutionary agent that kills a tree, such as a drought, wildfire, insects, or…
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Giant sequoia in Mariposa Grove, Yosemite National Park. Photo George Wuerthner I visited Yosemite National Park recently. I was dismayed to see the logging of large trees in the valley. According to the Park Superintendent, the justification for logging is “to use every tool at our disposal to save the forests and to save the…
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Clearcuts along the McKenzie River corridor east of Eugene, Oregon did little to slow the Holiday Farm Fire. Photo George Wuerthner The Holiday Farm Fire began on September 7, 2020. The fire charred 173,000 acres along the McKenzie River Valley in western Oregon’s Cascade Range, possibly due to a fallen power line. The fire destroyed…
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Yosemite National Park, California. Photo George Wuerthner The New York Times recently published an article titled At Yosemite, A Preservation Plan That Calls For Chainsaws. The idea that we need to log the forest to create healthy forests in a national park is a major threat to the management policies of the National Park…
Author
George Wuerthner is an ecologist and writer who has published 38 books on various topics related to environmental and natural history. He has visited over 400 designated wilderness areas and over 200 national park units.