Callender 8/8/01
Old-Growth Forests
Department of Interior
This branch is in charge of wilderness and national parks. The former will not allow
motor vehicles; the latter allow recreation but no cutting of trees. The Fish & Wildlife
service and National Park Service are in this Department, as is the National Wilderness
Preservation System.
Department of Agriculture
This Department includes the Forest Service. It oversees our national forests. These
were created by Pinchot under Teddy Roosevelt so that the U.S. would not run out of
timber. Conservation, Pinchot, is the “wise use” of natural resources. In the NW U.S.
the Forest Service controls 36 million acres of forest.
See Knize article for what it does: e.g., Clear-cuts, visual protection corrider.
Forests
Old-growth forests range from the Alaskan panhandle (spruce) to Washington and
Oregon (Douglas fir) to northern California. In their present form, they are about 6000
yrs old; some of the trees are 1000 yrs old. Dead trees may stand for 200 yrs, feeding the
whole ecosystem. On one tree 1500 species of invertebrate may be found.
In CA, there has been very little change at all in these ecosystems (where they are
undisturbed by man). Here the trees are Sequoia sempivirens and Sequoia gigantica.
The latter is restricted to state and national parks now. The former, the largest trees to
have ever grown, live on the coast.
The original forest contained between 20-70 million trees; 70-95% have been logged in
the last century, increasing over the past 3 yrs.
Negative impact:
younger trees not as big
Fish & wildlife harmed -- northern spotted owl (2000 left in 1990)
Topsoil into streams after clear-cut
Global warming
Each big tree is enough wood for two houses.
Wilderness Act, 1964. Set aside 9.1 million acres as preserved wilderness. Now it’s
approaching 100 million acres… The Bush administration is trying to revoke a recent
Clinton rule that banned logging and road-building in over 58 million acres of wild roadless areas in our national forests.
Callender 8/8/01
Case of Pacific Lumber; see Newton paper in EEPB. The Case of Pacific Lumber
1865-1984: perpetual sustained yield; great employer
1986: purchased in hostile takeover by Charles Hurwitz with junk bond money and
turned to a policy of clear-cutting, no replanting, cutting trees saved for next
century…caused erosion, destruction of streams, hurt breeding of salmon, etc.
1990: clear-cut a broad 1.5 mile corridor into the middle of the Headwaters forest
(ancient redwood grove in CA) and named it “our wild-life-biologist study trail”.
1991: Judge William Dwyer declared a moratorium on cutting the old-growth habitat to
save the spotted owl, prompting an outcry from loggers.
1992. “Thanksgiving massacre”; cut off talks with CA and FWS to cut down as many
trees as possible in Owl Creek on Thanksgiving weekend.
1993: Hurwitz wants the US govt to pay $600,000,000 for 4,500 acres of the ancient
redwoods”; otherwise, he says, he will press ahead with his plans to cut the trees down.
The habitat itself is roughly 45,000 acres, and he is unwilling to sell the whole tract.
1995: logging of Owl Creek illegal; immediately new plans to log Headwaters tract of old
redwoods.
1998. Headwaters Pact. 480 million dollars for 3000 acres of redwoods and 4500 acres
as buffer zone. Pac Lumber still owns 211,000 acres subject to various heightened
environmental regulations. The pact also gave Maxxam/Pacific Lumber ownership of a
705-acre tract of redwoods situated in the middle of the new protectorate.
2003. Pacific Lumber plans to begin cutting the area's second-growth trees, which line
steep slopes directly above a two-and-a-half-mile stretch of the Elk River.
Environmentalists, aghast at the idea of more clear-cutting within the boundaries of the
Headwaters preserve, fear the logging will harm the threatened salmon and further
damage the already fragmented forest ecosystem. The Elk River is one of only a handful
of remaining spawning grounds for the endangered coho.
Comments/questions
Everything (or almost) he did was legal.
Netted huge profits for shareholders in PL
What options were open to the State? Park? Eminent domain? Compensation?
Are the trees safer in public or private hands?