The following editorial was published in today’s Roseburg News-Review: https://www.nrtoday.com/opinion/guest_col/guest-column-manage-our-forests-or-continue-a-losing-battle/article_071441fc-4525-11ef-8e8b-1fa173a2b1ad.html
In April 2022, the Biden Administration issued Executive Order (E.O.) 14072, “Strengthening the Nation’s Forests, Communities, and Local Economies.” This order instructed federal agencies to “scientifically define” old-growth trees and to take appropriate steps to protect them for future generations.
The last time the government attempted to achieve these tasks was in the 1980s, resulting in widespread rural business failures and ever-increasing losses of public forests — including old-growth — to catastrophic wildfires, bugs, and disease that continue to this time. This E.O. promises similar results, but on a national scale, rather than just regional.
Biden’s E.O. affects all 128 of the nation’s forestlands managed by the Forest Service (USFS) and Bureau of Land Management (BLM); whereas the 1994 Clinton Plan for Northwest Forests (NWFP) only affected the highly productive Douglas fir forests of Oregon, Washington, and California.
And, whereas the NWFP developed a single “scientific” definition of “old-growth,” the E.O. computer modelers have come up with more than 200!
Different types of trees in different environments live different lengths of time. For most of the past century, Douglas fir — the most valuable timber tree in our public forests — were considered “old-growth” if they were at least 200-years-old.
This has not always been true. Jerry Phillips, Elliott State Forest manager and historian, always maintained old-growth was a “logger’s term” and referred to the deep furrowed bark and change in color from “red fir” — or mature second-growth — to “yellow fir,” or old-growth. On the Elliott, that would be a tree about 250-350-years-old.
In the 1940s, OSU forest scientists attempted to quantify the “logger’s term” and postulated old-growth were 350-450-years-old. In the meantime, field foresters in Coos County were doing the most detailed analysis of native Douglas fir forestland ever conducted — and they said old-growth might only be 191-years-old.
From 1945 to 1947, Weyerhaeuser foresters systematically bored 1466 trees on 1576 1/4-acre plots over 125,000 acres, lying immediately south of the 80,000-acre Elliott. Neither forest had ever been logged by that time, and 90% of both were covered with even-aged stands of native Douglas fir, corroborating observations by noted Douglas fir scientist Thornton Munger (1940):
“The paths of the great forest fires of the last century or two are plainly marked by even-aged stands, consisting to the extent of at least 90 per cent of Douglas fir (if within the preferred habitat of this tree).”
Weyerhaeuser documented 31,650 acres of old-growth, with the oldest tree being 380-years-old, and some were 300-feet tall; among the largest Douglas fir ever measured. These even-aged stands dated at least three “great fires” from 1565 to 1755, averaged 225-years-old [1720], and contained 40% defect from fire, bugs, and decay.
Half of the area (61,870 acres) was 166–190-year-old mature second-growth, averaging 180-years-old [1765] with only 6% defect and dating at least two major wildfires from 1755 to 1790.
In 1945, the Elliott’s 80,000 acres were mostly 60-year-old Douglas fir that had followed ca.1845, 1868, and 1879 catastrophic-scale wildfires.
The remaining 32,480 acres of Weyerhaeuser land was “very lightly timbered” with even-aged stands 10-40-years-old, dating from the 1902 fires through 1936.
These 200,000+ acres of virgin Douglas fir forestland during WW II reflected a minimum 10 — likely more — major wildfires from 1565 to 1936, or on average, a major wildfire every 35-40 years. These lands were subsequently actively managed, have supported more than three generations of hundreds of local families, and haven’t had a major fire in more than 80 years.
In the 1980s forest ecologists developed the first “scientific definition” of old-growth for Douglas fir. It included big, old trees, large snags and dead wood throughout, and a multilayered canopy of ladder fuels. The scarcity of this unusual timber type was blamed on logging, rather than nature, and active management of our nations’ forests was mostly ended.
The current Biden E.O. report states for 25 years, since 2000, only 9,000 acres of public old-growth were logged, while insects and diseases killed 182,000 acres and wildfires killed 700,000 acres more.
Two points in this article that I disagree with:
1. That our forests exist for the purpose of fueling local economies and rural businesses.
2. That an old growth tree with “40% defects” is a problem. This is a highly anthropometric view of a forest, viewing it as a lumber plantation. But should we also view this as nature at work in a functional ecosystem?