timber

Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Timber In Oregon and Much Much More

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city of beaverton library This is the city of Beaverton, OR library.

You would think that information about the forest sector would be readily available in Oregon, and sure enough, thanks to a helpful friend of the blog at OSU, these reports were found. An amazing amount of information and helpful graphics. Check them out!

..they probably are on the web, but that’s not how I got them, so they are attached.
OR 2012_Oregon_Forest_Report
OR_Forest_Facts_and_Figures_2013
If someone finds them online, please put the link in a comment and I will transfer the links up here on the post.

Thanks to the Oregon Forest Resources Institute for summarizing all these data.

To Manage, Perchance to Sell, Forest Vegetation on Public Lands: Why or Why Not?

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We have been discussing what lies behind our different worldviews on a deeper level, or at least trying to, for some time. Recently, Mike Wood asked us to talk about our interests here. For some reason, this ran out of steam, but now our guest, Bryan Bird, volunteered to engage in this discussion. The discussion started in a thread about the Rim Fire, so I am starting it over here so it doesn’t get lost. It’s really not about the Rim Fire, it is more general and more fundamental.

Again, Bryan is a guest, so I ask you to be on your best behavior on this thread.

Here’s the first post, in reply to Bob, which triggered my latent desire to have this conversation:

Point taken, but if we are doing this: I am a trained scientist (Masters), held science jobs with the USFS and the US Park Service, and spent the last 17 years digging around in the relevant scientific literature and working in the field on fire and logging related issues. I grew up in the Sierra Nevada foothills outside of Sequoia-Kings Canyon NP.

One thing I am fairly certain of, based on this experience, is that on the balance, timber harvest on federal, public lands is a losing proposition, both ecologically and economically. That is not to say that there may be circumstances when mechanical vegetation treatments will be justified and we should put people to work doing it, but generally not.

So I replied here:
Bryan, if you are up for it..

I am a trained scientist (Ph.D), held science jobs with the FS and CSREES, and have spent 40 years (sheesh!) working sometimes in the field and sometimes not on forest management (including fire and logging issues). Including a notable stint in FS Research where my cubicle adjoined two fire scientists. I worked many places including the Eldorado in California.

I am not certain, based on this experience, that timber harvest is a “losing proposition both ecologically and economically”. In fact, I would argue the opposite.

I think there are two framings that I have…
1. “Local” production is best:
Should the US get its wood it uses from here or from our neighbor to the North or from ?. Why is wood different from agriculture or energy? Isn’t it better economically and environmentally to produce it ourselves?

Or 2.
Why not use trees you remove?
This posits that there are reasons to thin forests and to diversify stand structure. These reasons may be for fuels treatment or to increase habitat for certain species.

How do you frame this issue?

I would imagine that you, like me, are not an expert in economics. But there are markets for wood, and people sell wood and wood products all the time. But we can have that discussion as well, as lots of folks on the blog and elsewhere do know about it.

I would be very interested in carrying on this discussion with you, and see where we diverge in our thinking. We have similar experiences, but I suppose different values. If you are up for it, I definitely am.

And he replied here:

I suspect our fundamental difference is found in what we value our public forest lands for. It appears to me that you see some mix of subsidized commodity production to be preferable (classic multiple use), whereas I see recreation, clean water, wildlife, hunting, wildness, property values, and even aesthetics to be the highest value for the most people (Americans). Go to Headwaters Economics website to see any number of rigorous analyses of these values in Western states and counties. http://headwaterseconomics.org/land/protected-public-lands-increase-per-capita-income

I do not have a degree in economics but I have co-authored several papers, reports and projects that considered the economics of timber sales on public lands and non-commercial, restoration on public lands. My general take home is that, when all values on public lands are considered, it does not make fiscal sense to manage them for commodity production. In fact, there were few forests, post the Ronald Reagan/James Watt heyday of logging levels that actually made any positive returns for the treasury. Most forests, with perhaps the exception of the Allegheny (cherry) did not return receipts to the treasury from their timber programs. I know this is a complex equation and others will argue it.

I do believe in sourcing our timber from within our borders. I also believe private, commercial timber lands are the place for that and can meet the demand. You have to keep in mind the public forest system (USFS mainly) was established after the prime growing lands were already in private ownership. What remained was marginal for timber production (thus the high costs).

If there is product coming from genuine ecological management of public forests, then sure, use it locally for cottage industry, firewood, stove pellets etc. But, I do not want the commodity production driving the management of our public forest again as it did in the 70s, 80, and even into the early 90s.

At this point, we’ll transition to this thread. See comments below.

Colorado Forest Products (TM) PSAs

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cfp_logo_lg

Found these PSAs for Colorado Forest Products (TM) in my email this afternoon.

The Colorado State Forest Service is very excited to announce that next week our first series of public service announcements (PSAs) featuring our Colorado Forest Products™ program will begin airing on the networks of 9News (KUSA, KTVD).

The creative process involved with the production of these appealing and informative 15 to 30 second PSAs has been both challenging and rewarding for the Colorado State Forest Service’s Wood Utilization and Marketing team. Please, take the time to view our 3 PSAs here:

Interesting that Andy had just posted below about “worthless” trees in 4FRI.. wonder what makes 4FRI’s “worthless” when some of the same kinds and sizes of trees are worth something in Colorado?

Here’s more stuff from the CSU website here:

Colorado’s Source of Wood Products

Colorado uses tremendous amounts of wood products, but it depends on imports from other states and countries to meet its needs. Key states exporting wood products to Colorado include Oregon, Idaho, Washington, California, Montana, Arkansas, Minnesota and Washington. Canada and Mexico also export large quantities of wood products into Colorado as well.

Purchasing Local Wood Products

There are existing businesses in the state of Colorado that produce and supply locally derived wood products. Purchasing products that were grown, harvested and manufactured in the state:

Decreases Fossil Fuel Consumption and Emissions

In many cases, wood products are being transported great distances to Colorado. This increases the amount fossil fuel used and burned to transport materials.

Retains Consumer Dollars in Colorado Economy

Purchasing local products, keeps consumer dollars in Colorado’s economy and does not flow to other states. It also keeps local people employed whether they are working directly for the company or supply materials to the company or goes to the local grocery store it stays within the community.

Increases Ability and Opportunity to Improve Colorado’s Forest Health Conditions

Supporting local products produced with Colorado wood can help reduce forest management and restoration treatment costs because the wood coming out of the forest has value. When products are generated as a result of these treatments, they generate revenue and create an opportunity to improve Colorado’s forest health.

Plantation Thinning Success on the Rim Fire

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Derek tipped me off about the new BAER fire severity maps, yesterday, and I was happy to see that the efforts to thin plantations has resulted in lower fire intensities. Here is the link to both high and low resolution maps. It is not surprising that fire intensities outside of this thinning project I worked on were much higher, and I doubt that there was much survival in the unthinned plantations. Those plantations were the within the 1971 Granite Fire, and is yet another example of forest re-burn. This part of the fire has terrain that is relatively gentle, compared to the rest of the burned areas. To me, it is pretty clear that fuels modifications reduced fire intensities.

This photo below shows a boundary between burn intensities. The area east of road 2N89 was thinned and burned much cooler than the untreated areas to the west. The areas in between the plantations had moderate to high burn intensities, due to the thick manzanita and whitethorn. Those areas were left to “recover on their own”. The SPI lands did not fare as well, as they didn’t thin their plantations.

Rim-Fire-plantations

The highest burn intensities occurred in the old growth, near the Clavey River. Activists have long-cherished the areas around this river, and I am assuming that these were protected as spotted owl/goshawk PACs. As you can see, this area has very thick old growth, and it shows on the map as high intensity. This same scenario is one that Wildlife Biologists have been worrying about for many years, now. These wildlife areas have huge fuel-loading issues and choked understories. Prescribed fires cannot be safely accomplished in such areas, without some sort of fuels modifications. Last year, I worked in one unit (within an owl PAC) on the Eldorado where we were cutting trees between 10″ and 15″ dbh, so that it could be safely burned, within prescription.

Clavey-old-growth

Nearly all of the Groveland Ranger District’s old growth is now gone, due to wildfires in the last 50 years. What could we have done differently, in the last 20 years?

Dr. Paul Adams Responds to Oregonian Water Quality Story

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On working forestlands, the Oregon Forest Practices Act requires that some trees and snags be left behind during harvest for wildlife habitat purposes. Along with buffer zones along forest streams, road-building activities must be approved under law and water runoff after harvest from the state’s plentiful rainfall is closely monitored. (Photo courtesy Oregon Forest Resources Institute)
On working forestlands, the Oregon Forest Practices Act requires that some trees and snags be left behind during harvest for wildlife habitat purposes. Along with buffer zones along forest streams, road-building activities must be approved under law and water runoff after harvest from the state’s plentiful rainfall is closely monitored. (Photo courtesy Oregon Forest Resources Institute)

UPDATE: HW Policy & Mgmt – AdamsP 07 is a copy of the Adams paper that Loup Loup referred to.

This article was run in the Oregonian on Aug. 20 entitled “Do Oregon’s clear-cut and pesticide buffers protect drinking water from creeks, rivers? “. It makes one wonder if this was timed to raise this question at the same time as Senator Wyden is working on the O&C lands issue- especially when it is not clear that the story fairly depicts the OSU studies, and the Oregonian did not publish Dr. Adams’ response. Fortunately, I was able to obtain a copy of his response and post it here:

Forestry and Drinking Water – Still a Vital Combination

Forestry and clean water, it’s an issue with many angles. On Wednesday, The Oregonian focused on a local controversy while also raising broader questions about forest stream protection and clean, reliable drinking water supplies. But even among these questions and views of the local controversy, some key facts can be gleaned (quotes italicized below from the original Oregonian article) and further illuminated. The latter observations draw from my 30+ years of experience with forestry and watershed research and education.

“Timberlands are easier on water quality than cities and farms.” Not only that, timber harvesting and other forestry activities occur at some level on nearly all of Oregon’s major municipal watersheds. Drinking water quality from these areas remains high because of typically excellent source water and very strict standards for treatment and monitoring, although localized or short-term problems sometimes occur. This is true even in watersheds that have little or no timber harvesting because water quality in forest streams can vary widely with storms and other natural influences.

“Oregon’s rules for private forests are less stringent than in neighboring Washington…” Yes, but this begs the question of whether those stringent standards result in an effective balance of benefits from those forest lands. During 1994-2006, a period when much stricter rules were enacted, western Washington lost about 185,000 acres of forest land to development and other uses. Oregon remains committed to maintaining its private forests in forest land use, and that includes serious consideration of the cost-benefit balance of forestry regulations.

“Stream buffers for aerial herbicide spraying are also smaller in Oregon than in Washington.” Again true, but does water quality sampling in Oregon reveal any current problems? A 2012 analysis by the USGS of the McKenzie River basin, which is Eugene’s water source and includes extensive industrial forests, states: “Forestry pesticide use is not considered a likely threat to drinking water at the present time.” Instead, in this mixed land use basin, “…urban pesticide use is potentially an important source of pesticides of concern for drinking water.”

“The state Forestry Department is working with timber companies, university experts and other agencies on three studies to better gauge the effects of logging on streams.” But contrary to the oversimplified, negative findings exclusively mentioned in the article, these studies are showing very encouraging results about the effectiveness of current forest practices and Oregon’s regulations in protecting water quality, including fish habitat. Some refinement of our rules may follow as the picture becomes clearer but there is no compelling evidence that dramatic changes are needed to protect water quality.

Other long-term water quality data from state agencies already support the general effectiveness of forest practices in Oregon. Oregon’s forest owners also have a history of working collaboratively with water users, and since 1997, they have invested over $95 million in Oregon’s Plan for Salmon and Watersheds. More broadly, these landowners provide an exceptional array and quality of ecosystem services, for which typically they receive no direct compensation. And with persistent pressure to sell or modify forestland for development and other uses, the questions of regulatory costs, benefits and unintended consequences must be taken very seriously.

Paul W. Adams is a Professor and Forest Watershed Extension Specialist at Oregon State University. Any opinions expressed are his own.

Note that Dr. Adams is the same as LoupLoup referred to in his comment here.

Yosemite Wildfire Study

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While browsing for historical fire maps, I ran across this interesting study of Yosemite wildfire issues. I scanned some of the study and felt it would be useful information.

http://staff.washington.edu/jlutz/Publications/Lutz_vanWagtendonk_Thode_Miller_Franklin_Climate_Fire_IJWF_2009.pdf

I didn’t know that there are fewer individual and less severe wildfires in the early season, due to snowpack’s effect on thunderstorm development. The Forest Service land, where I took this 1990 picture of the A-Rock Fire, has burned 13 times in the last 100 years. Why did this particular wildfire kill so much old growth, when previous uncontrolled fires did not?

A-Rock3-web

You can also see the fire’s “twin”, across the canyon. It also has suffered a re-burn, although it was the Park Service who let a fire get out of hand, on that incident too. The A-Rock re-burned when a prescribed fire was lit, and lost, within an hour of ignition. The Meadow Fire burned for weeks, costing $17 million, closing the Park during the height of tourist season. The Forest Service portion of the A-Rock Fire hasn’t re-burned, yet.

The Colville Experiment

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This sounds like an interesting approach. Here’s the news story.

COLVILLE, WA – Today, Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (WA-05) held a Summit with a panel of local business and community leaders involved in the Colville National Forest to discuss how to more effectively utilize Forest Service land to promote healthier forests, reduce the risks of forest fires, and strengthen rural economies.

Congresswoman McMorris Rodgers said, “The Colville National Forest is the economic engine for our Northeastern Washington counties and healthy forests mean healthy communities. Of the 1.1 million acre Colville National Forest, over 300,000 acres are bug infested. In addition, it has the potential to bring more jobs, recreation and increased local revenue to Ferry, Stevens, and Pend Oreille counties.”

The federal government made a promise over a century ago to actively manage our forests and provide 25% of revenues for schools and counties impacted by National Forest land. But declining timber harvests has meant dramatically less revenue.

McMorris Rodgers is an original sponsor of H.R. 1526, Restoring Healthy Forests for Healthy Communities Act. It directs the Forest Service to meet specific harvest levels in certain areas, will help improve forest health and prevent catastrophic wildfires, extends supplemental Secure Rural Schools payments for one year, and would improve local forest management by allowing counties to actively manage portions of National Forest land through the creation of “Community Forest Demonstration Areas.”

The bill is expected to be on the House Floor this fall.

McMorris Rodgers has also been working for the past two years to initiate an innovative public-private partnership in the national forest.

The “A to Z” Mill Creek Pilot Project sets up a 10-year contract on 50,000 acres in the Colville National Forest. It allows a private company to use private dollars for everything after the timber sale is laid out, including the pre-sale environmental requirements and NEPA. With private funds and local management, the Colville National Forest can be managed for healthier forests and stable, sustainable revenue.

According to McMorris Rodgers, the Washington Department of Natural Resources produces seven times the timber from one-quarter of the acreage as the Forest Service in Washington state.

“The Forest Service should work with the timber industry to create jobs and revenue at a time when they are badly needed, while still protecting the environment and ensuring a sustainable harvest. This pilot project will show how it can be done, and I want Ferry, Stevens and Pend Oreille counties to be model for the rest of the country.”

The winning bid will be announced in September.

Schott Resigns from Southern Oregon Forest Restoration Collaborative

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A reader submitted this editorial in the Albany (Oregon) Democrat-Herald, which I think it an interesting bookend to the discussion about local wood below. So Santa Cruz-ites are finding a middle ground, where the sector has NOT been important, but where it has been important, in Southern Oregon, they cannot find common ground. Hypotheses anyone? I wish the People’s Research Fund could fund social scientists to survey folks across the west on some of their deeper values around this.

The story involved the Southern Oregon Forest Restoration Collaborative, a local effort which has been working to reach a common ground on ecological issues and reforestation.

But the effort has hit a bump: The only representative of the timber industry in the group, Dave Schott, has resigned. In explaining the reasons for his resignation, Schott said that in his view, the group has been overly focused on the priorities of environmentalists and has failed to take into account the needs of the logging industry.

The director of the collaborative called Schott’s decision “short-sighted,” according to a story about the dustup in the Medford Mail-Tribune newspaper.

And that short-sighted assessment would seem justified, except for one thing:

Schott had spent eight years on the board.

Eight years.

Now, maybe the better part of a decade doesn’t amount to a lot of time in the effort to change the policies that have led to generations of gridlock over our forests.

But surely it’s not too much to hope that one would have seen some progress in those eight years toward resolving the issues that have devastated our rural communities — and threatened the health of our forests, as witnessed by this summer’s busy wildfire season.

When the group initially formed, the collaborative agreed to base its work on a three-pronged approach that included economic, environmental and social considerations, said Schott, executive vice president of the Southern Oregon Timber Industries Association. But, he said, as the years went on, the economic prong of the equation kept getting short shrift.

No one thinks that logging levels ever will return to the levels of the 1950s and 1960s. And no one is advocating anything like widespread clearcuts or the elimination of old-growth stands.

But there is a place for logging as we work to reboot our rural economies, an important place. The idea that we should simply declare our public forests off-limits not only jeopardizes the health of our forests but makes it difficult to move toward any of kind of compromise.

And it also means there isn’t any way to compromise. As one player in this drama noted, “Special interest groups are hard to bring to the middle, no matter how big that middle may be.“

The result? Years go by, and little happens — except people who started a good-faith effort to locate some common ground increasingly despair of finding it.

Maybe the efforts currently running through Congress — in discussions led by members of Oregon’s delegation — finally will make some progress.

But there is a sense that time is running out.

“This is coming to a head,” Schott said of the debate. “People are realizing something has to be done. We can’t keep kicking the can down the road.” (mm)

Buy Local Wood – (from Santa Cruz?)

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local wood 2

Thanks to Mike De LaSaux for posting this on the SAF LinkedIn site.

It is a TED talk video of a conservationist, Terry Corwin talking about using local sustainably produced wood for construction. Here are some of the snippets I copied..
“islands of privilege” “environmental haves and have-nots” “bias toward local sustainably produced wood,” and “embrace local supply of building material as much as food.”

I remember submitting an op-ed to the Denver Post with a similar message and received the reply that “this was nothing new.” My op-ed was around “why can I go to the grocery store and find a locally grown section but not Home Depot or Lowe’s?” and so on.

It would be interesting if that were thought to be the “right thing” to do in Santa Cruz but not in places where federal lands happen to be.

But I think what’s most important is who stands up and what kind of credibility they have. If conservationists would stand up with this message everywhere, some of our battles might be different; or not be battles at all.

I was curious about the local wood movement, and found this link at Dovetail Partners. Here is a link to the Colorado campaign.

I have always wondered why “timber industry” doesn’t play a larger role in this local wood effort. I can only think that the “industry” is not a monolith (as we have been discussing recently) and some parts benefit from imports. If not them, who should play this role? (personally I think that some of the Endowment should go for supporting a “Local Wood” effort, but not sure that’s appropriate given their charter).

It would be somewhat ironic if conservationists, such as Ms. Corwin, carried the water on this effort.

Forest Land – A Bad Investment?

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This cartoon is from the New Yorker in 1983.. as they say "the more things change.."
This cartoon is from the New Yorker in 1983.. as they say “the more things change..AND does say something about most of us on this blog

Taking what I’m sure is a mini-break from fires.
In our discussion of timber companies who own land (and taxes they pay), I thought it might be interesting to folks on the blog to talk a little about TIMOs and REITS, which don’t get as much press in the west. For example, I received this in July in my Morningstar email..you probably can’t see it unless you are a member.

So perhaps the landowning timber company in the west will become as rare as .. the spotted owl. If we want to be a country that has forest industry, then small private and feds in the west may have to step up in terms of supply. If we want to get it from Canada, I’m sure our northern neighbors will be happy to oblige. A perhaps ironic end to years of Canadian lumber disputes.

Over the past three- and five-year periods, MeadWestvaco (MWV) shares have underperformed the U.S. packaging peer group. Unlike most of its competitors, which have shed legacy land holdings and noncore businesses to focus on packaging, MeadWestvaco still owns more than 600,000 acres of land, actively engages in property development, and runs a specialty chemical business that is largely unrelated to the core packaging business.

We consider the specialty chemical and real estate operations to be a distraction from the core business and believe they are a key reason that the packaging business has struggled in recent years. We think MeadWestvaco shareholders would be best served by an outright sale of the specialty chemical business and a tax-free real estate investment trust spin-off of the land and property management business.

Stock value is important, therefore analysts are important, therefore..

Here’s an introduction to the issue by Dovetail Partners.. but you can search on “TIMOs and REITS forest impacts” and find a variety of scholarly and non-scholarly articles.