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An AP article viua Greenwire:

E&E News has an article today about a study in the American Ornithological Society’s journal The Condor: Ornithological Applications, which shows that “over the past 20 years, northern spotted owls have disappeared from half the areas they once occupied in Washington’s Mount Rainier National Park.”

“This study demonstrated that even when high-quality habitat was readily available, the presence of Barred Owls was negatively correlated with the dynamics of Spotted Owls,” the authors wrote.

“Barred Owls are now competing with Northern Spotted Owls for food and space, and increased Barred Owl densities are associated with declines in Northern Spotted Owl populations across their range,” said Katie Dugger, a co-author of the report and a researcher with the U.S. Geological Survey’s Oregon Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit.

…

“In 1994, a conservation plan covering the owls’ territory was put in place. Since then, the spotted owls in Mount Rainier have lived with no significant threat from logging, wildfires or other human-related dangers that may be present in other spots across the species’ range from California to British Columbia.

“Along with significant territorial changes, the authors found that the population of spotted owls in the Mount Rainier region appears to be shrinking. They wrote that the park contains “some of the oldest intact forest habitat available to Northern Spotted Owls in the Washington Cascade Range, yet only 18 adult owls were detected on the study area in 2016, down from a high of 30 owls in 1998.”

NY Times op-ed today: “Is the Forest Service Trying to Evade the Public?” by Sam Evans, National Forests and Parks Program Leader for the Southern Environmental Law Center.

“If the Forest Service has its way, visitors won’t know what’s coming until logging trucks show up at their favorite trailheads or a path for a gas pipeline is cleared below a scenic vista.”

That’s hyperbolic, to say the least.

Discussion?

Why reduce the number of PO’s?

USFS press release:

BLACKDUCK, MINNESOTA – August 1, 2019 – The Chippewa National Forest (Forest) is seeking comments on the Forest-Wide Permanent Opening Management Project.  To assure your comments are fully considered during this scoping phase of the project, we request that you submit comments by August 30, 2019.

The purpose of the project is to develop a management plan for the long-term maintenance and/or enhancement of high-quality permanent openings (POs).  These openings are areas of land managed in order to create and maintain a wildlife habitat of grass, low shrub, and/or herbaceous ground cover.  The project proposes to reduce the number of current PO’s from 4,103 to 513 and the managed acres from 7,313 to 1,223 across National Forest System lands within the Forest.  Management would focus on high-quality POs that would benefit the native flora, fauna, ecosystems, and processes endemic to the lands within the Forest boundaries.

To assure your comments are fully considered during this scoping phase of the project, we request that you submit comments by August 30, 2019.  Submit your comments electronically in a common file format (.doc, .docx, .pdf, .rtf, .txt) to: [email protected] with the subject line “Permanent Opening Project.” Please include your name, address, telephone number, and the title of the project with your comments. OR Mail your comments to the Blackduck Ranger District Office, Attn: District Ranger, Karen Lessard, 417 Forestry Drive, Blackduck, MN 56630.  You can also submit your comments by fax to: (218) 835-3132.

For additional information about the public comment process or to receive a map of the project area, please contact Karen Lessard at: 218-835-4291 or [email protected].

Dogs in the Roaring Fork Valley have found another way to get stoned other than the boring break-in of edibles at home: They are eating human feces tainted with marijuana.

Dr. Scott Dolginow, who owns Valley Emergency Pet Care in Basalt, said he is seeing anywhere between three and 10 dogs a week that come in with marijuana toxicity.

His working theory is that these dogs are eating human feces that have enough THC, the psychoactive ingredient in marijuana, in it to carry over for a second high. And they are finding these piles of pot-laced poop on trails and in campgrounds.

“Seventy to 80% of people say they have no idea where their dogs got it, but they say they were out on a trail or camping,” he said. “I can’t believe that the owners are lying.”

Just ask Rebecca Cole, the owner of Marty, a 2-year-old cattle dog mix that got into something on the No Problem Joe Trail and ruined a Sunday evening this past spring.

After spending part of the day on the trails east of Aspen, Cole noticed Marty acting strangely — staggering, throwing up, peeing on the floor and just generally out of it.

“He was crashed out; I had to carry him to the vet,” she said. “I literally walked in the door and they said he was high. … I couldn’t believe it because I don’t have anything in my house.”

Cole said she saw Marty with a chunk of something in his mouth on the trail but didn’t think anything of it.

“Most dogs will eat human feces given the opportunity,” Dolginow said.

Dolginow, who also owns a vet clinic in Moab near a lot of camping areas, said there are too many instances of dogs coming in with THC toxicity symptoms after being outside to not think human feces is the source.

“It’s unlikely that many people toss an edible or a roach on the side of the trail,” he said. “It also makes sense from the level of toxicity we see.”

The phenomenon is occurring in places like San Francisco where there is a high population of homeless people who defecate in parks.

Oftentimes there’s not much vets can do and owners have to just let their dogs ride it out until they come down.

In more severe cases dogs are either sedated or are treated with IV fluids, Dolginow said.

He added that when he is hiking Hunter Creek he notices human feces just off the trail on a regular basis.

Pryce Hadley, ranger supervisor for Pitkin County Open Space and Trails, said he has not seen evidence of human waste on open space.

“Obviously we encourage people to follow the ‘leave no trace’ principles in the backcountry and use established facilities in the front country,” he said.

Cole would appreciate that, too.

“It was scary,” she said. “I want people to pick up their poop.”

A news article, “U.S. Forest Service announces massive RFP to clear out Arizona forests,” describes the RFP here, which has this aim: “At full production, awarded contracts will seek to mechanically thin between 605,000 and 818,000 acres over 20 years within six separate sub-areas located in portions of the Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest, Coconino National Forest, Kabab National Forest, and the Tonto National Forest.”

The agency notes that “This is one of the first times the Agency is using the recently authorized 20-year stewardship authority (from the 2018 Omnibus Bill).”

Lots of info from the agency, such as Examples of Desired Conditions after Mechanical Treatments, with images for:

All aged stand
Moderate Site
Savanna
Group Selection
Artificial Constraints
Variable Spacing Rx

A related article, “Conservation groups help pick up the slack in forest thinning,” says that “Environmentalists, conservation groups and local officials have all united behind the idea of thinning the forest to not only reduce the threat of catastrophic wildfires, but improve conditions for wildlife.” Mention only the Wild Turkey Federation.

The article notes that a$1,000-per-acre subsidy, as for the White Mountain Stewardship project, “would cost about $2 billion to accelerate the thinning of the more than 2 million acres in the footprint of 4FRI.” Of course, not every acre needs treatments. But that offers a bit of perspective on the scale of the need.

Thanks to Nick Smith of Healthy Forests, Healthy Communities for the link to the article on the RFP.

An open-access article from the Journal of Forestry by Terry Jain, “The 21st Century Silviculturist.” With discussion by Connie Harrington and others. Worth a read and discussion here.

Introduction

As a discipline, silviculture has a long legacy of practitioners who mentored the next generation, passing their knowledge—and vision for the future—onward. For example, silviculturists in the northern Rocky Mountains such as Julies Larson, Irvine Haig, Chuck Wellner, and Russ Graham (Graham 2009) followed this mentoring process, leaving a legacy of knowledge and irreplaceable experiences that many others have been privileged to incorporate into their own careers. Along these lines, we offer this discussion. The unique opinions and perspectives of this group of silviculturists from across the United States are intended to contribute to the mentoring process by offering our thoughts on the promises and challenges facing 21st century silviculturists, beginning with my own insights concerning the future of our profession.

I happened to come across the 2018 annual report for the national forest in my neck of the woods, the Mount Hood. Here’s the financial info in the report. It’s interesting to compare the categories.

Anyone know where I might find out how much Congress (and R6) allocated to the Mount Hood?

The political fight has begun over the Interior Department’s proposal to relocate the Bureau of Land Management’s headquarters to Grand Junction, Colo.

I makes sense in some ways to put BLM’s HQ in the middle of most of the land it manages, but it will be wrenching for many employees. OTOH, maybe some are happy to leave D.C.

A juxtaposition is two articles linked in Nick Smith’s Healthy Forests, Healthy Communities News Round Up today. Enviros in New Mexico say don’t thin, citing a need to consider negative effects, while s scientists in Alberta documents a change in stand density and an increase in fire severity. Yes, different regions, but the basic premise in the same: Relatively minor negative effects of forest management vs. longer-term effects of severe wildfires.

AP/SF Chronicle:
Groups appeal ruling over Santa Fe forest thinning plans

Environmentalists went back to court Monday in hopes of putting the brakes on plans to thin thousands of forested acres in the mountains bordering Santa Fe.

Wild Watershed and others filed their appeal with the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver, arguing that a district court judge erred when allowing Santa Fe National Forest to move ahead with its plans for Pacheco Canyon and areas near Hyde Memorial State Park.

The plaintiffs contend that forest officials failed to analyze the cumulative and indirect effects of clearing and burning in the area.

“These projects are the first of what could become the most extensive ever slash and burn forestry near Santa Fe,” said Sam Hitt, founder of Wild Watershed and president of the Santa Fe Forest Coalition.

In approving the projects in 2018, forest managers said thinning and prescribed fire would be used to reduce risks posed by disease, insect infestation and catastrophic wildfire.

The work is part of a larger-scale effort to tackle problems that have resulted from decades of fire suppression and other land use practices in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, specifically the area that makes up the region’s watershed.

The Star (Edmonton, Alberta):
Fewer trees in Alberta Rockies could mean more manageable wildfires, researcher says

Forest fires in Alberta’s southern Rockies would be much more manageable if the landscape looked like it used to more than a century ago, research suggests.

As part of his 2016 PhD dissertation at the University of Alberta, Chris Stockdale, now a research and extension scientist with the Canadian Forest Service, looked at how forest fires have burned through southern Alberta Rockies from Bow Valley all the way to the border with the United States.

Using simulation technology, he looked at how fires burned through the current landscape filled with coniferous trees, as well as what the landscape looked like a hundred years ago, which was mostly grasslands with a small mix of coniferous and deciduous trees.

While the number of fires that hit the area did not change between the early 20th century and early 21st century, the severity of the fires did.