By: Noah Angell, Communications Fellow

In these trying times it’s easy to feel helpless, as if our voices don’t matter, our efforts too small, or the systems we’re up against too deeply rooted to change. I’ve felt that too. Working in conservation, especially as a Latino who has had to learn and navigate these systems that weren’t built with our communities in mind, those moments of doubt can feel overwhelming.

But that feeling, although very real and understandable, isn’t the truth. One thing I have always done is to show up, to create that space, to engage no matter what, because showing up is sometimes the hardest part. That is exactly what we need now. There are many ways to engage, ways that go beyond just simply voting, and when we do, collectively, we will be able to see and feel the impact of our actions. Change doesn’t always start big, it starts when people decide they will no longer stay silent and continue submitting to the status quo. However, change cannot start and will not happen unless we are loud and show up, together.

Here in Eugene, Oregon we are surrounded by natural beauty and a strong culture of environmental values and appreciation for nature. But these values and appreciation only matter if we actively engage, and in this case if we actively participate and advocate, especially at a time when environmental protections are being rolled back at a federal level, our neighbors and immigrant communities are being systematically targeted, and frontline communities are feeling these impacts the most.

This blog is meant to provide a quick guide to engagement— what it is, how you can engage, what it can look like, and where you can plug in locally.

What is Civil Engagement and Why Does it Matter?

Civil engagement is how the general public, both as individuals or groups, can participate in shaping decisions and addressing concerns that affect our communities. The first example you may think of is voting, and you would be correct. However, while voting is incredibly important, it’s really just the beginning.

Civic engagement can include things such as:

Local organizations you can support and resources you can share/Organizaciones locales que puedes apoyar:

Participando en Estos Tiempos Difíciles

En estos tiempos difíciles es fácil sentirse impotente, como si nuestras voces no importaran, como si nuestros esfuerzos fueran demasiado pequeños o como si los sistemas contra los que estamos luchando estuvieran demasiado arraigados para cambiar. Yo también lo he sentido. Trabajando en conservación, especialmente como latino que ha tenido que aprender y navegar sistemas que no fueron construidos pensando en nuestras comunidades, esos momentos de duda pueden sentirse aplastante.

Pero ese sentimiento, aunque muy real y comprensible, no es la verdad. Algo que siempre he hecho es presentarme, crear ese espacio, participar sin importar qué, porque dar el paso y hacerse presente a veces es lo más difícil. Y eso es exactamente lo que necesitamos ahora. Hay muchas formas de participar, más allá de simplemente votar, y cuando lo hacemos colectivamente, podemos ver y sentir el impacto de nuestras acciones. El cambio no siempre empieza en grande; empieza cuando las personas deciden que ya no se quedarán en silencio ni seguirán aceptando el estado de las cosas. El cambio no puede comenzar, y no ocurrirá, si no alzamos la voz y nos hacemos presentes, juntos.

Aquí en Eugene, Oregon, estamos rodeados de belleza natural y de una fuerte cultura de valores ambientales y aprecio por la naturaleza. Pero esos valores solo importan si participamos activamente, si nos involucramos y defendemos lo que creemos, especialmente en un momento en el que las protecciones ambientales están siendo debilitadas a nivel federal, nuestras comunidades vecinas e inmigrantes están siendo sistemáticamente atacadas, y las comunidades de primera línea son las que sienten estos impactos con mayor fuerza.

Este blog busca ofrecer una guía rápida sobre la participación cívica: qué es, cómo puedes involucrarte, cómo puede verse en la práctica y dónde puedes conectarte a nivel local.

¿Qué es la Participación Cívica y Por Qué Importa?

La participación cívica es la manera en que el público en general, sea de forma individual o en grupo, puede influir en decisiones y abordar problemas que afectan a nuestras comunidades. El primer ejemplo que puede venirte a la mente es votar, y es correcto. Sin embargo, aunque votar es sumamente importante, es solo el comienzo.

La participación cívica también puede incluir:

The post Engaging During These Trying Times / Participando en Estos Tiempos Difíciles  first appeared on Cascadia Wildlands.

By: Madeline Cowen, Field and Organizing Manager

In May of 2018, the Willamette National Forest first proposed the egregious Flat Country old-growth timber sale. The project proposed aggressively logging 2,000 acres of older forests in the McKenzie River headwaters, which provide fresh drinking water to hundreds of thousands of residents in the Willamette Valley. Astonished by the proposal’s targeting of pristine, carbon-rich old-growth and mature forests in the renowned McKenzie River watershed, our community came together and began what would turn into a five year fight. 

When I first started volunteering as a WildCAT with Cascadia Wildlands, I spent virtually all my free time going out to the Flat Country project, field checking and getting to know fellow forest advocates in the community. This project, and my time spent there, is how I deepened my love and passion for defending the forests of Cascadia. With new friends and old, I wandered through moss-covered Douglas firs and western hemlocks growing more than 200 feet tall and six feet wide. I gazed up in astonishment at cathedral-like western red cedars surrounded by delicate vine maple, and interlaced with Pacific rhododendron flowering magenta in the summer. In autumn, we WildCATs would field check as many units as possible, leave with baskets brimming with chanterelles and head to Bigelow hot springs to soothe sore muscles. The ecosystems in this area inspired me to learn, and knowing it was under threat drove me to fight.

In addition to almost five years of extensive field checking and writing public comments, we wrote opinion articles and letters to the editor, and highlighted the project in the national Worth More Standing report to draw the attention of policy makers. We further grew public awareness through community-centered events like the first ever Flotilla on the McKenzie, and rallying at the Forest Service’s doorstep. The robust Deep Roots Trainings for Forest and Climate Action series, now in its fourth year, kicked off at Flat Country, and unaffiliated community advocates even hung a banner across highway 126 and put up a tree sit. Advocates, community members and rabble rousers put in blood, sweat and tears to protect these ancient forests and the communities that rely on them…and we won! At the end of 2022, the Forest Service announced its decision to withdraw the Flat Country timber sale. Thankfully, my and so many other people’s efforts resulted in the cancellation of this terrible project, keeping these irreplaceable forests standing. However, when it withdrew Flat Country, the Forest Service stated it planned to revisit the project. For the past three years we’ve been watching. 

Under the Trump administration, we are facing unprecedented attacks on public lands. The administration has demanded public land agencies increase the cut from national forests and Bureau of Land Management (BLM) managed public lands, with hardly any environmental review and reduced public involvement opportunities. This means we are likely to see horrendous projects like Flat Country popping up across the nation. We must remain resilient, keep a keen eye on projects, and be even more nimble with our field checking and organizing. When the Forest Service’s McKenzie District announced two projects around the same area as Flat Country in 2025, major alarm bells went off. The two projects are called the South Fork Delta Expansion and the Tie Project, and both have direct overlap with previous Flat Country units. With the help of our friends at Oregon Wild and WildCAT volunteers, we’ve taken a close look at these two proposals. The bottom line is that thankfully, they are not targeting the highly important mature and old- growth stands in Flat Country we were initially concerned about. However, the projects still do have some concerning aspects. Let’s break them down:

Tie Project

On Nov. 21st, 2025, in collaboration with the Oregon Department of Forestry using the Good Neighbor Authority (GNA), the McKenzie District of the Willamette National Forest announced it was beginning scoping the Tie Project. According to the initial scoping notice, the Forest Service plans to “treat” i.e., log, 7,898 acres. The stated purpose and need for the project is:

• Providing a sustainable timber supply to support local economies,
• Reducing wildfire risk through strategic thinning and shaded fuel breaks,
• Improving forest health and resilience by enhancing forest structure, species diversity, and stand density, and
• Maintaining and improving road systems for management, recreation, and wildfire response.

When I opened the map for the Tie project to see where it is located, my heart sank. I could immediately tell that the units are in the same area, and spreading across similar boundaries, as Flat Country. Were we really about to fight this old-growth logging project again and so soon? Before panicking, I needed to take a closer look. And as it turns out, the project is not as bad as it seems, at least in terms of targeting mature and old-growth. While the project is quite massive, with 7,898 acres of logging proposed, it appears that the majority of the project consists of previously clearcut plantations that have now grown into dense, relatively young forest stands. An area that legitimately could benefit from thinning. Also, of the 209 units proposed in the project, only 38 of them directly overlap with those from Flat Country. Of course, field verification is almost always necessary to determine how accurate this is. That checking will happen after winter snows melt. 

South Fork Delta Expansion

The second project in the Flat Country area is the South Fork Delta Expansion, first proposed in early July 2025 by the McKenzie District in the Willamette National Forest. This project is meant to “provide recreational opportunities near the Delta Campground area” which burned in the 2020 Holiday Farm fire, and also expand the restoration area in the 2018 Lower South Fork McKenzie River Floodplain Enhancement Project. Restoration and floodplain enhancement is absolutely a great use of agency and taxpayer resources, and oftentimes these projects need to use larger diameter trees and their rootwads to meet the goals of the restoration. Unfortunately, the fact that the agency wants to source trees directly from Flat Country, which is over 20 miles away from the restoration area when those efforts usually use trees from much closer, raised some flags, especially because the project boundaries are identical to some of the older units in Flat Country. 

The over 300 acres of old-growth forest where logging would occur is far more valuable as an intact ecosystem. The forest is currently providing habitat value not only to those species who are living there, but also to the salmon, bull trout and other aquatic life living downstream in the floodplains. These increasingly rare forests help mitigate runoff during extreme weather events, filter sediment, and ensure steady stream flows. Why degrade this habitat in order to restore habitat elsewhere? Why sacrifice old-growth forests in the uplands to restore floodplains and lowlands? The Forest Service did not disclose if these units are part of another timber sale that got cancelled and they failed to address the potential impacts to imperiled species utilizing the habitat, most notably the northern spotted owl. The Forest Service canceled the Flat Country project in the face of overwhelming public opposition. Why bring that controversial mess into this otherwise appealing project? 

Cascadia Wildlands and our partners at Oregon Wild brought these concerns and others to the Forest Service directly in an effort to identify a better way to move forward with restoring important floodplain habitat while minimizing impacts to older forests and protecting habitat for northern spotted owls in the Flat Country area. We are still in negotiations and are hopeful we can get to a place where we can support this project. 

Overall, I feel better about the South Fork Delta Expansion knowing that it will improve floodplain conditions and have minimal impacts to the mature and old-growth forests in the Flat Country area. And for the Tie project, knowing that the essential and incredibly valuable forests are not a part of it is definitely a better outcome.  Both of these projects are a stark reminder of how important it is for us to maintain a close watch over proposed projects, and the value of on the ground field checking. Want to get involved? Check out our Field Checking 101 video, and sign up for WildCAT (Cascadia Action Team), and reach out if you have any questions about these or other projects. 

The post Flat Country Repackaged? Thankfully, no. first appeared on Cascadia Wildlands.

By: Flora Booker, 2025 Summer Field and Events Coordinator

On July 30th, Cascadia Wildlands staff and WildCAT volunteers joined a tour hosted by the Southern Willamette Forest Collaborative and the U.S. Forest Service to take a look at the proposed Dead Mountain Project. The collaborative is a mix of agency staff, environmental groups, timber industry representatives, and local community members who live in and around Oakridge and Westfir, Oregon. While Cascadia Wildlands is not a part of the group, we joined them to walk through sections of the Willamette National Forest near Oakridge, around 40 miles east of Eugene, to view current conditions and imagine what these ecosystems could look like in the years ahead with increasingly intense climate-driven wildfires. 

With recent changes to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) under the Trump administration limiting public comment, this project shows how agencies can still engage the public in shaping land management. Federal directives to prioritize timber revenue can undermine ecological goals and local needs, highlighting the importance of careful evaluation to sustain ecosystems for human and more-than-human communities. 

Early on during the tour, we reached a ridge top and looked down at Forest Service managed public lands that had burned in past years. Sarah Altemus-Pope, the Executive Director of Southern Willamette Solutions, which manages the Southern Willamette Forest Collaborative program, pointed to a swath of trees scorched just last summer. She reminded us that this community has faced high-severity fire every year for five years. The urgency to reduce community wildfire risk became all the more real when, just days after our tour, the Aubrey Fire broke out along highway 58 just outside Oakridge. Burning just south of the Dead Mountain project area identified for future thinning and controlled burning treatments, the new start is a reminder that fire is a continual presence, shaping lives and forests. The project must ensure that the work done here prepares the forest and the community for what may come, through public involvement and careful planning to promote fire resilience.

Throughout the tour, collaborative staffers handed out a stack of maps: treatment units, proposed burn blocks, road plans, and land designations. They looked like standard planning documents but carried a larger story. We were told that those maps and plans for forest treatments had been developed through a process called Potential Operational Delineations, or PODs. In practice, it means land managers, local residents, and other interested stakeholders sit down together and weigh in on where fires are most likely to be contained, what community and resource values are at greatest risk, which ridges or rivers might serve as natural boundaries, and where firefighters could move safely. Forest Service representatives emphasized that POD planning highlights the need to thin forested areas near town and open the tree canopy to reduce crown fire risk, where flames climb up understory plants into the tops of trees, burning quickly and at extreme temperatures difficult to stifle. Local residents, many with direct experience of wildfires, stressed the urgent need for more controlled burns, and staff pointed out on our maps the areas where these treatments are proposed to take place.

The first site we walked through exemplified what these treatments can mean. Sarah Altemus-Pope grew up in Oakridge and ran regularly on the Dead Mountain trails. She told us she remembers when the forest was so dense the trails were quiet. After thinning opened the forest, she began to hear birdsong on her runs, filling the silence that had been there before. Community members nodded in agreement, noting that the trails have become more popular for recreation since then. The ground beneath us seemed to confirm her story: chinquapin, incense cedar, and madrone were sprouting in the understory, a richer mix of species than the uniform Douglas fir plantation that once dominated the hillside.

Later in the day, we stood in a different kind of forest. This one had been clearcut in the past and replanted densely with conifers, creating an even-aged stand that has grown without thinning or other caretaking. The trees were crowded, the air was still, and there was little sign of the diverse plant life we had seen earlier. Here, proposed treatments would thin the stand to create space for light, water, and nutrients to reach the understory, allowing biodiversity to return. When done thoughtfully, these treatments can create healthier forests that are less vulnerable to severe fire, while also offering better habitat and more resilient ecosystems.

The promise of healthier, more fire-resilient forests is clear when you stand among the trees, but profit rather than science-driven policy pressures complicate the picture. Management direction and laws like the National Forest Management Act of 1976 push the Forest Service to prepare parcels for timber harvest on a strict timeline, raising a critical question: how much of this management is about ecological and community wildfire resilience, and how much is about meeting timber targets?

Thinning can improve forest health, but its benefits depend on how the forest is accessed and managed. Roads bring soil erosion, altered hydrology, habitat fragmentation, and increased fire risk (Connor and McCoy 2013). The Dead Mountain project currently proposes to decommission four miles of road, restore up to ten miles, maintain or reconstruct 34 miles, and build three miles of temporary roads. Decommissioning roads can help reduce the oversized road system and encourage healthy waters, soils, wildlife, and resilient forests. Road decommissioning also reduces the risk of invasive species introduction and accidental human caused fires. Opening “light gaps” up to three acres can benefit meadows or oak savannas if paired with caretaking such as recurring controlled burns, but replanting them with uniform seedlings creates stands of dense, even-aged trees vulnerable to high intensity crown fires. Old-growth forests show resilience through structural complexity that buffers wildfire and supports biodiversity (Betts et al. 2017). 

Many elements of the Dead Mountain project have the potential to support resilience, but its success will depend on careful implementation. To meet community priorities and ecological goals, management must move beyond timber quotas and focus on cultivating healthy, fire-adapted forests that can withstand changing fire regimes. Equally important is investing in home hardening and other strategies for living with fire. Collaborative members are already advancing this work through fuel reduction near homes, maintaining a five-foot buffer, and other practices that strengthen firewise communities.

One of the most encouraging aspects of the Dead Mountain project is the depth of public engagement throughout the planning stages. The incorporation of community input through the PODs and NEPA processes show a genuine effort to reach informed decisions that reflect both ecological and local priorities.

The highlight of the tour, however, was seeing how my own community responded. At one point, I spoke with two WildCAT volunteers: one who is a seasoned field checker familiar with these forests, the other a newer volunteer, an artist with a fresh perspective. The experienced volunteer admitted he had not expected to be impressed, but the level of collaboration and the way participants genuinely listened to one another gave him hope. The newer volunteer agreed, noting how the project seemed to account for diverse perspectives and marveling at the contrast between forest stands we had walked through. Their reflections reminded me that fire planning isn’t just technical; it’s relational. Building trust and making space for different experiences is an essential part of the forest management process.

Projects like Dead Mountain can succeed when sound ecological management is paired with inclusive community engagement. Fire is a constant presence on the landscape, and making respect for and adaptation to these natural processes is essential. By centering local input, focusing treatments near communities, and balancing ecological goals with policy realities, this project — if actually implemented as planned — shows what thoughtful forest management can achieve.

The post Fire, Forests, and Collaboration on Dead Mountain first appeared on Cascadia Wildlands.

By: Dara Evans and Nicole Morshead, 2025 Summer Legal Interns  

Among the old-growth forests along Oregon’s North coast lives a population of delightful little creatures that frolic in the treetops feasting on conifer needles and rarely ever touching the ground. Weighing less than two ounces, these North Coast red tree voles are a unique population of red tree voles, which primarily exist from western Oregon to Northwest California. Unfortunately, decades of clearcutting and wildfires have destroyed the vast majority of the old-forests that these animals call home. What remains of the North Coast vole population live on federal public lands administered by the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management. For over a decade, advocates have fought to secure listing under the Endangered Species Act to protect these red tree voles, which would provide the entire isolated population with fierce and important safeguards that could prevent total elimination.  

The Endangered Species Act, designed to provide protections to endangered or threatened species, directs the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (Service) to “list” imperiled wildlife, fish and plants by adding the species to a comprehensive list of endangered and threatened species. The Service is meant to make these listings based on the “best scientific and commercial data available.” Once a species is listed, it gains numerous protections, including the designation of “critical habitat” deemed essential to the conservation of the species. The Service has had every opportunity to list the North Coast red tree vole but has repeatedly failed to do so. First petitioned in 2007 by the Center of Biological Diversity, the Service found that the North Coast red tree vole “warranted” protections under the Endangered Species Act in 2011, but that listing the species was “precluded” by other “high priorities,” an unfortunate loophole within the law. Since this initial finding, the Service maintained that the red tree vole warranted protection but continued to delay listing it – allowing habitat destruction through logging and wildfire to further imperil the shrinking population. In 2019, the Service denied protections to the red tree vole which the Center of Biological Diversity challenged, resulting in a settlement requiring a new listing decision. Unfortunately, in 2024, the Service once again found that the North Coast red tree vole did not warrant listing as an endangered or threatened species under the ESA.  

This clear violation of duties by the Service has led valiant red tree vole defenders Center of Biological Diversity, Cascadia Wildlands, Oregon Wild, and Bird Alliance of Oregon to file suit against the agency for ignoring the best scientific and commercial data and downplaying the risk of habitat fragmentation, isolation, and wildfire – which could lead to the extinction of the North Coast red tree vole.  

Cascadia Wildlands has fiercely advocated for the red tree vole for over a decade. In 2012, Cascadia litigated against three timber sales —North Fork Overlook, Buck Roberts, and Bummer Ridge — challenging the Bureau of Land Management’s failure to analyze whether the proposed thinning would harm the red tree vole. Cascadia, working alongside various other environmental groups, has continued to fight for the red tree voles’ right to live safely in Oregon North Coast forests. In 2015, Cascadia won a legal challenge over clearcutting in the Bureau of Land Management’s White Castle project, which put 160 acres of 100-year old trees, and their little residents, at risk. And now, Cascadia, along with the Center for Biological Diversity, Bird Alliance Oregon and Oregon Wild, will once again battle it out with U.S. Fish and Wildlife for the lives of the North Coast red tree voles.  

To learn more, see our press release discussing the details of the litigation we recently initiated. We hope the lawsuit will result in North Coast red tree voles finally receiving necessary protections.  

We are grateful for legal representation by attorneys at the Center for Biological Diversity. We also appreciate your ongoing interest and concern about this issue and the red tree voles that call the Oregon coast old-growth forests their home. 

The post Lawsuit Launched to Safeguard North Coast Red Tree Voles  first appeared on Cascadia Wildlands.

From June 20 to 23, Cascadia Wildlands held our biggest volunteer event of the year: the WildCAT Field Checking Basecamp. Volunteers gathered near Glide, Oregon, to help stop logging in some of the most breathtaking old-growth ecosystems in the Little River watershed.

The area lies within the traditional homelands of the Cow Creek Band of Umpqua Tribe of Indians. Their ancestors include Upper Umpqua, Takelma, Molalla, and Yoncalla peoples who have lived in and traveled through the South Umpqua River basin since time immemorial. We encourage support for Indigenous-led environmental justice efforts, including Cow Creek youth-led programs like Tuú Yap’a Xumá, which teaches traditional plant cultivation.

Throughout the weekend, WildCAT volunteers worked to field-check seven units in the proposed Bureau of Land Management (BLM) timber sale. Field checking is the process of documenting on-the-ground conditions of a forest to challenge or stop harmful logging projects. As we documented the threatened forests on the ground, news of even broader threats at the federal level began to surface. The Summer Solstice arrived under dark clouds that seemed to reflect our growing frustration over Trump’s plan to rescind the Roadless Rule and open millions of acres of public lands to logging. Rain fell steadily, turning at times to hail and wet snow. Still, spirits stayed high. Thanks to a well-tended fire and delicious meals made by our amazing volunteers, we stayed warm, nourished, and ready to keep going. Despite the elements, we successfully field-checked all of our targeted units.

Along the way, we trekked through dense forests, open meadows, and misty waterfalls teeming with life. We spotted mycoheterotrophs (partly or entirely non-photosynthetic plants that obtain energy and nutrients from fungi) like coralroot, gnome plant, and ghost pipe pushing up through the soil. These rare plants thrive in biodiverse ecosystems that support the complex symbiotic relationships they depend on. We admired Pacific madrones with their purple peeling bark, sprawling California black oaks, and towering old growth trees with broken tops that create prime nesting habitat for northern spotted owls.

Several trees with diameter-at-breast-height measurements over 70 inches towered above us, including ancient Douglas firs wide enough for our whole group to wrap around. Their massive trunks offered calm to each of us, while also providing critical habitat for countless other species. We found waterways that had not been marked by the Bureau of Land Management, recorded signs of wildlife ranging from bear to coyote, and watched a bright green Pacific tree frog launch itself confidently into the duff. 

On our final day, we gathered under the freshly shining sun, grateful for its warmth, and each shared a teaching we were taking from Basecamp and a gratitude for one another. I was sure the first comment would make us chuckle, something like “I learned to bring a darn good quality rain jacket!”. But instead, every single person offered something thoughtful. People spoke about their gratitude for the fire tenders and the care put into our shared meals. They reflected on joyful moments of connection with the life around us, on noticing things they hadn’t seen before, and on the kindness exchanged between all of us. What remained with us was the meaningful community we built and the vital field checking we accomplished together.

Now that the field checking is complete, Cascadia Wildlands will submit the data and detailed comments gathered by our volunteers to the Bureau of Land Management. If the agency fails to listen, we’re prepared to challenge the sale through legal action.To everyone who showed up, thank you. Your presence made this trip what it was. And for those who couldn’t join this time, we hope to see you at the next one. There are more old-growth ecosystems to stand up for, and more work ahead to care for the places we love.

The post Basecamp 2025 at Little River first appeared on Cascadia Wildlands.

This Bureau of Land Management logging project would log and build new roads through 1,800 acres of public forest in the middle of Oregon’s Coast Range. While out in the forest, Cascadia Wildlands saw salmon spawning in Honey Grove creek which runs through the project area. Logging in forests near watersheds can cause grave impacts to coastal coho salmon, chinook salmon, steelhead, pacific lamprey, and more. 

Alongside Honey Grove and Seeley Creeks, you’ll find previously clear cut forest and several pockets of lush older forest and legacy trees that reach 130 years old or more. These pockets likely contribute greatly to the health of the region’s watershed.

We have received over 600 public comments in opposition to the Aloha Trout project from CW supporters and Alsea locals. Here is one written by Timothy Cooke. Thank you Timothy for letting us share your story. 

Several sections have been edited for clarity.

Dear public land managers,

I am a 40-year-old architect who currently lives and works in Portland, Oregon. I grew up in Alsea and maintain a strong connection to the community and the landscape in Alsea. My family moved to Alsea in the late 1980s when I was five years old. Many of my earliest and happiest memories include spending countless hours exploring the forests around our house, hiking with my parents, learning to identify native plants and animals, building forts in the woods, playing in the many streams that flow into the Alsea River, and picking wild salmon berries that grow in the riparian areas of these creeks. In the summer, my younger brother and I would ride our bikes across Alsea Hwy and up Honey Grove Road to what we called the “cattle grate road” (you can find this road as part of the timber project’s plans) and explore Honey Grove Creek for hours on end.

When I was a little older, I began hunting for chanterelle mushrooms in the forests around our house, including on the Bureau of Land Management land that is proposed to be cut as part of the Aloha Trout Forest Management Project. Our family loved hunting for chanterelles and to this day, I look forward to hunting for them every fall in these areas when the rainy season begins. When I was a teenager, in the late 1990s, I began mountain biking as a hobby with a group of friends. We biked on dirt trails that were created by dirt bike riders and 4-wheelers. These recreation trails were located on the south side of Honey Grove Road in forested land.

In addition, my family spent many, many summer days swimming in the North fork of the Alsea River at Clemens park. Seeley Creek flows into the Alsea River at Clemens Park. This park is a public amenity that the Alsea community relies on to this day for recreation, fishing, and access to intact and healthy ecosystems, and I fear this park would be negatively impacted by the proposed harvests in the Seeley Creek watershed.

After carefully reading the scoping letter and studying the map for the Aloha Trout Forest project, I am deeply concerned with the level of harvest that is proposed in both the “harvest land base moderate intensity areas” areas as well as the highly sensitive riparian areas of the many drainages that flow into the Honey Grove Creek and Seeley Creek.

The removal of up to 70% of the trees within the project’s riparian areas and up to 95% of the trees in the “harvest land base moderate intensity” areas will dramatically alter the ecology of these forests for decades to come. Particularly, while the harvest land base is designated to produce timber volume, a 95% cut is far from “moderate” and will have a profoundly negative impact on the fish-bearing streams that flow through these proposed harvest areas.

Honey Grove Creek is one of the best Coho Salmon tributaries in the Alsea River basin and has already been negatively impacted by recent, intensive logging on private forest land that abuts the proposed Bureau of Land Management project.

I ask that the Bureau of Land Management consider canceling or dramatically scaling back this project due to the negative impact it will have on the residents of the Alsea community, and in particular, the residents that live on Honey Grove Road. This project would disrupt their livelihoods and quality of life. Impacts would include noisy road building and logging activities, run-off from logging and road building activities, and herbicide exposure. This level of logging will impact the drinking water quality for the families that rely on creeks and springs that flow from BLM land. It will also eliminate access to existing mountain bike trails and hiking trails on Bureau of Land Management land that have been carefully maintained over the years. By cutting these forests, the Bureau of Land Management will be reducing the public’s access to the many benefits that these healthy and intact forests currently provide.

If this project does proceed, please consider increasing the percentage of trees that will be retained in the HLB_MITA areas as well as the riparian areas. Even a modest increase in the proportion of trees left on the landscape will have dramatic ecological benefits. Benefits would include the increased retention of structurally intact forest habitat patches, retention of areas with minimal forest floor and understory disturbance, retention of multiple vegetation layers, retention of diverse tree sizes, species, and conditions. With higher levels of retention both the visual and environmental impacts of harvests are dramatically reduced.

I am concerned about climate change and recognize the values that forests provide for carbon sequestration and storage. Increasing the percentage of trees that are retained will only increase carbon sequestration. It will also increase the forest’s climate resilience as the effects of climate change increase in the coming years and decades.

I am also concerned about species who depend on these forests for habitat, including northern spotted owls and marbled murrelets. These stands have the potential to grow and develop into prime habitat for both species.

Please evaluate the full range of environmental impacts associated with logging and road building proposed for the Aloha Trout Forest project and do not treat these forests as a sacrifice zone that will only produce timber harvests. Develop an alternative approach that protects clean drinking water, recreational opportunities, connected fish and wildlife habitat, fire resilience, and carbon sequestration. Please incorporate community feedback into project planning efforts and protect forest values beyond timber production.

I have a five year old daughter that I hope to be able to take mushroom hunting on these BLM forest lands that are proposed to be harvested. If this project proceeds as proposed, I would no longer be able to take my daughter mushroom hunting in these areas.

I look forward to your response to these comments, and request that you notify me when a decision is made.

Sincerely,
Timothy Cooke

The post Supporters Rally to Save Aloha Trout first appeared on Cascadia Wildlands.

Hey fellow Cascadians! The team at Cascadia Wildlands (CW) has had a busy summer fighting to protect our beloved forests, field checking proposed timber sales, and advocating for climate action across Oregon. We’ve also had a series of important legal victories, one of which — concerning a Bureau of Land Management (BLM) proposal called the Integrated Vegetation Management (IVM) Program — gives us a powerful new legal precedent for our future work. You’re probably wondering how we got here.

Here’s a legal history lightning round: In 1994, the federal government adopted the Northwest Forest Plan (NWFP), which allocated federally managed forest lands to various purposes. The key categories are matrix (also called Harvest Land Base, or HLB), where agencies like the BLM have a free hand to aggressively log to maximize timber production, and Late Successional Reserves (LSR), which are older, more mature areas of forest that can and do serve as habitat for threatened species like the Northern Spotted Owl. These categories are crucial for us at CW because they determine what the BLM can and can’t do in different areas of forest.

In other words, these seemlingly arbitrary boundaries turn out to be some of our strongest tools for protecting healthy forests and vital habitat. And that’s why it was such a threat to promising owl habitat in LSR areas when in 2016 the BLM finalized a plan — the 2016 Southwestern Oregon Resource Management Plan (RMP) — that would supplant the NWFP and help the BLM undermine hard-won forest protections.

Welcome back to the present. In theory, plans like the 2016 RMP are only acceptable if they balance various interests (e.g. timber production, habitat conservation and promotion, etc.) as well as the NWFP does. In reality, the BLM has treated the 2016 RMP like a get-out-of-jail-free card, claiming it allows aggressive logging methods even in sensitive LSR areas. And that’s what gave rise to our IVM Program lawsuit.

We challenged several aspects of the IVM Program, but perhaps our biggest win involved a rule called the “20-year standard.” Because forests need time to mature into the older, more complex ecosystems that Northern Spotted Owls require for their habitat, the 20-year standard requires that the BLM not delay that development process by more than 20 years whenever it logs in LSR. While this standard contemplates logging in reserves that were previously off limits under the NWFP, the 20-year standard is the crucial bulwark against overly aggressive logging in the reserves under the 2016 RMP. This standard protects owls by ensuring that LSR areas can’t be set back too far from becoming robust owl habitat.

So how did we “win” on the 20-year standard, and why will this decision be so significant in the future? First, a judge rejected the BLM’s argument that, in essence, the 20-year standard only applied when the BLM wanted it to — and that if the BLM wasn’t trying to promote owl habitat, then it was fine if the BLM’s logging delayed LSR development by more than 20 years. (This is known by the technical legal term of “trying to have your cake and eat it, too.”) Second, this ruling against BLM’s interpretation of the standard will apply to all future cases with similar facts and contexts.

In fact, this decision affirming the 20-year standard has already impacted other timber sales such as the BLM’s proposed Rogue Gold project near Gold Hill and Rogue River. Without legal cover to pursue their most aggressive logging, the BLM will be required to leave precious LSR areas more intact for years to come. Across Southwestern Oregon, because of our win in IVM, more century-old trees will sway in the wind and more threatened owls will sleep peacefully in their canopy — thanks to the contributions of supporters like you. Thank you.

The post BLOG: A Win for IVM first appeared on Cascadia Wildlands.

I woke up to smoke settling on the Willamette Valley, and the smell churns my stomach. It’s July, or as most of us here in Oregon have come to know it — the beginning of fire season. As summer smoke fills the air, it is hard not to think about the 2020 fire season during which wildfires burned more than 1.2 million acres and destroyed approximately 5,000 homes. Now, as I write this, 31 wildfires larger than 1,000 acres are burning throughout the state. I hope this is not our new normal.  

Watch Duty, an incredibly important and useful app that tracks wildfires throughout the country often alerts me over ten times per day about fires in my area. With each alert, my heart sinks. I can’t help but worry about those who are directly affected and on the brink of evacuation. Indirect effects are also a reality as many people are constantly on alert for wildfires during the summer months, taking a toll both mentally and physically. 

While fire is a real concern across most regions of Oregon, Southern Oregon is particularly susceptible to large wildfires as it is dryer and hotter than much of the state. Understandably, the interplay of forest management and wildfire hazard in Southern Oregon is a priority in our evaluation of logging proposals on public lands throughout this region. In fact, this issue has been front and center of several recent legal challenges. 

Though at the forefront of our minds, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) consistently prioritizes timber volume over fire resilience and treatments that could reduce fire severity on public lands. Under the National Environmental Protection Act (“NEPA”), a federal agency, such as the Bureau of Land Management, must analyze and disclose the impacts of a proposed project on the environment. Specifically, federal agencies must take a hard look at the environmental consequences of their actions and disclose them to the public. This typically takes the form of an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) or an Environmental Assessment (EA). An EA, among other things, must include a reasonable range of alternatives to the project with the first being a no-action alternative. This no-action alternative acts as a baseline for all environmental factors within the project area that each other alternative is compared to accurately assess the project’s impact. Adherence to this important procedure, thorough analysis, and recitation of potential impacts are precisely what we look for when evaluating timber planning documents.  

The Bureau of Land Management must provide a detailed analysis for issues it determines would be significantly impacted by the project. This analysis, theoretically, should inform the Bureau of Land Management’s decision making, and its disclosure through public-facing planning documents allows the public to weigh in on the management of their public lands. 

Recently, the Bureau of Land Management published a draft EA and solicited public comment for the South Clark Forest Management Project. The Project proposed 2,238 acres of heavy logging just outside of Butte Falls, Oregon. The Project Area is within the footprint of the 2020 Obenchain Fire that nearly consumed several Jackson County communities. 

The Bureau of Land Management stated it would log by employing a method called regeneration harvest, colloquially referred to as “clear-cutting.” Included in the proposed clearcut acreage was approximately 600 acres of Wildland Urban Interface (“WUI”). The term WUI (pronounced woo-ee by forest defenders and agency personnel alike) is important to understand here. It is the zone of transition between unoccupied/natural land and human development and is a term well-known by those in areas especially prone to wildfires, such as residents of Jackson County. 

Despite the proximity to local communities and the ever-present reality of severe wildfire in Southern Oregon, the BLM omitted consideration of how the Project’s proposed logging would affect the severity and intensity of wildfire in the forest and surrounding communities. The BLM identified that its heavy logging would result in a direct increase in fire hazard (severity and intensity) for up to 50 years. According to BLM, the Project, overlapping and adjacent to the 32,671 acre South Obenchain fire footprint (2,109 of which are within the South Clark Project Area), warranted no further consideration or more detailed disclosure.Timber generation was the only issue BLM identified in its analysis. 

Even as a law student, developing my understanding of environmental law and forestry science, I could tell this was egregious and irresponsible. 

Cascadia Wildlands, Klamath Siskiyou Wildlands Center (“KS Wild”), and Oregon Wild submitted two detailed comments to the BLM. Both addressed the extreme risks and increase in fire hazard associated with the Bureau of Land Management’s treatments and implored the Bureau of Land Management to “implement an alternative that does not increase fire risk in [the] WUI for the community of Butte Falls.” The comments outlined the environmental consequences associated with the irresponsibly selected forest treatments and the agency’s timber tunnel vision.

Regeneration timber harvests create young, even-aged stands — picture a Christmas tree farm — primarily due to the high density of ground fuels and the concentration of heat. Low-lying and interlocking branching, lack of mature trees that can provide shade and block lateral wind movement, and the accumulation of slash or woody debris produced by logging render the post-treatment area a tinderbox. Light thinning, on the other hand, promotes fire resilience by decreasing the amount of thin, crowded trees that increase heat energy and are rapidly consumed during a wildfire. 

The BLM published the final EA, authorizing this Project, on July 12, 2024. And, to our pleasant surprise, they took the comments seriously. In fact, BLM removed all regeneration harvesting in the WUI and decreased the total number of acres to be harvested by nearly half. This was a huge win.  

Is the final EA perfect? No. However, the change within the final EA marked the meaningful and collaborative public process envisioned under the National Environmental Policy Act. This type of land-planning and public engagement prevents litigation — a timely, expensive, though sometimes necessary tactic to protect our forests and communities — and develops confidence in public land management agencies. Moreover, potential fire hazard will be dramatically decreased. The WUI and the forest nearest to Jackson County communities, like Butte Falls, will be preserved in a more ecologically beneficial and fire-resilient state. 

Cascadia Wildlands is ever on the lookout for harm to our unique forests and constantly advocating for wildfire-resilient, conservation-centric, and public-process driven land management. Logging may be a way of life for many in Oregon, but federal agencies like the BLM are required to balance their interests in timber production with conserving and protecting the environment for everyone and everything that calls them home.6  Fire impacts all of us. 

As I watch the smoke grow thicker and think about the status of my “go-bag,” I am grateful for public processes and community and environmentally informed forest planning such as what occurred in the South Clark Project. I am grateful for the sometimes hearbreaking and thorough work Cascadia Wildlands and others do to defend our forests. Protecting our forests does more than protect what lives directly within them. It protects all of us within Oregon and beyond. 

The post BLOG: A Win for Wildfire Resilience first appeared on Cascadia Wildlands.

The post BLOG: Basecamp 2024 was a success! first appeared on Cascadia Wildlands.

On a bright October morning I had the honor of joining a group of volunteers and staff from Cascadia Wildlands for a day of field checking in the woods.

Field Checking is the tactic of comparing existing conditions in the forest with conditions alleged in Forest Service sale proposals. Often, these proposals irresponsibly misrepresent the state of the forest. Unmarked waterways, old-growth stands, and crucial wildlife are invisible to the abstract paperwork of resource extraction. We’re out here to see if what they’re saying about the forest is true. This was my first time, and the Cascadia Wildlands crew did a great job of orienting me to the task.

We gathered on a forest road spur in the Willamette National Forest north of Blue River, where the Calloway Timber Sale is currently targeting 8,757 acres of Pacific Northwest forest for harvest. Caravanning up the road we set out to inspect the first unit, which was to our right as we ascended upwards of 3000 feet of elevation.

This unit had clearly been previously logged. Stumps and overgrown root bulbs dotted the land as it inclined to a nearby ridge. While this was not an old-growth forest, we set foot into the unit to make note of its many other defining ecological characteristics — various native plant and fungal species, and a wide range of tree species. Then we came quickly upon a large clearing.

This unit (which we found through cores to have trees of 30-40 years of age) and units like it, are often marked for harvest as a thinning measure, with the stated aim of reducing the unit’s fire risk, or increasing ecological functionality. This tactic in itself is questionable.  We found this unit in particular to already contain a clearing, and  did not appear otherwise to be overly dense in its growth pattern. So, the Forest Service’s rationale for harvest on this count was put into question.

We continued our journey through the forest and made note of a variety of tree species. The site contained noble fir, western hemlock, douglas-fir, and western redcedar. Species diversity, or stand complexity, is a sign of a healthy forest — one that does not require intervention to be valuable to local fauna. We noticed plentiful signs of mountain beavers, woodpecker foraging and elk scat.

As we reached the top of the ridge, we made note of the significant increase in slope on the downhill side. Certainly greater than 45 degrees. Steep slopes make for poor harvest candidates. The risk of post-logging erosion and landslides is significant. The potential damage to the ecological health of this ridge and adjacent areas could potentially preclude this unit from any harvest activities.

As noted earlier, the stand contained trees approximately 30-40 years in age. Younger trees at relatively low density lessen the commercial value of the stand. Low density trees, presence of clearings, a steep slope… This was starting to look like a unit the Forest Service should re-evaluate.

Having completed our survey of the first unit, we made our way towards the second. The road that should have taken us into the unit was unrecognizable, it was full of brush, presumably unmaintained for at least a decade or two. Undeterred, the group decided to carry on and hike down the unmaintained road.

As we make progress through the brush, it’s clear that the expired roadway had become a landslide in the recent past. Above us, old-growth Douglas-fir bare their roots to a steep eroded hillside, seeming to be clinging for dear life to the crumbling slope beneath them. Any harvesting activity on this unit would require extensive repair to a road already incredibly ill-positioned to begin with. We make note of these conditions.

The group tacked up into this adjacent old-growth, making quicker time than the eroded roadway allowed. Beautiful, ancient trees extended hundreds of feet into the sky above us, while vine maples sparkled in their fall yellow foliage. Chanterelles peaked out of the duff and the whole group moved in quiet awe, tilting our ears towards a woodpecker’s call. The slope steepened and the way proved difficult, but we continued with our day, taking measurements including DBH (Diameter at Breast Height) and core samples.

This area contained some compelling signs of a slight draw, as earth in a nearby fold in the landscape was beginning to be pushed away from the underlying rock with recurrent flushes. I found myself enamored with the complexity of the forest that we saw that day. Our notes are comprehensive and should well impress upon the Forest Service the incompatibility of this area’s true ecological state with their harvest goals. Thank you to the Cascadia Wildlands crew that shared their knowledge of field checking with me, thank you to my fellow volunteers who became new friends, and thank you to the forest for its breathtaking beauty. There are 361 units in the Calloway sale slated for harvest – and ample evidence these forest lands are incompatible with a harvest regime.

The post BLOG: Field Notes from the Calloway Timber Sale  first appeared on Cascadia Wildlands.