old-growth

Press Release: Over 100 “Kayaktivists” and Community Members Protest Old-Growth Logging

July 22, 2025October 8, 2022 by kaley

October 8, 2022 — Today, a “kayaktivist” flotilla of over 100 concerned community members rallied on the McKenzie River to protest an old-growth logging sale in the Willamette National Forest. The Flat Country project, proposed by the U.S. Forest Service, targets over 2,000 acres of old-growth and mature forests for logging across the headwaters of the McKenzie River. The agency could auction the old growth to be cut at any moment. Attendees held up signs from boats and kayaks, and unfurled a large banner declaring “Forest Defense is Watershed Defense”, to draw attention to the logging sale’s impact on downstream drinking water.

Press Release: Court Rules Logging Project Violates Endangered Species Act

August 1, 2025October 4, 2022 by kaley

October 4, 2022 — Late Friday, a judge in the District Court for the District of Oregon ruled that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (Service) justification for Bureau of Land Management (Bureau) timber sales totaling nearly 18,000 acres including in old growth forest violated the Endangered Species Act. The judge ruled against the Service’s claim that old-growth logging in the Poor Windy and Evans Creek timber sales on 15,848 acres of threatened northern spotted owl habitat would not harm the imperiled bird species.

Press Release: Conservationists Challenge Coast Range Logging Plan

September 8, 2022 by kaley

September 8, 2022 — Today, Oregon-based conservation organizations Cascadia Wildlands and Oregon Wild challenged the Bureau of Land Management’s (“BLM”) Siuslaw Field Office’s plan to log 13,225 acres of public forests in the coast range foothills west of Eugene. The agency’s Siuslaw HLB (“Harvest Land Base”) Project will clearcut these mature and old-growth forests that border many communities and residences west of Eugene. The BLM admits that this logging will increase fire hazard risks, slope instability and landslide risks, and drinking water contamination for these communities, but dismissed concerns raised about these impacts as insignificant.

Press Release: Mature and old-growth logging sale undermines Biden climate policy; threatens McKenzie River, habitat

July 22, 2025August 2, 2022 by kaley

August 2, 2022 — Today, old-growth forest and wildlife advocates provided the U.S. Forest Service the means to reconsider the pending Trump-era “Flat Country” timber sale in Oregon’s Willamette National Forest. The vast majority of the proposed logging would be in mature and old-growth forests, with over 1,000 acres of clearcutting, even though President Biden this year ordered his administration to prioritize conserving these forests as a crucial climate protection.

Press Release: Legal Warning Challenges Plan to Log Thousands of Acres of Oregon’s Old-Growth Forest Reserves

July 23, 2025July 5, 2022 by kaley

July 5, 2022 — A coalition of Oregon conservation organizations notified the Bureau of Land Management today it intends to sue the agency to protect marbled murrelets and coastal martens from a plan by the agency to log thousands of acres of old-growth forest in areas designated as late-successional reserves. The reserves were designated as part of the Northwest Forest Plan to protect the two threatened species, as well as hundreds of others.

Press Release: Court Halts Logging of Elliott State Forest Tract Sold to Private Timber Company

July 23, 2025June 28, 2022 by kaley

June 28, 2022 — Today, a U.S. District Court judge issued a ruling preventing Scott Timber from clearcutting old growth forest previously part of the Elliott State Forest. The court found that the proposed logging of the “Benson Ridge” parcel by the subsidiary of Roseburg Forest Products would harm and harass threatened marbled murrelets, in violation of the federal Endangered Species Act. The court’s ruling permanently enjoins logging of the occupied murrelet habitat.

Press Release: Conservationists Challenge Logging Plan

July 23, 2025May 26, 2022 by kaley

May 26, 2022 — Late yesterday, Oregon-based conservation organizations Cascadia Wildlands and Oregon Wild challenged the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) Siuslaw Field Office’s plan to log public lands west of Eugene across seven watersheds. The agency’s “N126 Late Successional Reserve Landscape Plan Project” is one of the largest logging proposals on public lands in Oregon in decades. The targeted forests are home to at least three federal Endangered Species Act (ESA) listed species: northern spotted owl, marbled murrelet, and Oregon Coast coho salmon, along with the red tree vole, which is currently a candidate for ESA listing. The agency failed entirely to consider impacts to these species, amongst other errors.

Press Release: Legal Victory Saves Threatened Old-growth Forest in Southern Oregon

July 23, 2025March 14, 2022 by kaley

March 11, 2022 — The Medford District Bureau of Land Management (BLM) “Lost Antelope” timber sale would have: Removed fire-resilient old-growth trees located in the “Wildland Urban Interface” and increased wildfire hazard to nearby ranches, farms and communities. Conducted “regeneration” and “gap creation” logging activities that resemble clearcutting. Resulted in the establishment of dense young even-age timber plantations that tend to burn at stand-replacing intensity.

Cancel Bureau of Land Management Plans to Log 200 Year Old Coast Range Forests

August 2, 2025November 26, 2021 by kaley

*We never share or sell your information.

Lawsuit Filed Challenging Removal of 3.4 Million Acres of Critical Spotted Owl Habitat

August 1, 2025March 23, 2021 by kaley

March 23, 2021 — Conservation groups in the Pacific Northwest filed a legal challenge to reinstate federal protections on more than 3.4 million acres of federal old-growth forests, which are essential for the survival of the threatened northern spotted owl. The lawsuit asks the court to reject a rule issued in the last days of the Trump administration that eliminated one-third of the critical habitat protections for the species. The nonprofit law firms Earthjustice and Western Environmental Law Center represent Audubon Society of Portland, Cascadia Wildlands, Center for Biological Diversity, Conservation Northwest, Environmental Protection Information Center (EPIC), Klamath-Siskiyou Wildlands Center, Oregon Wild, Sierra Club and The Wilderness Society in the lawsuit.

FIELD REPORT / BLOG: Quartzville-Middle Santiam Old-Growth on the Chopping Block

July 23, 2025August 5, 2020 by kaley

Proposed Quartzville-Middle Santiam (QMS) Timber Sale Project: Field Check Trip, July 2020 by Chelsea Stewart-Fusek Cascadia Wildlands Legal Intern, Summer 2020 On a gorgeous day earlier this month, the Willamette Valley Broadband of Great Old Broads for Wilderness joined the Cascadia Wildlands field checking team to survey some of the units in the QMS timber … Read more

Federal Appeals Court Blocks Mt. Hood Logging

August 4, 2025April 3, 2020 by nsc425

April 3, 2020 — Cascadia Wildlands and our allies Bark and Oregon Wild prevailed before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals today federal court in a long-running legal battle over the Crystal Clear logging project on the eastern slopes of Mount Hood. The logging project encompassed nearly 12,000 acres of public land in the Mount Hood National Forest, and included almost 3000 acres of logging of mature and old-growth forests along with plans to build or re-open 36 miles of roads.

Join Cascadia