FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE   

May 21, 2025

Eugene, Ore.— Conservation groups intervened today in a lawsuit brought by the timber industry and counties seeking to strip northern spotted owls of protections for their critical habitat across millions of acres of forests in California, Oregon and Washington.  

The industry lawsuit attempts to reinstate a critical habitat rollback issued in the final weeks of the first Trump administration that removed nearly 3.5 million acres from the 9.6 million acres that were protected for spotted owls in 2012.  

“The forests these precious owls depend on also provide all of us with benefits like clean water, recreation, jobs and climate resiliency,” said Chelsea Stewart-Fusek, an endangered species attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Given Trump’s relentless assaults on our most cherished wildlife and public lands, it’s no surprise that corporate timber interests are resurrecting their attacks on northern spotted owls and the places they live in the name of short-term profit.”  

The northern spotted owl first gained critical habitat protection in 1992, and those were adjusted in 2012 under the Obama administration. That rule was challenged in court by the timber industry, resulting in a settlement and a January 2021 designation excluding 3.5 million acres from critical habitat protection, nearly all on public lands managed by the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management.  

Just 10 months later, the Biden administration rescinded the final designation and instead finalized a proposed rule that excluded 204,294 acres instead of 3.5 million acres. That Biden administration rule is being challenged by the timber industry’s current lawsuit, which is seeking to reinstate the expanded Trump administration revision.   

“This latest attempt by the timber industry to remove protections for northern spotted owls is a cynical move that perpetuates not only the biodiversity and extinction crises, but also the pendulum swing regarding management of the owl’s habitat,” said Susan Jane Brown, attorney with Silvix Resources that represents some of the intervenors. “Rather than accept that the best available science requires the protection of millions of acres of spotted owl habitat to prevent the extinction and foster the recovery of the owl, industry’s lawsuit seeks to unnecessarily stoke controversy.” 

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service protected the northern spotted owl, a bird found only in the forests of the Pacific Northwest, as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act in 1990. In 2020, because of continued loss of the old forests they need to live and competition with the invasive barred owl, the Service found northern spotted owls should now be classified as endangered but has yet to provide stronger protections for the species. 

“This is a tired story: the timber industry attempting to game the legal system in order to expand logging on our public lands,” said Tom Wheeler, executive director of the Environmental Protection Information Center. “Unfortunately for them, they have to come through us first. We have stood up for the northern spotted owls and science for decades and we aren’t backing down.” 

Additional quotes: 

“The lawyers for Big Timber are cherry-picking a courthouse across the country to attack old-growth spotted owl habitat in our neck of the woods,” said George Sexton, conservation director for Klamath-Siskiyou Wildlands Center. “So we’re intervening to stand up for science and our forests.” 

“Drastically reducing spotted owl habitat protections is not only antithetical to the best science we have for allowing the imperiled species to recover, but puts at risk all the other benefits that protecting these public lands provide to Oregonians, the very people that these lands are supposed to be managed for,” says Nick Cady with Cascadia Wildlands. “Aggressive logging increases wildfire risk, threatens drinking water sources, recreation opportunities, and much more all for the benefit of corporate timber barons.” 

“With northern spotted owl population numbers in precipitous decline, the timber industry seeks to remove protections from a full third — 3.5 million acres — of the species’ critical habitat,” said David Woodsmall, attorney at the Western Environmental Law Center. “This is a choice by the industry to drive the northern spotted owl to extinction for private profit, antithetical to the American values of conservation embodied in our laws. Western Environmental Law Center has fought for northern spotted owl recovery for decades, and we will use the power of the law to thwart any action that threatens the survival of this iconic species.” 

“The logging industry wants to frame this lawsuit as just about the northern spotted owl, but what’s really at stake are our oldest, most resilient forests, forests that also provide cold, clean rivers for salmon, drinking water for communities and cherished places for countless people,” said John Persell, staff attorney for Oregon Wild. “Trump administration officials have made it clear they view these lands as little more than a source of profit. It’s up to all of us to stand up — for owls, salmon, clean water and carbon-storing forests — and say no.” 

“With less than 3,000 spotted owls left and a population that is declining precipitously, this challenge is a slap in the face to conservation and the survival of this species. Any reduction in acreage of critical habitat could be this species’ death knell,” said Joe Liebezeit, statewide conservation director for Bird Alliance of Oregon. 

“Everything needs a home to survive,” said Dave Werntz, science and conservation director at Conservation Northwest. “The northern spotted owl is no exception.” 

####

Eugene-based Cascadia Wildlands defends and restores Cascadia’s wild ecosystems in the forests, in the courts, and in the streets. The organization envisions vast old-growth forests, rivers full of wild salmon, wolves howling in the backcountry, a stable climate, and vibrant communities sustained by the unique landscapes of the Cascadia bioregion. www.cascwild.org

The post Legal Intervention Defends Northern Spotted Owl Habitat  first appeared on Cascadia Wildlands.

As we move into the post-wildfire season here in western Oregon, I am thinking of having some bumper stickers printed up. Maybe, “Gaia Knows Best.” Or perhaps, “What Would Gaia Do?”

In the aftermath of this year’s big fires, I want to share the idea that when the land has suffered what may appear to be a major wound, sometimes the picture is brighter than it first seems—especially when we are willing to trust natural processes and give the land some room to heal.

It’s nevertheless true that major wounds lie all around us this winter. Large wildfires, many that were likely sparked by power lines then driven to conflagration by unusually hot and dry east winds, have caused tragic loss: some in our communities have lost their homes and businesses; some lost their lives. We mourn those lives, and extend our compassion and support to those who lost homes and livelihoods. Tough times lie ahead as people make plans for a different future than they might have hoped and planned for.

We have also heard people’s fears and concerns about the wild lives lost. Will our forests recover? Is destructive wildfire going to become our “new normal” under climate change? Will big fires in spotted owl habitat drive them to extinction?

I am happy to tell you that, at least as far as the forests go, you can breathe a sigh of relief. Our Western Oregon forests and native wildlife are used to wildfire. They’ve evolved with it, and a fully functioning ecosystem needs it.

As to whether large wildfires will become the “new normal” under climate change, the truth is that large wildfires are just … normal. In recent decades, we’ve emerged from an unusually wet time period that coincided with federal policy encouraging fire suppression, so our expectations of a normal fire year are based on an abnormal baseline. Large wildfires – even so called “mega-fires” – are the historic norm west of the Cascades. We may start to see increased drought and extreme weather due to climate change, though, and that will certainly influence fire behavior in years to come.

If you’ve been wondering whether our forests can recover from the fires, you can set your mind at ease about this, too. Very large, and often severe wildfires have burned in our forests for thousands of years. Our forests and the wildlife within them evolved in concert with fire and not only recover in its aftermath, but thrive. Even this season’s biggest fires burned in a mosaic, leaving a patchwork of green forest, untouched or lightly burned, intermingled with more severely burned patches.

If left to recover naturally, these blackened patches of charcoal forest will start to sprout new growth next spring, birds and their nestlings will feast on insects that have colonized the burned trees, and tree seeds will sprout, nourished by the living mycorrhizal network beneath the burned soil surface. Fire, our forests can handle.

Now, whether our forests, and the wildlife that depend on them, will recover from decades of destructive logging is another question – and that’s why we fight tooth and claw against any old-growth and mature forest logging, as well as the particularly destructive post-fire clearcutting.

There is also some good news on the spotted owl front with regard to wildfire. An ongoing scientific debate about the fate of spotted owls after wildfire has flared back up recently. The upshot of the controversy is that an independent scientist has shown that spotted owls thrive through wildfires, while a group of industry and agency-sponsored scientists have been trying to cast doubt on that. There’s going to be some back-and-forth for a while, but it looks like the debate will come down in favor of the rigorous, independent scientists, as it usually does. I’m ready to breathe a sigh of relief here: I don’t think wildfires, alone, are going to drive spotted owls extinct.

Yet the owl population has been declining steadily since they were listed under the Endangered Species Act in 1990, so much so that the US Fish & Wildlife Service has determined they should be uplisted from “threatened” to “endangered,” meaning they are now in danger of extinction (note, the listing is not finalized; the government has determined they are too busy to handle it just now, but will revisit the idea in a year). So, what is sending spotted owls down the extinction spiral?

In a word, logging. Despite the frantic efforts of the industry and, unfortunately, most of our federal land managers, to blame a myriad of other causes, the main culprit is logging.

When an industry strips away a habitat needed for a species’ survival – and for spotted owls, that’s old-growth forest – then that species will die off. Estimates vary on the amount of old-growth the industry has deigned to leave behind in spotted owl range, but it could be as low as 10% of what existed prior to colonial settlement in the 1800s. It’s not too surprising that spotted owl populations are way down, too. Species and their habitats go hand in hand; when their homes go, they go.

If they aren’t logged, we can expect to hear plentiful birdsong and enjoy native wildflower blooms in our burned forests this spring. Forests that develop on their own post-fire are more complex than clearcut-and-replanted stands; they can develop into old-growth twice as fast as managed forests. On top of that, many are surprised to hear that burned forests are great at storing carbon. But not if they’re logged.

Owls – and any other living thing that prefers to live in a forest (even a burned one) versus a strip-mined hellscape – are among the reasons we are particularly concerned by new post-fire clearcutting proposals coming hot in the wake of this season’s wildfires. We are geared up on all fronts with our conservation partners to fight this, the worst and most environmentally destructive form of logging.

Because industrial timberlands will flood the market with burned logs from private lands, we are asking our state and federal agencies to take a more responsible role with our shared forests and leave them to recover naturally, providing diverse habitat for a myriad of wild species.

Although we’d hoped the agencies might have the decency to wait until the pandemic eased, the holidays had passed, and 2020 was finally in the rear view mirror before acting, they’ve unfortunately decided to start pitching post-fire clearcutting in some of our most cherished watersheds this month. We are keeping an eye on three massive, harmful projects now (outlined below). We know more will be headed our way in the months to come, and we will keep you all apprised of opportunities to weigh in.

McKenzie River / HLB-MITA Salvage Project

This proposal out of the Bureau of Land Management proposes to clearcut over 1,300 acres of burned forest in the McKenzie River watershed (salvage and green tree harvest within Harvest Land Base-Moderate Intensity Timber Area (HLB-MITA). We’d like to see the agency operate with some concern for the trauma already suffered by the human and wild residents of the McKenzie valley. Clearcutting these hillsides would instead add increased landslide risk and risk to fish streams, degraded soil webs, flash floods, and homeless wildlife to the list of insults following the Holiday Farm Fire.

The agency is taking comments on its scoping proposal now through January 11. They are asking whether they should do a full Environmental Analysis (EA) or if they can get away with filing this under a “Categorical Exclusion” – a new pass on environmental impact review granted for post-fire logging in the waning days of the Trump administration. We want them to slow down and take the time to do a full EA review as required by law, giving our citizens plenty of time to look over their plans and comment prior to them committing to undertake actions that would ravage our forest and watershed.

You can contact the field manager in charge, Rebecca Brooke, with your concerns: rbrooke@blm.gov

North Umpqua River / Archie Creek Salvage Project

Here again, the Bureau of Land Management is moving lightning-fast on a proposal to clearcut a massive area along the North Umpqua River that burned in September’s Archie Creek Fire. We can’t even tell you exactly how many acres are involved, because their scoping proposal is so vague it doesn’t even list that basic information. So much for fair and open public oversight procedures. We do know this one is too big to go forward under a Categorical Exclusion, but we fully expect the agency to rush its Environmental Analysis.

We’ve asked for more information, but in the meantime, you can comment until January 8. If you support a careful environmental review that fully considers all the logging impacts to fish, streams, water quality, soil quality, and wildlife that we would expect, let the agency know!

You can reach out to Mike Korn, the field manager in charge: mkorn@blm.gov

North Santiam River / Santiam State Forest

This proposal is moving fast to sell off swaths of our burned state forest to clearcutting. About half of the roughly 47,000-acre Santiam State Forest east of Salem burned last fall. As with fires generally, this one burned in a healthy mosaic pattern, leaving fertile ground for a new, natural forest to arise there. Instead, the state is sticking to its outdated 2010 planning document and wants to clearcut up to 3,500 acres. We know some of what they will cut will be green, and as you know, even the blackened areas provide important habitat for years to come.

The Oregon Department of Forestry has provided very little information about what they intend here. We don’t know how old these trees are, how severely they burned, or where exactly the agency intends to allow loggers free rein. They’ve shortened the usual public comment period to 30 days – comments due December 23 – and have revealed they intend to auction off the first trees for logging that same day! We think our public trust deserves better.

You can ask for more information and share your opinion of this plan here:
odf.sfcomments@oregon.gov

The post BLOG: After the Fires, the Birds and the Blooms first appeared on Cascadia Wildlands.

The North Landscape project, which was approved by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management’s Lakeview District last year, is expected to generate 111 million board-feet of lumber. The lawsuit seeks to overturn the project for allegedly violating the National Environmental Policy Act and Administrative Procedures Act.

In its haste to increase timber harvest on an extremely fragmented landscape, the Lakeview BLM has unlawfully elevated timber volume production over ecological considerations such as wildfire risk and at-risk species conservation. Nearly 7,000 acres of the project area that have been slated for thinning or clear-cutting are within the designated critical habitat of the Northern spotted owl, which is protected under the Endangered Species Act and continues to experience declines.

The project area contains five sites that are occupied by the spotted owl and the birds will be extirpated from these areas, while the BLM also plans to log seven unoccupied sites that could be inhabited in the future. Northern spotted owls are not expected to recolonize the area until suitable habitat develops in 120 years.

Further, the BLM failed to address important issues associated with the project, including the increasing spread of barred owls that are competing with northern spotted owls, the unique ecological features of the area including the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument, and also the fact that the project will admittedly drastically increase fire-hazard for the region.

Our organizations have asked U.S. Magistrate Judge Mark Clarke in Medford, Ore., to enjoin the BLM and its contractors from implementing the project and to vacate its approval.

Additional media coverage can be found here.

The post Cascadia Wildlands and Allies Challenge Enormous North Landscape Timber Sale first appeared on Cascadia Wildlands.

The post Field Checking the Quartz Timber Sale first appeared on Cascadia Wildlands.

For Immediate Release

Nick Cady, Cascadia Wildlands (314) 482-3746

Medford BLM Old-Growth Timber Sale Faces Legal Challenge

Groups Oppose the Government Returning to Old-Growth Logging

Today a coalition of conservation organizations representing tens of thousands of Oregonians filed a lawsuit against the federal Bureau of Land Management (BLM) seeking to halt the “Lower Grave” old-growth timber sale located on the Grave Creek tributary to the Rogue River.  This illegal logging project proposes to log fire-resilient old-growth forests currently serving as a critical refuge for the northern spotted owl, Coho salmon and red tree voles.

“The last thing the Grave Creek Watershed needs is more old-growth logging, more clearcutting and more logging roads,” said George Sexton, Conservation Director for KS Wild. “Our public land managers should be bringing communities together to restore forests, but the BLM appears intent on going back to the days of ripping up watersheds and slicking off native forests.”

The timber sale marks a sharp departure from the BLM’s prior restoration efforts in the Rogue River Basin aimed at undoing past damage wrought by rampant clearcutting and extensive road construction over the previous century.  Medford BLM had been successfully implementing “dry forest restoration” timber sales based on the recommendations of foresters Drs. Norm Johnson and Jerry Franklin. These dry-forest restoration principles allowed to the BLM to offer substantial timber volume for sale, while increasing the resistance of these forest stands to large fires, largely without controversy.

“Our organizations repeatedly stressed to the BLM that there was a way for them to design this project to generate timber for sale and protect the large old-growth trees,” said Nick Cady with Cascadia Wildlands.  “The BLM replied that its mission was to maximize the cut.  That is not the agency’s mission. The BLM is placing no value on wildlife, clean water, and forest health that Oregonians hold dear.”

The BLM admits that the timber sale will increase fire hazard in the “regeneration harvest” logging units in which over 95% of the old-growth trees will be removed and replaced with dense tree-farms. The sale will also result in the “take” of a newly established spotted owl pair and its juveniles.

“The Lower Grave timber sale is based on the wrong priorities. This logging will degrade rather than restore our public forests that have already been logged too much,” said Doug Heiken of Oregon Wild. “BLM’s top priority should be careful restoration of the public values that flow from our public forests, including clean water, recreation, climate stability, fish & wildlife, and quality of life that underpins our diverse economy.”

###

The post Suit Filed to Prevent Old-Growth Logging Near Rogue River first appeared on Cascadia Wildlands.

Groups Protest Oregon Timber Plan Riddled With Loopholes

Latest BLM Plan Increases Clearcutting and Dismantles Streamside Forest Protections for Clean Water, Salmon, and Communities

The post Cascadia Wildlands and Conservation Allies Challenge BLM Forest Plans in Oregon first appeared on Cascadia Wildlands.