August 22, 2007
As I write this we're in the middle of July. Everything has been really dry. Lightning fires around the Klamath, the Sierras, and Southern California. CDF, know known as CalFire, reported over 170 fires started from a spate of lightning fires last week. And then--lo' and behold--the North Coast was blessed with, in many places, about an inch of real rain overnight between July 17th & 18th. A beautiful respite. Supposed to be back to hot and dry next week. I hear that the Southern Humboldt Fire Plan is being pushed to completion. Stream and watershed restoration work, as well as many fuel hazard reduction projects, are in full swing.
One of the shaded fuel breaks I've been able to follow is on Telegraph Ridge along the Ettersburg Road. The work by Dave Kahan and various crews, including those from the Mattole Restoration Council, are doing fine work. Dave is an artist and personally schooled me in what a shaded fuel break means. It's not wholesale removal of trees and vegetation. It's a careful removal of `ladder fuel' hazards that leaves the forest more open and defendable against a fire, but still carefully retains shade elements that will slow or prevent rampant brush regrowth that presents a hazard and makes the hazard reduction work much less effective. Get in touch with the Fire Safe Council or Fire Departments near you for assistance in making your local roads and homes more firesafe--a specific plug for the Mattole Restoration Council at 707-629-3514, www.mattole.org. If they can't help you they can put you in touch with those that can.
I'm excited about the 10th Annual Coho Confab cosponsored by the Salmonid Restoration Federation (SRF) and Trees Foundation, being held in the Mattole, August 17th through 19th. I'll cover the event in the next "Diggin' In" column. Also of great interest, but an event I'll probably have to miss, is the 2nd Annual Spring Run Chinook Workshop sponsored by SRF and the Salmon River Restoration Council on the Salmon River in the Klamath Basin, July 24th through 27th. Might have someone that attends contribute to the next column. Check out the SRF website at www.calsalmon.org to stay abreast of salmon/steelhead news and events.
Problems continue with the California Coho Recovery Strategy. The Department of Fish and Game (DF&G) finally did hire a new person, Scott Wilson, to be the DF&G liaison for the Coho Recovery Team. They might even meet in August or September. Coupled with a hampered Coho Recovery Strategy is recent inadequate action by the Board of Forestry and the DF&G. What was looking last summer as a positive attempt to address consistent forestland protections for all listed anadromous salmonid species `retrograded', under industry pressure, into a "Coho Incidental Take Permit Assistance, 2007" rule package--addressing just Coho, and only areas where Coho have been present since 1990, and with the modest improved protection measures recommended by the Fish & Game Commission unlikely to ever be implemented anywhere. On top of it some legislators are holding hostage over $11 million dollars for restoration projects, ostensibly due to this poor showing by the Board of Forestry and DF&G. I have spared you the description of the excruciating details of this continuing saga. See some of my earlier columns for some of those details. Try the Trees Foundation website at www.treesfoundation.org.
Reforms in the Archaeological and Cultural Heritage Protection Program of CalFire are in the offing. The Native American Advisory Council (NAAC) to CalFire and the Native American Heritage Commission (NAHC) will be cosponsoring a 1-3 day workshop to deal with these issues sometime in the near future.
The pilot project for a Program Timberland Environmental Impact Report (PTEIR) for the Mattole River Watershed continues. The steering committee will be meeting on August 2nd for a field trip and to digest and respond to the information that came out of the four community meetings earlier this year. They also will be considering various draft management plans and draft cumulative impacts evaluations. I'll be summarizing this project as it evolves. A Mattole Basin-wide CalFire scoping session will probably be held in the early fall. Check out the MRC website:
www.mattole.org.
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This RFFI acquisition at this point seems to be a specific manifestation of dreams and notions shared over a restoration campfire in 1971, on a salmon tributary of Indian Creek, which is a prime tributary of the South Fork Eel River with its confluence across from old Piercy. At the time, the northern portion of the "Usal Redwood Forest" was owned by Andersonia Timber Company and was up for sale. We encouraged Andersonia not to sell, to evaluate their lands, and keep them for the benefit of the surrounding communities. Unfortunately they sold to Georgia-Pacific, but now, with a whole other set of players acting in `cosmic' synergy make that dream and notion a possible reality. The project lands basically extend from the South Fork Eel River to the Usal Road, and from the Mendocino-Humboldt County line to Highway 1 and further south near Leggett to include significant areas of the lower Hollow Tree Creek watershed. The dream, expressed succinctly by RFFI, is to have community-based forestry formed on solid principles of ecology, economy, and equity. This project land, with foresight and checks and balances, can be a model for a new forestry that lasts for centuries. It's all just beginning. People have hopes for such a model to be possible--one which might even be applied to the battered lands of Pacific Lumber/Maxxam.
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Get in touch with EPIC at 707-923-2931 and Humboldt Watershed Council at 707-822-1166 for the latest information on many of the above topics and other issues. Please get involved in ways that are effective and meaningful for you, and that contribute to real solutions.
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TOC for Forest & River News, Summer 2007