Monday, June 17, 2013
Dying Douglas fir trees bear witness to the drought that hit Western Washington last summer. Trees between 5 and 15 years old appear to be the most commonly affected, but some larger trees also show symptoms, including entirely red crowns, red tops and red branches. Glenn Kohler, forest entomolo ...
Monday, June 17, 2013 10:01 AM
SALEM -- A legislative budget writing committee has passed a bill freeing the Oregon Department of Forestry to deploy resources to keep small wildfires from becoming large. House Bill 2050 also evenly splits the cost of fighting large-scale wildfires between forest landowners and the state. C ...
Thursday, June 13, 2013 4:44 PM
CHEHALIS, Wash. -- After 10 years as executive director of the Washington Farm Forestry Association, Rick Dunning says he will retire July 1 to take care of four F's: "Family, farm, faith and friends -- and fishing. That makes five." He has been offered other positions, but he has sworn to make n ...
Tuesday, June 11, 2013 9:35 AM
SAVANNAH, Ga. (AP) -- A building supplier phoned Pollard Lumber Co. about providing wood for a large government construction project in Georgia, but the deal broke down over a single question about how the family-owned sawmill has committed itself to environmentally friendly practices. The mill ...
Monday, June 10, 2013 10:20 AM
GRANTS PASS, Ore. (AP) -- The Oregon Board of Forestry has taken on a tough job: figuring out how to produce more logs as well as better fish and wildlife habitat through logging on state forests. The board voted unanimously Wednesday in Salem to embark on a new management plan for three sta ...
Thursday, June 06, 2013 8:52 AM
KLAMATH FALLS, Ore. (AP) -- Klamath County budget writers have given up plans to cut the sheriff's office as they struggle to deal with declining timber revenues. The county Budget Committee voted Wednesday to tap the general fund and road funds to restore $1.4 million in cuts that would hav ...
Friday, May 31, 2013 9:04 AM
GRANTS PASS, Ore. (AP) -- Sen. Ron Wyden is zeroing in on his plan for boosting logging on federal lands in Western Oregon and helping rural counties beset by money problems. The Oregon Democrat announced Thursday a more specific framework for legislation to address complaints that so-called ...
Friday, May 24, 2013 11:14 AM
SALEM -- The Oregon House on May 22 passed a bill creating a metric for determining wildfire damage on private and public forestland. Senate Bill 709 is designed to prevent forestland owners from declaring exaggerated loss claims when their property is damaged by wildfire. It protects both la ...
Wednesday, May 22, 2013 12:11 PM
TUMWATER, Wash. -- Ken and Bonnie Miller's tree farm is well off the beaten track, but plenty of folks have found their way to their home in the woods. Over the past 20 years, the Millers have extended the welcome mat to school groups and others wanting to see how they work their 40 acres of fir, ...
Tuesday, May 21, 2013 8:59 AM
SHINGLETOWN, Calif. -- Organizers of a salvage logging demonstration here May 14 might have appreciated how a group of high school seniors from Anderson, Calif., evaluated what they saw. "I think it's good to see," Connor McCone said. "They're taking what's left of (the forest) and being really e ...
Tuesday, May 14, 2013 4:13 PM
Rural Oregon county commissioners on May 14 announced a new organization supporting congressional action on active management of federal forests in Oregon. The Healthy Forests, Healthy Communities organization hopes to educate citizens on current federal policies and describe how the policies nega ...
Tuesday, May 14, 2013 12:01 PM
The U.S. Forest Service has named a new deputy regional forester for the agency's Oregon and Washington region. Becki Lockett Heath, currently supervisor of the Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest, will be one of two deputy regional foresters assisting Regional Forester Kent Connaughton. "In m ...
Friday, May 10, 2013 9:58 AM
Washington State University Extension is putting its forestry courses online. The extension service recently launched Forest Stewardship University, which is taught by experts and comparable to in-person forestry workshops, said Kevin Zobrist, WSU Extension educator. He said the program faced ...
Wednesday, May 01, 2013 9:08 AM
The Weyerhaeuser Co. reports that timberlands in the West are in a better position to benefit from the housing recovery than those in the South. Log demand has rebounded more in the West because the region was able to capitalize on healthy exports to the Pacific Rim even before domestic usage i ...
Tuesday, April 30, 2013 3:48 PM
SALEM -- The Oregon House has given unanimous approval to a bill to create a system for determining the cost of wildfire damage. House Bill 3201, which is designed to help landowners avoid unsubstantiated loss claims, passed the House on April 29 by a vote of 55-0. HB3201 was drafted in respo ...
Monday, April 29, 2013 5:36 PM
ANDERSON, Calif. -- Jim Arney foresees a troubled time for the timber industry for reasons that have little to do with the economy or spotted owls. In 2002, Arney helped form the Portland, Ore.-based Forest Biometrics Research Institute, which guides timber producers on the technical work of givi ...
Friday, April 19, 2013 10:38 AM
SACRAMENTO - Some members of Congress are ridiculing a proposal to give Endangered Species Act protections to a woodpecker that purportedly thrives on intense wildfires. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is taking comments on the potential listing of the black-backed woodpecker, which feeds on ...
Tuesday, April 16, 2013 4:24 PM
Forest land owners will learn how to tackle the western spruce budworm and pine bark beetle in upcoming workshops. Washington has declared forest health hazard warnings in parts of Okanogan, Ferry, Klickitat and Yakima counties because of the pests, which are found throughout the Pacific Northwes ...
Tuesday, April 09, 2013 4:58 PM
The U.S. Forest Service must study competition between threatened spotted owls and barred owls before proceeding with a timber project in an Oregon national forest. A federal judge has blocked logging on more than 2,000 acres in the Willamette National Forest, including about 450 acres of spotted o ...
Friday, April 05, 2013 10:54 AM
A string of legal victories in federal court has strengthened the hand of timber and grazing interests in legal disputes over public land, according to an industry attorney. Opinions by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and federal judges in recent years have established several principles th ...
Wednesday, April 03, 2013 3:52 PM
SALEM -- Charley Coury drove to Salem from his wood products company in Springfield March 27 to urge lawmakers to increase funding for Oregon State University's Forest Research Laboratory. Coury, general manager of 9Wood Inc., displayed to lawmakers in the Ways and Means Subcommittee on Education ...
Wednesday, March 27, 2013 10:34 AM
GRANTS PASS, Ore. (AP) -- A timber industry group has filed a lawsuit challenging the latest habitat protections for the northern spotted owl, a threatened species. The lawsuit was filed in federal court in Washington, D.C., on Thursday against the secretary of Interior and U.S. Fish and ...
Friday, March 22, 2013 9:50 AM
Four tree farms are vying to be honored as the state Tree Farmer of the Year, which will be named at the April 26 meeting of the Washington Farm Forestry Association. The American Tree Farm System, which includes 29 million acres of privately owned forest land nationwide, has established standa ...
Thursday, March 21, 2013 9:48 AM
The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that runoff from logging roads isn't subject to Clean Water Act permits, reversing a previous federal appeals court ruling. In 2010, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the runoff is subject to Clean Water Act permitting rules as a "point source" of ...
Wednesday, March 20, 2013 9:17 AM
REDDING, Calif. - Federal fire officials gave a spirited defense of their sometimes controversial decisions to let some wildfires burn through timberland in rural areas. Conducting prescribed burns or managing - but not actively suppressing - naturally ignited fires that aren't an immediate thr ...
Tuesday, March 19, 2013 4:37 PM
A federal judge has resurrected an Idaho county's lawsuit against road closures on national forest land that had been dismissed last year. Valley County filed a complaint against the U.S. Forest Service in 2011, claiming the agency's road policy violates federal law. It was consolidated with ...
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