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Environmental groups sue to block old-growth logging project in Oregon’s Coast Range

The BLM's Blue and Gold timber sale is on the Oregon coast north of Roseburg.
Cascadia Wildlands
The BLM's Blue and Gold timber sale is on the Oregon coast north of Roseburg.

By Eric Tegethoff, Oregon News Service

PORTLAND, Ore. (KTVZ) -- Environmental groups have filed a lawsuit to stop the logging of centuries-old trees on the Oregon coast. The Bureau of Land Management is moving forward with the Blue and Gold logging project to cut down rare old-growth forests in the state's coastal range.

Grace Brahler, wildlands director with Cascadia Wildlands, says the logging project will wreak havoc on the ecological system and is bad for fire management.

"It's really concerning at a time when we're seeing longer fire seasons, hotter temperatures that the agency is moving forward with actions that are going to move forest stands from low or moderate hazard level into a high hazard level for wildfire moving forward," she contended.

Brahler believes the effects from the project will be felt for decades to come, and noted that the Biden administration has proposed an amendment conserving old-growth forests from logging. The BLM has also elevated conservation as a priority alongside other uses on public lands. However, the agency also needs to produce a certain volume of timber on its lands and concluded the Blue and Gold project would have no significant impact on its environmental assessment.

But Brahler pointed out that it also threatens endangered species on the Oregon coast.

"This is just really ideal mature and old growth habitat that a lot of our most imperiled and iconic species like the marbled murrelet, the northern spotted owl, the coastal coho (salmon) - they rely on these forests and these areas," she said.

Brahler added that old-growth forests are playing crucial roles as carbon sinks and stores as the climate changes.

"We're in such a critical climate window right now for climate action, and we have right in our backyard these incredible forests, these ancient temperate rainforests in the Cascadia bioregion that are the most powerful natural climate solution," she continued.

Article Topic Follows: Environment

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