All NM & Tonto AZ NF's ceases all wood extraction permits.

H

hank4elk

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Just found out yesterday that a judge has ordered the USDA-NF to cease all wood extraction permits in all NM National Forest lands & the Tonto NF in AZ.
All logging,thinning & firewood cutting.
WEG again. Spotted owls again.
I have a stack of tags & 3 cords at home and now it is cool enough to work safely...you know,now I see why everyone hates these phoney tree/bunny hugger groups. I saw the reason for their involvement years ago due to FS lands abuses logging & extraction industry in general.
But every good urban interface thining project gets stopped.Every logical logging/thining gets stopped. Firewood cutting now too. Even dead & down.
This is bullshit. And I'm an enviromentalist type guy,even cop to being a Sierra Clubber in 60's.................this is why I quit SC in 1968. Same crap.
 
I was just at the district office Friday and they were selling permits and wood. Monday I was out hunting bear and a wood truck tried to run me over on a forest road. Crap I need wood!
 
That seems like an overly broad application of the law to shut down all cutting.

Anybody know if this is related to Cottonwood? That case set the really bad precedent on this kind of activity and the remedy had bi-partisan support.
 
Ben Lamb said:
That seems like an overly broad application of the law to shut down all cutting.

Anybody know if this is related to Cottonwood? That case set the really bad precedent on this kind of activity and the remedy had bi-partisan support.
Click to expand...
I heard last month about them(WEG) trying to stop thinning in the Urban Interface Zones around Santa Fe,again. That is a new Paridise or Malibu fire waiting to happen.They did the same thing 5 years ago and that was the last time I was involved with official public comment,etc.
Then a blurb about a suit in AZ & then talk in SF paper was them suing about Santa Fe thinning project. I made a couple comments on FB and the Editorial page about the stupidity of not thinning around Santa Fe and the disaster waiting to happen there. I was scoffed at . Eff em I figured. LOL ,jokes on me.

Everyone here in SW have been waiting for it to cool down & fire danger to subside to cut firewood. Many,like myself,rely on wood for heat.
I know the local mill has been hauling logs off the burns since they got permits in spring to keep the mill running. Now mountains of cut logs will sit all winter and start rotting.
No cutting is allowed on State Trust Lands ,unless you have the cheap lease & you can cut.
Same with BLM. No woodcutting programs,not even for the mountains of dead & down wood.

I wanted to keep the dead wood on my place for future use,like in 10 years when I am a real OLD fart. Oh well.
 
Gila said:
Details....we are screwed. They will gouge the price of wood. Propane is now sky high. The gouging is devastating us.

www.fs.usda.gov

Cibola National Forest and National Grasslands - Home

Cibola National Forest and National Grasslands - Home
www.fs.usda.gov
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I talked to local forester & she could not comment as it is a suit and all that BS. They have nothing to do with it besides dealing with folks like me.....been there,done that.
The wood that was stockpiled by commercial woodcutters will be gone fast,like the few mills.
The price of propane is up. Better top off the small tank I use for cooking & backup heat
Got gas today,$3.01 a Gal. for Premium. We have a glut of oil here in NM.
Total BS.
 
hank4elk said:
I talked to local forester & she could not comment as it is a suit and all that BS. They have nothing to do with it besides dealing with folks like me.....been there,done that.
The wood that was stockpiled by commercial woodcutters will be gone fast,like the few mills.
The price of propane is up. Better top off the small tank I use for cooking & backup heat
Got gas today,$3.01 a Gal. for Premium. We have a glut of oil here in NM.
Total BS.
Click to expand...
Rushed out today to buy wood after reading your post. I was in the middle of paying for it when the boss called and told him not to sell it. Went to another vendor and she wanted $350 a cord which I wouldn't pay. The people I have been buying wood from for years won't even return my call. The permit holders will be taking out their wood, you can be sure of that. The forest service will have to completely shutdown access which they will. I only hope that I can get my elk hunt in before they shut the gates but, alas, I should be so fortunate.
 
Ecotards at work again. They never learn. Now, that whole area will become a set for conflagration, come fire season. Stupid people, with stupid agendas. Nothing unusual, for this day and age. I am glad that I have lots of access to private wood, here, because I burn A LOT of wood in my big furnace.
 
I tried to insert the link from NM USDA-FS,but I'm dumb. New statement(NON) from Alb. was released overnight.

I will get by,I will survive...

On a side note our suit to stop water grab was successful for a 3rd time last month and now they have appealled & reapplied for permits.....our coaltion had help from NRDC,legal...which I warned against.
Let's see,how much does 10 years of law suits add up to in billable hours for lawyers? Wonder why local judges don't just close the door after one suit is dismissed?
 
Gila said:
EarthJustice is just another child group of the NRDC like wild life guardians are. All three are anti-hunting groups with the same lawyers. What's your point anyway?
Click to expand...

When people see how these groups are able to take away our rights to use our land, it is what makes people support the movement to transfer them to the state. You can still cut wood on NM land can’t you?
I don’t want the land transferred but a lot of rural people do, and although I disagree, I can sure sympathize with why when I see shit like this.
These groups inspire their opposition just like all of the mess over grizzly bears and wolves stokes support for repealing or changing the ESA, which I am a big fan of doing because of Earth Justice
 
Gomer
You can cut wood on your own land in NM.
BLM does not issue non commercial cutting permits in NM that I have seen.I got permits to collect logs on Pelona Mtn thru them one year,but they were still USDA-FS permits in the end for some reason.I could never get up the Mtn that year,access out......lol
State Trust Lands are a racket in NM,totally. IMHO Up to the rancher who OWNS the land, er lease. They let commercial cutters in around here some how. There is no program like FS on STL's.
Hell,there is no racket like State Trust Lands in NM. They have little to no staff,for a reason............
 
Effort is being made to make changes to the ESA to allow us to apply common sense management to our National Forest lands.


In 1990 the Northern Spotted Owl was listed as a "threatened" species under the federal Endangered Species Act (ESA), resulting in the steep decline in federal timber harvests and the economic collapse of many rural communities across the nation.

In the Pacific Northwest over 9.5 million acres of federal land have been set aside as "critical habitat" for the owl, where forest management is either highly restricted or entirely prohibited. Yet Northern Spotted Owl populations are still declining, even in areas where logging has been prohibited for decades. As wide swaths of federal lands have been set aside from forest management for the owl, early seral habitat for deer, elk and other dependent species-including prey species for owls such as woodrats- have declined by 90 percent.

Against this backdrop, in August the Departments of the Interior and Commerce announced changes to Endangered Species Act regulations. Given today's political environment, it's not surprising the changes, though they consist of modest tweaks to ESA processes, have been controversial and framed in partisan terms. Here we will attempt to cut through some of the political rhetoric and explain of how the regulations are changing, and not changing:

First, the new regulations do not change the basic process for endangered species reviews.. Listing determinations will continue to be judged "solely on the basis of the best scientific and commercial information regarding a species' status." As before, federal agencies must consult with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service or National Marine Fisheries Service to ensure federal actions don't jeopardize a listed species or undermine their critical habitat.

What changes is the previous "one-size-fits-all" approach to the ESA. As with the Northern Spotted Owl, the the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has treated "threatened" or "endangered" species the same, an approach that often undermines public support and fails to consider the specific needs of unique species. The revisions will follow the same two-tiered classification system that Congress originally established for "endangered" and "threatened" species, enabling the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Department of Commerce's National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) to develop unique rules to help recover species populations (a model that NMFS already uses).

In the Pacific Northwest there has been controversy over critical habitat the spotted owl doesn't even use. To provide clarity, the new regulations focus on prioritizing occupied critical habitat rather than unoccupied areas that may never support wildlife. The regulations ensure that federal agencies first evaluate areas where species are actually present, before considering areas where they are not. Designated "unoccupied habitat" must contain one or more of the physical or biological features essential to the species' conservation. This rightfully placed the focus on the habitat utilized by a species and helps ensure that critical habitat designations are free from speculation or surmise.

It often takes a lot of time for the federal government to make decisions on listing a species or determining critical habitat. In federal forest management, such decisions can add months, if not years, to the implementation of forest projects that reduce overstocking and fire risk, provide timber or enhance wildlife habitat for various species. In the case of the Northern Spotted Owl, the Fish & Wildlife Service's 2011 Revised Recovery Plan identified catastrophic wildfire as the primary source of habitat loss.

In addition to revising definitions to promote consistency and clarity in the consultation process, the new regulations establish a deadline for informal consultations to provide greater certainty for those needing timely decisions, without compromising conservation of ESA-listed species. Informal consultation covers projects that won't have a negative impact on listed species and where additional process or study will bring no conservation benefit. The regulations also aim to streamline the relatively complex process of formal consultation.

In conclusion, these are the first changes to ESA regulations in 33 years. During this time science has evolved. Research has since found that active forest management can benefit the Northern Spotted Owl, whose primary habitat are increasingly threatened by stand-replacing fire due to a lack of management. We hope the new regulations can help streamline forest management where treatments are needed, in a way that benefits both wildlife species and communities that depend on healthy, resilient and renewable forests.
 
Does the restriction on cutting firewood affect people who are camping cutting or gathering wood for their camp? I know that sometimes that is a separate activity from cutting firewood for your home under a FS permit?
 
Maybe these two can craft some common sense legislation to put an end to this nonsense?

helenair.com

Daines, Feinstein to introduce wildfire protection bill

Senators from California and Montana said Thursday that they plan to introduce a bipartisan bill that aims to protect communities from wildfires like the one that killed 85 people and
helenair.com helenair.com

"Daines and Feinstein have been working on forest management reform proposals for several years, and the Paradise tragedy may be what pushes the legislation through a divided Congress, Daines said. He called the bipartisan effort a breakthrough."
 
Ben Sellers said:
Does the restriction on cutting firewood affect people who are camping cutting or gathering wood for their camp? I know that sometimes that is a separate activity from cutting firewood for your home under a FS permit?
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No, as long as it is consumed in the forest and not removed. The 60 thousand dollar question is: Will hunters have access to the forest? The answer to that is maybe yes and maybe no. The forest service will have to shut the gates to keep wood from leaving the forest.
 
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