America's Forests 2010 / Mike McMurray - Photographer/author
From the Photographer: Mike McMurray:
Something that caught my attention this year was the speech Tom Vilsack, our new Secretary of Agriculture made in August in Seattle Washington.... "The Forest Service must not be viewed as an agency concerned only with the fate of our National Forests, but must instead be acknowledged for its work in protecting and maintaining all American forests, including state and private lands. Our shared vision adopts an 'all-lands approach,'.....". Mr. Vilsack said many things in his speech that most of us in forest products applaud and are very much in favor of, for instance his comments on forest health and the need to manage all of our forests. He also talked at length about the loss of our forest infrastructure that has occurred in our rural forest communities, and the importance the mills, loggers and our skilled workers have played and how we need to again provide the opportunities to re-employ these folks in helping develop new markets for wood, biofuels and other necessities that can come from our forests.
Another area of his speech that I paid a lot of attention to was his concentration on water. He stated, "the new approach to managing our forest aims to secure the nations water supply." "Nearly 87% of all of the country's fresh water supply originates from forests and agricultural lands...." and "80% of the forest area in the United States is outside of the National Forest System." This was an attempt to enlighten people in urban areas (cities) with the importance of well managed, healthy forests and how we are all benefit from taking care of the forest through management not preservation.
We now have over 70+ million acres of burned, dying or diseased forests in our National Forest system. According to Forest Service estimates that number is growing and could double in just a few more years. Besides losing the billions of dollars of value of these forests, by not cleaning them up, we continue to add to the CO2 release that these dying, decaying forests produce. This alone should alarm every environmentalist, recreationist, conservationist and federal official. Cleaning up our federal forests could do far more in reducing greenhouse gas production than what is being proposed currently by the EPA.
Something else that caught my attention is a bill before the Senate, Senate Bill S-787, the 'Clean Water Restoration Bill'. This bill effectively would turn control of all water over to the Corps of Engineers and the EPA. There is a similar bill in the House, but they are keeping it under 'House Arrest' and out of public scrutiny. This bill is under the guise of a clean water and wetlands protection act. It also attempts to give the government control over all "waters of the United States".
As I have said in this calendar, "those" that control the watersheds, control all productivity in the country; farming, ranching, grazing, wood products, all industry and commerce, and everyone's ability to recreate. Every acre of productive land in the country is considered in some watershed. A federal take-over of our water and water rights is not in America's best interests.
What then is the answer to our continuing debate over how to manage our resources? We have played political football with this issue for over 100 years and we don't seem to have learned much, at least politically. We have "preserved" millions and millions of acres in wilderness that prohibit human intervention, we have states and special interest environmentalists trying to preserve millions more acres and there are those that want to re-establish the Clinton "Roadless areas". Yet as I tour the west particularly, I see vast areas of wilderness burned up in massive, natural wildfires and insect devastation. These aren't the result of 'climate change', or 'fire-suppression' but lightning strikes and naturally occurring periodic epidemics. I see the same in many of our most famous National Parks.
In looking at where we came from over a hundred years ago when 'wood from our forests' provided almost everything we needed to build, house or travel (remember trains, bridges, railroad ties), to now, going to an almost religious reverence for trees in an attempt to "preserve" or protect every acre..., what we have actually done is to lay the foundation for mother-nature to run her course.... which has been a very destructive one. Continuing down the same path of more wilderness and roadless areas, has already proven extremely destructive. The course we must now choose is one of 'conservation', through sustainable management that renews our forest, all of the forest, particularly 'public' forests, and makes them healthy again and at the same time can provide thousands of 'shovel-ready' jobs, which can re-vitalize both the forests and our rural communities.
Mike McMurray - Photographer - Conservationist
A native Oregonian, Mike is respected as one of North America's foremost forest/eco-system photographers. He has photographed nature & wildlife professionally for over 33 years. Mike also produces video documentaries on nature and environmental topics throughout North America. A lifelong outdoorsman, Mike has been involved in the realization of truth & balance in social/environmental issues.
Conservation = Wise Use!