A ‘technical glitch’
DNR explains clear-cut change near Gully Lake
The Department of Natural Resources is explaining a sudden change to a harvest plan as a “technical error.”
The Truro Daily News published a story May 23 revealing that, according to DNR’s online harvest map viewer, the department was proposing to clearcut 13 hectares of forest beside the boundary of the Gully Lake Wilderness Area.
Subsequently, DNR staff changed the online harvest viewer information so it now reads that the harvest adjacent to the wilderness area will, if approved, be a partial cut.
A DNR spokesperson explained the change in a May 25 email.
“Operationally, this site was always prescribed to undergo a partial harvest. Unfortunately, a technical error occurred and incorrect information had been posted to the online Harvest Plan Map Viewer,” wrote the spokesperson.
DNR staff changed the information online for all three blocks, labelled PI173495 A, B and C, from proposed clear cuts to proposed partial cuts.
The spokesperson says DNR apologizes for the confusion the technical error may The Gully Lake Wilderness Area.
have caused.
DNR sent out a clarification and notification of the change May 26 to everyone on their map up-date notification list and is also notifying every one who made a comment on the Gully Lake harvest plans.
One person who had already submitted comments was Chris Miller, national conservation biologist with Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society (CPAWS).
“It’s important for everyone to have access to accurate information, so I’m glad the department has admitted they made a mistake,” said Miller.
The plan for the Gully Lake blocks is for a uniform shelterwood harvest where loggers thin mature overstory trees throughout the forest, removing a third of the timber.
A shelterwood harvest is intended to increase the amount of sunlight reaching the forest floor to help naturally occurring species, in this case sugar maple and yellow birch.
Miller is concerned the proposed harvests on the boundary of Gully Lake Wilderness Area will further isolate the protected area in ever-growing region of disturbance.
“The problem is that there is no provincial policy in place to guide forest management decisions near protected areas,” says Miller. “There needs to be a role for the Department of Environment in the decision making on this. They manage the protected areas, yet it’s the Department of Natural Resources that approves what happens on the border.”