U.S. Forest Service plan threatens lasting damage

The Big Piney, Pleasant Hill and Boston Mountain ranger districts of the U.S. Forest Service’s Ozark-St. Francis National Forest have announced their 2018 proposed projects. They cover some of the favorite hiking, hunting, canoeing, fishing, birding, photography places in Northwest Arkansas.

One of the three projects, roadside vegetation management, includes spraying herbicides for invasive species along all roads in Forest Service lands from Searcy, Newton, Madison and Washington counties. That’s 8,500 miles of road. Monsanto’s glyphosate/Round-Up is one of the chemicals proposed. That herbicide is believed to be carcinogenic and cause of many of the chronic diseases we suffer from today. Weeds have become resistant to it, soil bacteria die from its repeated use and soil becomes sterile. Big Ag is on a chemically dependent treadmill from using multiple chemical supplements, causing what some call a “chemical soup” in our wild and agricultural lands. The Forest Service is part of the Department of Agriculture.

Another project, Robert’s Gap, beside the Upper Buffalo Wilderness, covers 56,000-plus acres, of which 16,000 acres are proposed for prescribed burning. There is precedence since the 1990s for prescribed burns, but nesting birds and slow-moving animals are killed, soil structure can be damaged, food for endangered bats and migrating tropical song birds die, many Spring perennials and annuals do not come back, young trees die, and smoke inhalation for all inhabitants in the area is a problem. The whole of the Buffalo River watershed is affected.

Among the many proposals, another with destructive consequences is the harvest of near-old-growth hardwood trees, frequently done with the intention of pine conversion. Both Robert’s Gap and the third project, Jake’s Creek, will allow timber harvest of near-old-growth trees, lessening forest diversity, isolating forests into fragmented areas, and disrupting animal movement. These mature trees are the regenerators for future forests and their root systems provide support for understory saplings. Harvesting them is profitable for the timber industry but not for wildlife, endangered species nor for people. Is the intention to turn our woods into a managed tree farm, not the wildness that was the original U.S. Forest Service mandate to manage for recreation, wildlife, endangered species, hunting, grassland, watershed protection and timber?

Finally, deforestation is a leading cause for the buildup of excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere causing climate change. In a time when there are increasingly violent storms, intense drought, 100-year floods every couple of years and coastal cities planning for ocean rise, shouldn’t we practice custodial management of our forests, rather than degrading our Ozark ecosystem with these projects?

More information is available by calling the Forest Service in Jasper. Mike Mulford, the National Environmental Policty Act coordinator can be reached at (870) 446-5122, Ext. 5136 or through email at mmulford@fs.fed.us. It is important to give comment and be informed throughout the process. LOLLY TINDOL

Pettigrew