Seeing the Forest

Seeing the Forest

Trees that fall into the water have many affects, including the slowing of waters during floods to protect fish, as well as creating pools for habitat, they also help trap nutrients that support life in rivers and streams. The Forest Service used to remove trees from rivers in order to help the salmon travel unchallenged downstream, but after finding out that these were crucial for habitat as well as protection, the began to transport large trees to the rivers in Siuslaw National Park to help repair damage done by the timber industry and other factors. Siuslaw National Forest is located in Oregon, and some places get up to 100 inches of rain per year, making it one of the most productive temperate forests in the world. The trees grew so well that it attracted those who wanted to take these trees and use them for other means. The Forrest Summit in 1993 was a meeting where newly elected Clinton came to advocate for a long term plan to treat deforestation, this resulted in the Northwest Forest Plan, which designated areas that were protected from timber companies. In the Siuslaw National Forest, the whole park was off limits.

After timber companies were no longer allowed in this forest, the roads went pretty much unmaintained, resulting in large portions of he roads being taken out by a storm in 1996. Road building and clear cutting made it more common in mountainous areas for the landscape to be susceptible to landslides and erosion, as well as negative impacts on the streams and it's ecosystem. Even though the Siuslaw Forest was now off limits, the forest service decided to find a new way to go about things involving a large group of people including the timber companies and the watershed council to name a few. They decided on a common goal: the restoration of Salmon. After gaining ownership of the land by using a federal conservation fund, the forest service cut a new path for the river through the Siuslaw forest, in order to restore fish habitat that was destroyed by undercutting due to consistently moving the river to a straighter more direct path. The forest service also started thinning places of trees in order to speed up ecosystem growth and diversity by allowing room for other species to grow. This project created jobs and supported the ecosystem, with 60% of the sales going towards national forest restoration, and the other 40% going towards salmon restoration projects. They've also decommissioned roads and are replacing or removing culverts in order to keep the water flow as natural as possible to aid the ecosystem and travel of the fish and other organisms that need to move freely up and down the stream. In 2012 there was another large storm that took place and the only road washouts that happened were places in the river that the forest service hadn't gotten to yet, proving that the new changes made to help the stream had also helped the roads and reduce flooding in unwanted areas. This whole transformation is a huge success story on the front of restoration, it not only helped the environment, it also helped the economy and the community. This got everyone on board and made a sustainable plan for keeping this ecosystem healthy, if not by this exact model, then by the knowledge that it's possible for so many people to come together and reach common ground even with opposing opinions for the greater good of the environment and community.

All of this information I acquired from watching the video: Seeing the Forest

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Multiplier Effect

Image
Oliver's Market helps the local economy by buying from local vendors instead of picking the lowest priced items, which helps keep the cash flow within Sonoma County. 27.4 percent of everything they sell is from a vendor within Sonoma County. They're able to turn a profit by buying at the sellers price and then raising it a bit so that they can benefit the community but not go broke doing so. Oliver's is also a business that hires local employees, helping raise the number of jobs for Sonoma residents as well as, again, helping the local economy by not outsourcing work. Speaking of outsourcing, their headquarters are also local, which is yet another thing that helps stimulate the economy within Sonoma County. To add to that even more, they also donate over $300,000 to local Sonoma County charities. Although it's not always a viable option to buy local when the product you're looking for isn't produced locally, there are still more 'Go local' options ...
Read more

My Favorite Place in Nature

Image
It's really hard to decide what my favorite place in nature would be, but if it really came down to it, it would have to be a tie between a redwood forest and the Mendonoma coast. I chose a redwood forest because that's where I grew up, and every time I'm in one I instantly feel more calm and at peace, hearing the sounds of nature soothes me and helps me feel more connected to the world as a whole; not to mention how beautiful it is. The towering trees also make me feel small in a good way, forcing me to think of the hundreds of years they've existed and how trivial everyday life can be in comparison to so much time passed. The reason for choosing the coastline and beaches of Mendocino and Sonoma is because of how mysteriously gorgeous they are, pushing me into an almost meditative state. I always get caught staring into the surf, thinking of how all life supposedly sprung from the ocean, how it never stops moving and changing, and how anything that enters either surv...
Read more

Summarized Learning from: 'Seeing the Forest'

The information below is from this video . It has been summarized and put in bullet points, to read the full page on what I learned from this video, click this link to my other blog post . ---Trees that have fallen into a waterway have amny benefits, including protection and habitat for fish, trapping of nutrients, and the slowing of flood waters. ---The Siuslaw National Forest (located in Oregon) gets up to 100 inches of rain per year, making it one of the most productive temperate forests in the world. ---Since these resources drew in so many people that wanted to use them, it was classified as protected and therefore off limits after the Forest Summit in 1993 where Clinton helped create The Northwest Forest Plan. ---Roads began to deteriorate once timber funding was no longer a financial support for their maintenance. And landslides and major erosion occurred during the storm in 1996. ---This prompted the Forest Service to rethink things, so they began on ...
Read more