SAN FRANCISCO - August 30 - The US Forest Service (USFS) is currently considering whether to move ahead with plans for the Globe Timber Sale in the Grandfather District of North Carolina’s Pisgah National Forest, despite the opposition of environmentalists and many other concerned citizens, in particular residents of Blowing Rock. USFS released its environmental assessment June 30, and ended the period for public comment August 18, after it had briefly extended the comment period because of a request from Senator Elizabeth Dole. The Globe Project involves a large number of stands, totaling more than 231 acres, in two distinct areas : the Upper Johns River (south of Blowing Rock) and along Franklin Branch Road on Globe Mountain .

The Southern Appalachian Biodiversity Project hired Rob Messick to take a preliminary look at stands in the Upper Johns River area before USFS released its environmental assessment. He found two stands with old growth in or directly adjacent to them. Environmental organizations asked USFS to drop these two stands from the proposed sale. When USFS failed to do so, the Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC) hired Rob Messick and Josh Kelly to quantitatively verify old growth in or near the two stands. They studied four plots, 20 x 50 meters in size, and found that three out of four had old growth that fit USFS’s Region 8 Guidance for Old Growth (1997). The plots were in Chestnut Oak Forest, Dry Oak Heath, Montane Oak Hickory and a type transitional between the latter and Acidic Cove. Trees up to more than three hundred years old were growing in the Chestnut Oak Forest and Dry Oak Heath in and near the stands. At the request of SELC, four prominent scientists examined and verified Messick's and Kelly's methodology and advocated protecting at least two stands in or near existing old growth..

In 1995 researchers entered the Lower Thunderhole Creek Area four times and made a Best Approximation delineation of class B old-growth forests there. After USFS released its environmental assessment on the Globe Project, researchers re-entered the Thunderhole Creek Area, and doing repeatable plot and core sample work (Greater Precision work), identified within a large stand proposed for logging, ten acres of old growth that fit USFS’s Region 8 Guidance. Apart from its old growth, the Thunderhole Creek area is significant for having high quality trout waters and an unusual occurrence of Montane Alluvial Forest along a significant section of its banks.

USFS states that its objectives in proposing the Globe Sale include providing habitat for turkey, grouse, deer, and bear; using herbicide on exotic species; and creating a network of old growth. The old growth to which the agency refers is future old growth, not existing old growth. One of the stands to be so designated was cut only twelve years ago. USFS refuses to discuss the actual old growth and claims that it is not an issue, since the agency is setting aside forest that it promises to allow to grow old.

If USFS in its decision on its environmental assessment continues to plan to log actual old growth, the decision will be appealed. SELC "will make sure that USFS complies with the law," Gerken promises.

Meanwhile, a move is afoot to obtain permanent protection for the forest from Congress. Residents of the Blowing Rock area have on hand a draft bill to designate a Grandfather National Scenic Area, and are seeking Congressional sponsors for it.

Sources:

Eason, Jeff. “Globe Debate Warms Up.” Watauga Democrat. Available online at www.wataugademocrat.com. Posted August 14, 2006.

Gerken, D. J. Personal Communication. 2006.

Messick, Rob. Personal communication. 2006.

”Old Growth Timber Sale Proposed Just Outside Blowing Rock, NC.” in “Front Porch Blog,” Appalachian Voices. Available online at www.appvoices.org. Posted July 26, 2006 .

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