FOREST FLASH
January 2024
In Pacific Forest Trust’s e-newsletter, Forest Flash, we send you the most recent PFT news and updates on forests, clean water, climate, and wildlife. Subscribe here.
Engaging local communities is essential to scaling up the use of prescribed fire to help our forested landscapes become safer and healthier. Part of PFT’s preparations to ramp up “good fire” on properties we manage includes ensuring that nearby community members have all the information they need to feel at ease with fire reintroduction. With planned reintroduction of beneficial fire on two PFT-conserved properties, McCloud Soda Springs and van Eck California, we have been hosting educational community meetings. The first took place in Fieldbrook in Humboldt County late last year; the second was earlier this month, in McCloud, California. The latter meeting focused on our efforts at the mentioned McCloud Soda Springs Working Forest, where we plan to burn the entire property, over time, in phases, with 300-400 acres to be treated in 2024. Once completed, it will be one of the largest burns on private forestland in over 20 years.
At that meeting, PFT’s Stewardship Forester Jack Singer discussed, along with our burn boss partners at Terra Fuego, useful information on all-things controlled burn, and answered audience questions about safety precautions before, during and after the burn.
The McCloud Soda Springs Working Forest spans 1,350 acres of ponderosa pine-mixed conifer forest and is home to numerous species and replete with myriad springs that feed into the McCloud River. PFT has spent years focusing on the restoration of the forest to more naturally fire-resilient conditions, targeting our harvests to expand the spacing between trees, remove ladder fuels and dense small thickets that are highly flammable. The upcoming burn will be the next step in our restoration and management plan, thereby further reinvigorating the landscape’s habitats, increasing watershed health, and securing the surrounding communities by doing our part to reduce the risk of catastrophic wildfire.
Back in October 2023, at the former meeting in Fieldbrook, CA, we discussed our plans for a controlled burn, scheduled for fall, on +/-300 acres of the 2,200-acre van Eck California Forest this fall. There, PFT explained the parameters and aims of the burn, while also engaging the community on how reinstituting natural fire regimes is one of the most effective means of increasing fire safety and nourishing forest health.
These meeting are key to involve communities in this proactive transformation of how we manage fire. Community collaboration and discussion are a critical piece of embracing the cultural shift from fire suppression to fire management, and we’re excited to share updates these planned burns!
In mid-December PFT hosted its second Portland showing of Beyond the Trees, the award-winning documentary about our innovative work on the van Eck forests of Oregon and California. We were joined by another lively crowd to watch and discuss the film.
David Patte of Sun Break Wines explains why he chose PFT as a beneficiary of his 1% for the Planet giving
At the time of the showing, Beyond the Trees had just been awarded its seventh award nomination, a “Best of the Festival” designation from the Paramount Film Festival in Los Angeles. The festival will take place at the end of February, before PFT President Laurie Wayburn, as well as the film collaborators from van Eck, and the film’s producers at Imaginary Forces, head to London to show the film during The Economist’s Sustainability Week.
We are grateful to David Patte, owner and winemaker who operates Sun Break Wines from the beautiful Willamette Valley, for not only providing the delicious ciders and wines offered at this and our prior Portland screenings, but also for graciously signing on as our latest 1% for the Planet partner. Patte is contributing 1% of total Sun Break revenue to support environmental organizations like PFT.
Thanks, as always, to all our supporters and event attendees. It has been so rewarding to show Beyond the Trees in cities and towns across the country, and to witness its messages positively impact those who watch the film. Stay tuned for news on forthcoming screenings!
Please consider a donation to the Pacific Forest Trust. Your help—in all capacities—makes our work possible. Thanks for supporting us as we support forests!
A state-appointed Natural and Working Lands Expert Advisory Committee (EAC), chaired by PFT President Laurie Wayburn, is embarking on its second year of work advising California on how to scale up significant carbon emissions reductions through changing management on its natural and working lands. Called for by AB1757, these recommendations comprise a first-in-the-nation effort to leverage the power of forests and other biological sinks—through active management, restoration, and conservation—to help meet the state’s ambitious climate goals. Doing so will yield immediate results amounting up to 400 million tons in carbon reductions over the next decade, thereby transforming natural lands from victim to powerful tool in the fight against climate change.
“This effort is a monumental first,” said Amanda Hansen, CNRA Deputy Security for Climate Change, in a recent meeting, “No other state has done this at any comparable scale.”
With forests alone, changing management through voluntary working forest conservation easements could contribute 150-300 million tons of CO2 emissions reductions over that ten-year period. The Committee also lays out a path for increasing CAL FIRE’s program of prescribed burning, establishing a state-developed burn program and permit which enables smaller landowners to restore and use “good fire” on their lands. Additionally, the recommendations highlight the necessary restoration of oak woodlands, ways to sharply reduce the loss of oak forests, and the increased conservation of riparian forests. The benefits of these actions extend well beyond crucial carbon sequestration: conserving and restoring forests is essential to safeguarding the state’s essential watersheds, maintaining its remarkable biodiversity and ensuring healthy rural communities. To read recommendations for forests, click here.
Such recommendations, when implemented, would reduce more carbon emissions than what California has projected will be gained through the electrification of the transportation sector overall—and at a fraction of the cost. Here’s to embarking on another year of advocating for and implementing transformative nature-based climate solutions!
ICYMI
In case you missed it (ICYMI), here are some other exciting things PFT has been involved in lately!
- PFT President Laurie Wayburn was featured in a recent Los Angeles Times article on the very topic of cuts to climate programs in Newsom’s 2024 budget.
- PFT’s Shasta Timberlands Conservation Easement was recently completed, and it got a write-up in the Redding Record Searchlight, as well as a highlight in Industry Intelligence Inc.
- It’s official: We’ve got a date for 2024’s Forest Fete. It’ll take place Thursday, May 2, 2024 at 6:30PM PT. And the theme? RESTORING GOOD FIRE. Come help us set the night aflame with food & drink, speakers, live music, and more!
