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ALERT - December 4, 2006: Protect Our Woods joins allies to submit a response to the Draft Supplement to the Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS) for the German Ridge Restoration Project in Hoosier National Forest6. Alternatives to Cutting and Burning for Creating Early Successional Habitat Not ConsideredNEPA requires that an agency consider reasonable alternatives to a proposed action, especially if that alternative is less environmentally degrading.Assuming that there was a true lack of early successional habitat on the Hoosier National Forest or the German Ridge, a claim that neither the German Ridge DSFEIS nor the HNF Plan has been able to establish satisfactorily (and a claim which we do not accept), there are ways that early successional habitat could be established without the considerable negative environmental impacts that result from logging and burning. The Shawnee National Forest gives some indications of different options that could have been considered for the HNF Plan and for the German Ridge project, since the German Ridge project is tiered to the HNF Plan. Regarding the Shawnee National Forest, there have been discussions about opening the forest interior to logging for creation of early successional habitat. In addition, there have also been discussions about purchasing high quality early successional habitat on the edges of the Shawnee National Forest. After purchase, these lands could then be treated to ensure the continuation of habitat. Why then wasn’t this option considered on the Hoosier? Why is the public only given one option, that of logging and burning? The actions carried out on the Shawnee, versus the actions proposed on the Hoosier were the result of public pressure to purchase new, early successional habitat from the forest’s edges, versus creating them in the interior with logging and burning. This shows that the Forest Service has the discretion to listen to what the public wants. The public in Indiana has been pressuring the Forest Service successfully, over the previous forest plan period, to reduce logging compared to the proposed ASQ. So obviously it would be within the discretion of the agency to likewise respect the values and ideas of the public, and explore purchasing options as they did on the Shawnee National Forest, and to keep commercial logging out of the Hoosier National Forest. The other option not considered with regard to early successional habitat is the idea of conservation easements. The Forest Service claims that private land early successional habitat is not “reliable,” and that we have no way of controlling what type of habitat private owners can or will provide. This is not entirely true. The Forest Service knows and understands that private landowners respond to incentives. If the agency didn’t want to acquire private land as the Shawnee National Forest did, then another option would be to study how the purchase of conservation easements on private land may achieve the goal of “enough” early successional habitat. We find that the decision to consider the option of acquiring early successional habitat along the edge of the Shawnee National Forest and not doing the same for the Hoosier National Forest/German Ridge is arbitrary and capricious. We also find that not considering other arrangements with private land that already has early successional habitat to offer is arbitrary and capricious. Click here for part 7a. The Questionable Need of Restoring Oak Hickory Part 1 of 2Protect Our Woods
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