SALVAGE LOGGING HARMFUL TO NATURE, COMMUNITY & CLIMATE

Scientists call for a drastic change to BC’s logging of forests burned by fire and affected by insects

“Salvage logging after a fire usually causes more damage to a forest than the fire itself.  Scientists speaking in a panel discussion broadcast as an online seminar organized by the volunteer group Conservation North explained that logging reduces biodiversity, contributes to climate change, increases the vulnerability of the forest to further fires, and often causes soil degradation and erosion.” - -- Michelle Connolly, Director, Conservation North

Michelle Connolly provides details recorded in a recent virtual webinar (available for viewing) co-sponsored by the Interior Watershed Task Force, a Citizens Coalition in the Okanagan advocating for clean water, natural forest, and wildlife habitat; The Fraser Headwaters Alliance, a volunteer-based organization advocating for sustainability in the Fraser Headwaters bio region; and Wild Sight an environmental NGO defending wildlife, water, and wild places in Canada's Rocky Mountain Regions.

The session featured Seraphine Munroe (Maiyoo Keyoh Society), Dr. Karen Price (independent ecologist), Dr. Phil Burton (emeritus University of Northern BC professor), Dr. Diana Six (University of Montana) and Dr. Dominick DellaSala (Wild Heritage).

“Dr. Dominick DellaSalla, a researcher who has published more than 300 journal articles on forest ecology, said the word ‘salvage’ is misleading,” Connolly told WT.

According to Dr. DellaSala: “Nothing is saved or preserved, but instead, logging forests after a fire causes more damage than the fire itself.” Fire usually contributes to biodiversity and sustainable environments, and logging releases more carbon into the atmosphere than is captured by any seedlings that may be planted, and this carbon contributes to climate change.

Dr. Diana Six, a forest entomologist and professor at the University of Montana, characterized beetle outbreaks as events that help forests adapt to a future changing climate if they are left alone and not logged. Dr. Six explained that most people only notice the dead trees that follow an insect attack or fire. However, “surviving trees pass on genetic-based traits that support persistence of the ecosystems under new conditions.”

Dr. Karen Price, an ecologist who was a member of the old growth technical panel for the BC Ministry of Forests, said that: “dead trees often have more value than live trees from an ecological perspective. We should think of wildfire as restoration”. Price points to the example of a plan developed by the Stellat’en and Nadleh First Nations in central BC.

“The big lesson from this webinar is that in a changing world leaving primary forests alone contributes to resilience of both communities and nature,” explains Conservation North spokesperson Michelle Connolly.

The recording is available here