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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (April 7, 1997)
Spring time is allergy time for many students ■ FLOWERS: Eugene has one of the highest pollen counts in the nation, and many people suffer for it By Amy Palanuk Higher Education Reporter As the breeze brushes by and the sun beams down, the scents of spring glide through the air al most like a ffisbee over 13th Av enue. It’s innate. People know. It’s Frisbee time. But that’s when the trouble stents. Fresh whiffs of pollen hit the nose of allergy sufferers and the sneezing and wheezing begins. The once beautiful Frisbee weather becomes a season of Kleenex and sniffles, and people are reminded that they live in one of the most pollen-infested regions of the world. But relief is only a phone call away. The Student Health Center provides assistance and guidance for those plagued with runny noses and itchy eyes. On a daily basis, nurses at the clinic see students suffering from the sneeze-infested season. They provide insight and guidance on how to avoid the worst allergic reactions. The best advice? Stay inside when the pollen flies. Experts say avoiding the pollen-laden air is the best way to keep the irritating reactions away. The highest pollen levels right now are from the blossoming trees and fresh-cut grass. But the next few months hold even more pollen possibilities in the sprout ing buds. When the worst pollen counts hit the Willamette Valley late spring term, the health center holds clinics for allergy sufferers. SEASONAL ALLERGIES SYMPTOMS ■ Sneezing ■ Watery/itchy eyes ■ Cold symptoms that won’t go away ■ Skin rashes ■ Some types of asthma ■ Headaches ■ Persistent cough ■ Vomiting ■ Recurring ear infections PREVENTION ■Wearsunglassesoreyeglasses.it j provides a barrierto pollen in the air j collected from throughout the day ■Wash bed linens regularly ■ Don't use a feather duster, damp dust with a wet cloth ■ Don’t let your pets sleep with you, they can carry high counts of pollen in theirfur ■ Limit outdoor activity on windy, dry days ■Avoid lying in the grass ■ Shower at night to remove pollen Students meet with a nurse prac titioner and 19 other students to discuss symptoms and ways to avoid hay fever. After a half-hour discussion about allergies, the students are then given needed prescriptions. Gerald Fleischli, health center director, finds these large meet ings better than a ten minute ap pointment where a student would only receive six minutes of education. “It increases volume and im proves the quality,” Fleischli said. For students new to the area, sometimes unfamiliar symptoms will occur in the spring. Many times these are the first signs of hay fever striking. Most will no tice itchy eyes, irritated skin and a constant runny nose. Over-the-counter antihista mines are sometimes adequate for relief, but these can cause drowsy side-effects, Sharon Har bert, health center registered nurse, said. Eye drops and in halers can also provide relief, but for the most effective kinds, it’s best to get a prescription. Herbert encourages students to talk to pharmacists in the health center to get the best advice for hay fever relief, or to make an ap pointment with a nurse or aller gist on staff. The number for the student health center is 346 2770. Range director for Pacific Northwest’s largest forest retires ■ TIMBER: Bob Richmond faced tough decisions on logging and conseiyation of the 2.3 million-acre forest The Associated Press BAKER CITY — U.S. Forest Service trucks are still green. But that’s about the only thing that hasn’t changed since Bob Richmond joined the agency as a range conservationist in 1961 in North Dakota. Richmond was an oddity when he joined the Forest Service as a range conservation ist; of the 71 new employees in the agency’s Northern Region that year, he was the only one who wasn’t either a forester whft pre pared timber sales or an engineer who de signed the logging roads. Today the Forest Service employs hun dreds of wildlife biologists, geologists, ar chaeologists and other specialists whose chief duty isn’t to sell timber but to predict how logging, grazing and other activities will affect forests and the animals that live in them. Richmond, 59, retired last week, 36 years after beginning that first job in North Dakota, and a decade after moving to Baker City to supervise the largest national forest in the Pacific Northwest: the 2.3-million-acre Wal lowa-Whitman. Like most career Forest Service employ ees, Richmond rarely had time to become accustomed to a job before he had.a_new one. In his first 27 years with the agency, he moved nine times. In 1980 he moved to Portland, where he became director of range management for the Forest Service’s Pacific Northwest region. Duringhis tenure in Portland, Richmond visited the Wallowa-Whitman several times and in the process “fell in love with North east Oregon.” Richmond said the region reminded him of his native Wyoming, where he grew up on a ranch about 20 miles from Cody. But when he left Portland in 1984, his destina tion was not the rural West, but the urban East Coast and a job at Forest Service head quarters in Washington, D.C. Richmond worked there for three years. It didn't take him that long to decide he was n’t interested in “climbing the ladder”, to a higher job. ~ “ J “I was less than taken with the intera gency politics,” Richmond said. “I wanted to get back to the field. ” He started work in Baker City on Sept. 14, 1987i_ On that September day, the Wallowa Whitman was two weeks from the end of its 1987 fiscal year, during which the forest of fered for sale 205 million board-feet of tim ber. The majority—141 million feet—con sisted of live trees. * \ Much of that volume was in the form of old growth ponderosa pines, the staple of Eastern Oregon’s timber industry since the 19th century. The statistics for that year were typical, but even before Richmond arrived in Baker City there were signs of change, particularly in the ambunt of ponderosa pine the forest would sell. Wallowa-Whitman officials were work ing on a plan that Would guide activity on the forest for the next 10 to 15 years, includ ing the amount of logging the Forest Service would allow.gThat proved to be ;a con Hentioifs itetfd.'dffwhat would complicate Richmond s eijUre tenure. “When I got here,’ the debate had started about thefotest phtff,” Richmond said. “The timber industry felt the [logging] projects were too low.” j Environmentalists began to appeal most timber sales on the Wallowa-Whitman, forc ing the forest to postpone, or in a few cases cancel, logging. In 1991 the W$Jo|Sa-Whitinan offered for r safe ^SEf'.njfljjiph l^ejsbf green timber. That pluiSfriefedfe^l ffilBBn in 1993. The'annual t average from 1991-96 was 13.8 million. “It was frustrating to be on the one hand cursed by the timber industry arid to be cursed on the other side by environmental groups who said forest supervisors like Richmond are just wood butchers §vho are only interested in getting a timber sale out,” Richmond said. “I just couldn’t understand why we couldn’t meet our targets.” some things you need to know before the world ends: A Final Evening with the 9 minati Larson and Levi Lee April 9,10,11, 12,17,18,19 8 pm Arena Theatre . Villard Hall a second season production UNIVERSITY THEATRE UT box office 346-4191 EMU tickets 346-4363 ODE Classifieds 346-4343 New this term! NIKE's test of speed, agility and quickness April 19 9 20 COED (3 males, 3 females) Challenges include: • Flag football * Agility competition • Tug-O-War m Mini triathlon m Obstacle Course • Muscular endurance competition IT’S FREE! DEADLINE: APRIL 9 Challenge your friends, dorm floors, fraternities/sororities. Sign UP at the RIM office and win NIKE gear! RIM • 102 ESSUNCER • 346-4113 P E L A N GL rl Cakrawala EMU BALLROOM April 13,1997 6:00 p.m. Tickets sold at ^9.00 each available at the EMU Front Pesk For more information call: Lisa at 683-5411 Shinta at 302-6982
