New timber sales delayed by plant and animal surveys
Some species appear only
every three to five years,
making surveys difficult
EUGENE — Federal timber
sales are being delayed until next
year in Oregon and Washington
because surveys of old growth
forests for 33 rare plants and ani
mals have not been completed.
Most of the species are fungi,
snails and obscure plants that of
ten appear only once every three
to five years because of their irreg
ular reproductive cycles.
“The problem is, we have 33
species that we don’t even know
how to identify, or they show up
only sporadically,” said Greg Cox,
head of a joint federal agency ef
fort to develop guidelines for how
to survey forests for rare plants
and animals.
The delay by the U.S. Forest
Service and Bureau of Land Man
agement is yet another blow to a
logging program that already has
been slashed by 80 percent under
President Clinton’s Northwest
forest plan.
A Forest Service official said
Tuesday that timber sales should
start getting approval again by
February, but any further delays
could have a dramatic impact on
i
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:
sales in the 1999 federal fiscal
year, which begins Thursday.
Under Clinton’s forest plan,
agencies were supposed to devel
op these so-called “survey and
manage” guidelines by Oct. 1. But
the agencies won’t have guide
lines for 33 species by Thursday’s
deadline.
from Mici