8 — THE BAKER COUNTY PRESS
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 11, 2015
Local
Brian Addison / The Baker County Press
The image on the left was the scene pointed out by forester Arvid Andersen during a February trip up Dooley Mountain with reporter Brian Addison. To the right is
the same area as it now looks after the Cornet Fire, depicting the uncanny accuracy of Andersen’s prediction.
Cornet Fire aftermath
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1
It wasn’t a crystal ball
that Andersen looked into
to draw his dire prediction
but rather the knowledge
and recognition of a large
timber stand lacking in
active forest management,
greatly restricted by envi-
ronmental regulations.
In February, Andersen
drove to the south side
of Dooley Mountain and
pointed to overly dense
timber stands and dead
and dying trees infected
with bark beetle and dwarf
mistletoe speckling the
landscape. At that time, he
warned of the potential for
catastrophic fi re and im-
pending forest devastation.
Sadly, everything Andersen
said in February played
out through August on the
public and private lands in
the Dooley Mountain area.
As he drove the forest
roads September 7, near
the headwaters of Denny
Creek, Cornet Creek, and
Rancheria Creek, Andersen
comes across areas of total
devastation but also several
areas where the fi re moved
through and did very little
damage.
One of the lesser dam-
aged areas, where he
thinks the trees will likely
recover, includes a fi ve or
ten-acre area where the
USFS conducted a timber
thinning project within the
Stices Unit.
“I commend the Forest
Service for this one,” he
said of the Stices Unit proj-
ect. “They did a good job
here. But, instead of just
fi ve or ten-acre units, why
don’t we do it with 100 or
500-acre units?”
Andersen drives down
the forest road a ways and
comes across another area
where a thinning project
was recently conducted.
The project provided
space between large trees
resulting in fi re resiliency
with little or no permanent
damage to the land with
slightly scorched trees that
will likely recover, he says.
Then Andersen points
right across the road from
the thinned area to a timber
stand with no active man-
agement, an area where
federal environmental
regulations demand that no
trees larger than 21-inches
be cut and no trees cut
within a 300-foot buffer
zone near a stream. In this
area the forest understory
was thick, the trees grew
close together with limbs
over-lapping and the fi re
roared through with intense
heat causing total dev-
astation. “Totally gone,”
Andersen says.
“How do you like your
21-inch rule now? How do
you like your 300-foot buf-
fer now?” he again mutters
to himself in frustration
over what he describes as
a misguided effort of for-
est conservation through
overly regulated forest
management.
Andersen worked many
years as a forester for
Ellingson’s lumber mills
in Baker City through the
1980s and 1990s and drew-
up timber sale contracts for
Ellingsons on private and
public lands. His experi-
ence with timber contracts
and his eye as a timber
cruiser leads him to realize
the great potential and
value of the trees burned in
the Cornet Creek Fire.
“We have lemons so let’s
make lemonade,” he says
while assessing the dire
situation. “You can make
a profi t on burned timber
but you have to be timely
about it. You can’t wait
two years from now.”
He explains the urgency
and need for expediency
by the USFS in drawing
and offering timber salvage
contracts. If the trees are
not harvested soon and
left to the exposure of next
summer’s heat, the trees
become susceptible to
insect infestation and to the
scourge of the Douglas fi r
and yellow pine, the blue
stain fungus, according to
Andersen.
“Right now these trees
have almost full-value,”
he said. “Further into next
summer the little tree’ll be
shot and the bigger trees
will lose most of their
value.”
To give an estimated
current value on the burnt
timber, Andersen locates a
large burned yellow pine
next to the forest road re-
cently cut by fi re crews for
safety reasons. The cut log
shows the bark blackened
by the fi re but the wood
inside unblemished by the
fl ames.
After a few measure-
ments with his timber
cruising measuring rod, he
determines the log at about
840 board-feet with a value
of around $400.
Andersen then begins
to discuss the economic
impact on a larger scale.
He pulls out his cal-
culator and does a quick
computation surmising that
the area within the Cornet
Creek Fire holds about
5,000 board feet of sal-
vageable timber per acre.
He then explains that a
25,000-acre timber salvage
could produce 125 million
board feet of lumber.
In terms of dollars, a
25,000-acre salvage trans-
lates to about $12.5 million
stumpage. Stumpage is
defi ned as the amount of
money the land owner can
expect to profi t after all
labor expenses to harvest
the timber have been paid.
On timber sales from
federal land, 25-percent of
the total stumpage comes
back to local schools and
county road departments,
Andersen explains. On a
25,000 acre fi re salvage
timber sale, the local
school district and county
road department would
reap the monetary reward
of more than $4 million,
according to what Ander-
sen calls a conservative
estimate.
“For every million board
feet of timber, that sup-
ports seven full-time jobs.
Jobs that could support a
family,” he adds.
At its height of produc-
tion, Ellingson’s lumber
mill in Baker City would
run through about 50 to
55 million board-feet per
year and employed up to
170 workers, according to
Andersen. In addition to
the mill workers, the local
timber industry employed
hundreds of foresters,
loggers, contractors, and
log-truck drivers.
At the top end of the
estimate, Andersen sees
up to 280-million board-
feet of timber ready to be
salvaged after the Cornet
Creek Fire. “That’s enough
timber to run Ellingson’s
for fi ve years,” he said.
So, when Andersen
looks at what is left after
the Cornet Creek Fire, he
sees opportunity for jobs
and for money gener-
ated to fund schools and
county departments. He
also sees an aggressive
timber salvage operation as
an opportunity to protect
the ground from further
ecological damage.
There are other con-
cerns and reasons to begin
timber salvage beyond the
rapidly decreasing value of
the burned trees includ-
ing the great potential for
soil erosion on the steep,
mountainous landscape.
Part of the urgency in
beginning a salvage effort,
according to Andersen, is
to protect the scorched,
steep mountainous land
from massive erosion after
the coming winter snow-
melt and rainfall.
“In a perfect world, the
timber would be salvage-
logged and then after-
ward hand-crews would
lay down some of the
burned trees on contour.
That would help hold the
ground and help with soil
erosion,” said Andersen.
He explained the addi-
tional work of laying some
of the remaining trees on
contour could be added as
a requirement of the con-
tractor within the timber
sale contracts.
Already, large rocks litter
the highway creating a
serious hazard for motor-
ists. Without some effort
to mitigate against soil
erosion, Andersen points
to a steep, scorched slope
above the Dooley Moun-
tain Highway (OR 245)
and asks, “What’s going to
hold the soil back.”
Andersen tells the story
of fi re salvage projects on
federal land after a large
forest fi re in Idaho in 2014
where work on the timber
salvage began within days
after the fi re was out.
Elvin Carter, 86, once
owned and operated one of
the largest timber contract-
ing businesses in Baker
County. He recalls a time
when the local private
logging industry was
called upon to bring their
Caterpillar tractors to help
contain forest fi res before
they could spread. He
explained that his highly
skilled CAT operators
could doze a fi re-line and
contain a forest fi re.
“Used to be, in the ‘70s
and ‘80s, they called us
immediately and they
wanted our CATS,” said
Carter. ‘One CAT would
take the place of 100 men.”
Carter believes, even if
timber salvage contracts
were issued by the USFS
in an urgent manner, that
the local timber industry
with the ability to process
the timber no longer exists.
“There’s a lot of sal-
vage but where are you
going to get the loggers
and where are the mills,“
Carter asks rhetorically.
“The industry’s been shut
down. There are only two
or three little loggers left in
this area and no mills. This
town used to have three
mills.”
Carter Logging was in
business operating out of
Baker City for 28 years
and at its height of opera-
tion employed 40 people.
Carter Logging’s staff
and business began to
dwindle around 1985 when
federal environmental
regulations were enacted
for the purpose of protect-
ing spotted owl habitat.
The enacting of those
environmental regula-
tions and fewer and fewer
timber sales administered
by the USFS began to spell
the end of the local timber
industry and a huge chunk
of the local economy.
Carter Logging, and as
many as 20 other private
logging contractors were
able to hold on until 1994,
when Congress dealt the fi -
nal blow to timber harvest
viability in eastern Oregon
by enacting legislation
referred to as “the Eastside
Screens.”
The Eastside Screens
were enacted as a tempo-
rary 18-month measure to
protect old growth trees.
Those Eastside Screen
regulations limits the
size of tree cut on federal
land by timber harvesters
to 21-inches in diameter
and also requires a buffer
zone of 300-feet next to
streams where no tree may
be cut. Even though touted
as a temporary measure
in 1994, those Eastside
Screens are still in place
today some 20 years later.
“The 21-inch rule and
the buffers around riparian
areas were just made up
and were not based on any
scientifi c evidence,” said
Andersen.
When the Eastside
Screen regulations were
pending in 1994, some still
remember hearing Elvin’s
son Tom Carter saying,
“That’s it, we’re done. We
won‘t be able to operate
anymore.” Not long after
Tom‘s prophetic words,
Carter Logging ceased
operations and Tom left the
logging industry to run a
wilderness outfi tting com-
pany in Idaho and Elvin
bought a farm a couple
miles north of Baker City.
Those who worked for the
Carter’s were forced to
settle into new careers.
Andersen remembers
when the local timber
industry was vibrant and
he was well-employed by
the Ellingson‘s mill. He
has managed to stay in the
timber industry as a private
timber consultant but his
work frequently forces him
to travel away from his
family to earn a living.
“I’ve had to piece to-
gether a living to support
my family,” he said. “I
don’t have a retirement and
no health insurance.”
Elvin Carter was asked if
he’d been out to look at the
Cornet Creek Fire after-
math. “No I haven’t been
out. I’m just sick of what
happened,” he answered.
USFS Wallowa-Whitman
National Forest Public Af-
fairs Offi cer Katy Gray of-
fered a prepared statement
describing the bureaucratic
process when asked about
the agency plan for timber
salvage on the Cornet
Creek Fire area.
“We’re still working
on the BAER (Burn Area
Emergency Response).
That is to look at post
fi re threats to human
life, safety, property, and
critical natural or cultural
resources,“ Gray began.
“As they do that they will
evaluate and look at every-
thing like soil severity on
specifi cally Forest Service
grounds. Once that process
is complete, the next step
is to look at the trees.
Take care of the BAER
process then look at areas
for potential salvage. The
top of our priority list is to
get those areas evaluated.
I want to emphasize that
we are working with our
partners at ODF (Oregon
Dept. of Forestry), NRCS
(Natural Resources Con-
servation Service), FSA
(United States Dept. of
Agriculture Farm Service
Agency), Baker County,
and the BLM (Bureau of
Land Management and that
we are taking a compre-
hensive look at the entire
area.”
Questions to the agency
about a timeline for timber
salvage and the prospects
for attracting timber
contractors to bid on the
projects went unanswered.
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