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Environmentalists sue Ashley National Forest

Leon D'Souza THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

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Leon D'Souza </01 Byline 1>
SALT LAKE CITY -- Two Utah environmental groups are suing the Ashley National Forest to stop a massive timber sale that they say will remove valuable old growth forest in the Uinta Mountains.
The Utah Environmental Congress and the High Uintas Preservation Council filed a lawsuit last week in federal court to stop the Trout Slope West timber sale -- a 9. 2-million-board-foot sale big enough to fill about 8,500 log trucks.
The sale is scheduled to take place in August.
"They're going to decimate hundreds, if not thousands, of acres of forest," Utah Environmental Congress spokesman Kevin Mueller said. "It will damage the habitat for any species that need old, secure forest."
The area provides key habitat for elk, deer, goshawk, three-toed woodpecker and lynx. already dotted with patches of 40-acre clear-cuts. This story appeared in The Daily Herald on page D3.
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We need to save the 3-toed pecker.

How could they do this? I thought with the wilderness designation that the Uintahs are blessed with, that this would be out of the question.
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Not all of the Uintas is designated as Wilderness area. The highest elevation, innermost area is definitely protected, but the lower areas both east and west, on the north slope and the south slope are vulnerable. If you've ever driven to just about any trailhead in the Uintahs, you'll notice on the drive up that there are plenty of areas where they have really logged it to death. Some of those pine forests are so thick you can only see about 30 yards into them, but then suddenly you'll see a logging road, or you'll see a huge area that they have mowed down all the trees, and there are a few saplings starting to come up.
I wouldn't put it past the current administration to open up the wilderness area somehow too, or get it delisted as a wilderness area! Hope not!
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Not all logging is bad guys, it helps prevent major forest fires by reducing the amount of tender that can burn. If done correctly all animals and the area in general can greatly benefit. At times they will just thin out some areas but even when they clear cut bigger areas it helps animals like elk and deer by providing areas for grass to grow. This of course helps hunters by having more open areas to hunt but the animals are the big winners as long as the clear cuts are not too big. In years past I thought elk would not even go into areas that had logging in progress but I soon found this was not the case. I was elk
hunting in a area a few years ago that had logging going on, I was on the other side of a huge meadow. I heard a cow elk calling from the other side where the logging was going on. I made a stalk to the spot and watched a group of 10 or 11 elk go right by a bunch of logging equipment that was shut down for the weekend. After that I changed my mind about logging operations, if done right, they are not a bad thing but some environmentalist would have you believe that all logging is bad. Just my opinion. WH2
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If you're interested in the details of the Trout Slope West Timber Project, you can get them here

[url "http://www.fs.fed.us/r4/ashley/projects/"]http://www.fs.fed.us/r4/ashley/projects/[/url]
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