Free Republic

A federal court ruling in favor of environmentalists is forcing the Forest Service to suspend more than 1,500 permits for activities ranging from fire prevention to Boy Scout meetings and also is threatening to delay cutting of the Capitol's Christmas tree until after the new year. A Forest Service regulation that allowed projects determined as having minimal environmental impact to be exempt from environmental studies and reviews was challenged by the Earth Island Institute. Judge James K. Singleton of the Eastern District Court of California ruled in July against a project to remove charred and damaged trees, which could kindle...

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - Twenty environmental groups sued the Bush administration over a decision to repeal Clinton-era regulations that blocked road construction, logging and industrial development on more than 90,000 square miles of the nation's last untouched forests. In the lawsuit filed Thursday, the Sierra Club, National Audubon Society, Greenpeace and other groups challenged the U.S. Forest Service decision earlier this year to reverse the 2001 "roadless rule" that protected 58.5 million acres of undeveloped national forest. "These are the last wild areas of North America, and there is overwhelming public support for their protection from development," said Kristen Boyles,...

SAN FRANCISCO - California, New Mexico and Oregon sued the Bush administration over the government's decision to allow road building, logging and other commercial ventures on more than 90,000 square miles of the nation's remaining pristine forests. In the lawsuit filed Tuesday, attorneys general for the three states challenged the U.S. Forest Service's repeal of the Clinton administration's "roadless rule" that banned development on 58.5 million acres of national forest land, mostly in western states. "The Bush administration is putting at risk some of the last, most pristine portions of America's national forests," California Attorney General Bill Lockyer said. "Road...

UNITED NATIONS - The U.N. environment chief has a message for leaders of the world's major industrialized nations: scientists have shown that it pays to preserve forests, coastal waters and marshes. Klaus Toepfer made the case that investing in the environment will go a long way toward meeting U.N. goals to reduce poverty, supply clean drinking water and fight the spread of infectious diseases. "Our motto is environment for development," he said in an interview last week. The Group of Eight meets in Scotland on Wednesday and will address global warming and climate change — and Toepfer expressed hope that...

Nairobi - Kenya is evicting thousands of families who illegally occupy a vast swathe of forest in the country's Rift Valley region, the government spokesperson said on Friday. Alfred Mutua said the government would not backtrack on its decision to forcibly evict thousands of families from the Mau Forest, a vast swathe of indigenous woodland in the Central Rift Valley region, west of the capital Nairobi. "We are not going to allow people to live in forests," Mutua said, adding that: "These forest areas are water catchment areas and the waters from these areas not only feed our country but...

Changing planet revealed in atlasAn atlas of environmental change compiled by the United Nations reveals some of the dramatic transformations that are occurring to our planet. It compares and contrasts satellite images taken over the past few decades with contemporary ones. These highlight in vivid detail the striking make-over wrought in some corners of the Earth by deforestation, urbanisation and climate change. The atlas has been released to mark World Environment Day. The United Nations Environment Programme (Unep) produced One Planet Many People: Atlas of Our Changing Environment in collaboration with other agencies such as the US Geological Survey and...

New Monkey Species With Goose-Like Call Discovered Two Separate Teams of Scientists Stumble Across the Strange New Animal in Tanzania By AMANDA ONION - When a team of scientists first heard hunters from Tanzania's Wanyakyusa tribe talk about a quiet, black-faced monkey that hung out in high elevations, they weren't sure if it was real or a "spirit" animal from the tribe's oral tradition. "Sometimes the difference between real and spiritual animals is not clear-cut when you speak with the Wanyakyusa. So we went into the forest with one of the hunters," said Tim Davenport, director of Wildlife Conservation...

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Despite dozens of interceptions at U.S. ports, a public enemy has infiltrated the nation's borders. Taken captive in Fulton County, N.Y., and identified by a Cornell University expert, the adult female alien is the only one of its kind ever discovered in the eastern United States. The discovery of a single specimen of Sirex noctilio Fabricius, an Old World woodwasp, raises red flags across the nation because the invasive insect species has devastated up to 80 percent of pine trees in areas of New Zealand, Australia, South America and South Africa. If established in the United States,...

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration ended a four-year-old ban on development in roadless areas of national forests Thursday. The move could pave the way for oil and gas drilling, logging, mining and road building in 34.3 million acres of untouched woods. The new rule gives governors of pro-development Western states greater say over forest management in their states, which environmental groups fear will lead to development that threatens fish and wildlife in pristine areas. The first intrusions into the forests will probably be by natural gas-drilling rigs rather than chainsaws and timber mills because of market forces, according to economists,...

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration ended a 4-year-old ban on development in roadless areas of national forests Thursday. The move could pave the way for oil and gas drilling, logging, mining and road building in 34.3 million acres of untouched woods. The new rule gives governors of pro-development Western states greater say over forest management in their states, which environmental groups fear will lead to development that threatens fish and wildlife in pristine areas. The first intrusions into the forests will probably be by natural gas drilling rigs rather than chainsaws and timber mills because of market forces, according to...

Arnold pledges to save trees Governor says California's roadless areas will be safe from Bush policy Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vowed Thursday that the Bush administration's attempt to open a third of national forests to logging, mining and development will not diminish protections for California's remote forestlands. Announcing an agreement with the U.S. Forest Service to protect about 4.4 million California acres left vulnerable to construction under the new Bush administration rules, Schwarzenegger said those largely undeveloped areas will remain untouched. "I am committed to protecting the vibrant health and sustainable future of our forests," Schwarzenegger said in a statement. "Roadless...

WASHINGTON (AP) - The last 58.5 million acres of untouched national forests, which President Clinton had set aside for protection, were opened to possible logging, mining and other commercial uses by the Bush administration on Thursday. New rules from the U.S. Forest Service cover some of the most pristine federal land in 38 states and Puerto Rico. Ninety-seven percent of it is in 12 states: Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah, Washington and Wyoming. Governors can submit petitions within 18 months to stop road building on some of the 34.3 million acres where it would...

MOSCO2, April 4. (RIA Novosti)-Experts forecast that China's demand for Russian timber will increase by a third within the next five years, which will lead to poachers stepping up their efforts more than anyone else, Biznes reports. Alexei Yaroshenko, a Greenpeace expert says China imported about 20 million cubic meters of lumber from Russia in 2004. "Russia's total annual lumber exports do not exceed 40 million cubic meters," says Vladimir Gorshkov, the vice president of Bumprom. Anatoly Kotlobai, an expert on illegal timber procurement and trade with the World Wildlife Fund, maintains that half of the exported timber was felled...

WASHINGTON - Environmentalists sued the Bush administration on Thursday over new rules for managing the 192 million acres of national forests. The rules issued in December give managers of the 155 national forests more discretion to approve logging and other commercial projects without lengthy environmental reviews. The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in San Francisco, claims the rules water down protection of wildlife and the environment "to the point where they are virtually meaningless." The suit filed by San Francisco-based Earthjustice on behalf of a coalition of conservation groups said the rules fail to include important environmental protection measures...

Recently, managers of the nation’s 155 national forests were granted more discretion to approve logging and other commercial projects without the lengthy environmental reviews previously required by the 1976 National Forest Management Act. To most people that might not qualify as front page news, but it should be. The nation was saddled with all manner of environmental legislation during the 1970s and part of the payback has been literally catastrophic for many of the nation’s forests. There has also been a hidden cost for anyone using any kind of product involving or derived from wood. The new rules brought the...

WASHINGTON - Insects that emerge every 17 years in the eastern United States provide valuable nutrients to forest ecosystems when they die, an ecologist says. The Brood X cicadas emerge from their burrows on a regular cycle, sing to attract a mate and lay eggs before dying on the forest floor. Cicadas cling to a leaf after crawling their way above ground(AP Photo) Last spring, the insects swarmed forests, raising concerns about their effects on the ecosystem. Scientists had noticed forests tended to have higher levels of the nutrient nitrogen in their leaves after cicadas emerged and tree growth tended...

Nov. 15 (UPI) -- Environmentalists plan a new push against the Bush administration's controversial and sometimes inflammatory intentions to open up more areas of western national forests to logging and energy exploration. In a conference call Monday, leaders of green organizations contended that President Bush's narrow margin of victory in the November election proved there was no mandate in the West supporting removal of limits contained in the current ban on road-building in the most pristine areas of the nation's national forests. "Americans from both red states and blue states continue to overwhelmingly support protecting our last wild forests," maintained...

Pre-Inca Ruins Emerging From Peru's Cloud Forests John Roach for National Geographic News September 16, 2004 On the eastern slope of the Andes mountains in northern Peru, forests cloak the ruins of a pre-Inca civilization, the size and scope of which explorers and archaeologists are only now beginning to understand. Known as the Chachapoya, the civilization covered an estimated 25,000 square miles (65,000 square kilometers). The Chachapoya, distinguished by fair skin and great height, lived primarily on ridges and mountaintops in circular stone houses. Sean Savoy, leader of the Gran Saposoa-El Dorado IV Expedition (July-August 2004), points out a stone...

Wake Up Call!! Memories of the days when trees were thinned from national forests are not that distant. We have witnessed the destruction of the timber industry and the results of forests grown thick with timber and dieing from beetle infestations and forest fires. I have pasted some information below for your review. The Timber industry has been desecrated and now the ranchers and livestock producers are in jeopardy of suffering the same fate. Will you stand with your fellow citizens and support their freedom and the right to a free market? Will you help them address problems created by...

Fire used as tool to heal forest By Jane Braxton Little -- Bee Correspondent Published 2:15 am PDT Tuesday, September 14, 2004 MINERAL - From the rim of Cinder Cone, Scott Isaacson watched fingers of fire work their way through the underbrush and trees north of Snag Lake in Lassen Volcanic National Park. A pair of red fir trees burst into flames, sending spectacular orange columns through the blanket of smoke spreading slowly across the ground 500 feet below. Isaacson, Lassen Park's fire information officer, surveyed the progress of the 3,300-acre fire with approval. "This fire is a perfect tool...