In my experience in several northwoods national forests, it’s very difficuly to walk a half mile from a road and not find some sort of road immediately, or signs of logging. The upper midwest national forests have incredibly high road densities, and very little virgin timber left, less than 1%. It only makes sense to seek a bit more balance in these forests. The massive overlogging has really had an effect on trout streams, silting in many areas of once pristine fisheries.
The exception to this is the Superior National Forest which has around 1 million acres of protected wilderness, otherwise known as the BWCAW.
Environmentalists took to the air over Ashland to make their case that the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest is endangered forests from over-logging. Vanessa Feltes flew along.
Thanks for the posting. I have spent a bunch of time tromping around the Chequamegon exploring, biking, and hunting and saw first hand the amount of unused roads still in commission and the logging practices that favor mono crops of early age timber. Its a shame because you can see what the BW and parts of the UP (Slyvania & Porkies)have and man is it a world of difference. The CNNF can have those special old growth forests - but it will take a change in the management practices that I hope happens sooner rather than later.
Comment by sheldon8 — August 25, 2008 @ 11:32 pm
Good comment Sheldon.
I hope some don’t get me wrong or think I’m bashing the Chequamegon-Nicolet. It’s truly a very pretty area and one of the highlights of the midwest in terms of remote land and wildlife. I just have cause for concern when you compare road densities and lack of virgin timber/roadless areas to the Superior National Forest or some of the western national forest. Not every square mile needs to have motorized access or a road.
What’s interesting is that the Chequamegon has a large chunk of unprotected roadless land,even more so than other midwestern national forests. However, current forest policy allows road construction in these areas, which is ridiculous.
Due to the recent smacking down of the roadless rule this month, these Wisconsin roadless areas are no longer protected. The national forests in Wisconsin have 69,000 acres of unprotected roadless lands up for grabs which is a considerable amount for the midwest.
You can see them here:
http://roadless.fs.fed.us/states/wi/state3.shtml
Comment by Mike — August 26, 2008 @ 2:16 am