On a snow-packed logging road near Camel’s Hump last Thursday, Matt Leonard halted a team of Vermont biologists and foresters who manage the vast woodlands around the mountain. Leonard, a state forester, had spotted deer tracks leading from a cluster of evergreens 50 yards away. Brimming with pride, he described how the state had approved logging in that stand of trees 17 years ago to foster ideal conditions for deer. The tracks suggested the strategy had worked.
Leonard and the team, led by Department of Forests, Parks and Recreation forester Jason Nerenberg, are responsible for a new 15-year plan for 26,000 acres of state-owned lands on and around Camel’s Hump. When the team released a public draft, the document earned praise from environmental groups for its big-picture approach to land management.
Not everyone was impressed. Critics say the plan reflects an “outdated mind-set” that treats forests as a commodity and not as a rich ecosystem.
In the next 15 years, the plan calls for 3,764 acres in Camel’s Hump State Park, Camel’s Hump State Forest and connected state lands to be logged in a way that officials say will enhance the benefits of the forest for people and wildlife. That represents 251 acres per year — more than triple the average number of acres logged for the past 25 years.
For state officials and critics alike, any discussion about the planned timber harvests quickly becomes philosophical: What is the purpose of a forest? How does the state serve the best interests of a population with so many competing demands on the land? How does commercial logging fit with the mission of the Department of Forests, Parks and Recreation?
“This was way, way beyond the scope of the logging that’s occurred in the past,” said Jamison Ervin. She lives with her husband, Alan Pierce, on property abutting the state lands. Both have advanced degrees in land management, and they say the plan amounts to a devastating increase in logging on state land for financial gain. They say the state should be leaving trees in place to combat global climate change.
“This is getting whatever they can out of the park,” Ervin said.
The couple said in an interview and in public comments to the state Agency of Natural Resources that the plan shows a disregard for the rich ecosystems on Camel’s Hump.
But Forests, Parks and Recreation Commissioner Michael Snyder responds that much of the land around the mountain was cut over in the 1800s and hit by massive wildfires in the early 1900s, so the trees in today’s forest are largely all the same age. Logging will create openings in the forest for younger trees to thrive, which makes for a more diverse ecosystem.
In addition, Snyder said, part of his department’s legislative mandate is “to encourage economic management of its forests and woodlands.” State law specifically authorizes the department to sell timber from state lands in the context of its overall mission of maintaining healthy state parks and forests.
A 45-minute drive from downtown Burlington, Camel’s Hump is a popular recreation area year-round. Counting hikers, hunters, skiers, snowmobilers, rock climbers and other visitors, many thousands of people visit Camel’s Hump State Park and the adjacent state forest every year.
To environmental scientists, the area has a different significance. The gigantic swath of virtually uninterrupted forest is one of the state’s most important environmental assets. Groundbreaking research on the damage done by acid rain was carried out on the mountain’s slopes; near the summit are important migratory bird habitats and legally protected wildflowers.
This variety of public benefits makes public land special, Snyder said, and creates pressure on five regional stewardship teams to manage the state’s forests carefully. The teams include scientists from Snyder’s department and from the departments of Environmental Conservation and Fish & Wildlife.
For each timber sale on state lands, one of the regional teams decides where to harvest and even which specific trees loggers may remove — they spray a blue dot on each one — to accomplish the state’s policy goals. Sometimes that means thinning the forest canopy so that a certain species of tree, like the evergreens Leonard pointed out, can thrive.
Even “patch cuts” — small areas of an acre or so where all trees are felled — are designed to help by turning areas of the land into young forest, where saplings and ground-level vegetation host a vastly different ecosystem than the older forest nearby.
“We use forests a lot, to the point where we’ve all come to take them for granted,” Snyder said. “I would ask your readers: Just look around you right now and consider the wood that’s around you. What are you sitting on? What are you writing on? To some degree, this air we’re breathing is a forest product.”
Between 2002 and 2015, the state netted $925,548 from timber sales around Camel’s Hump, or about $868 per acre logged. But Snyder was emphatic that a desire for more revenue isn’t driving the planned increase in timber harvests.
Snyder and the other officials say the entire plan — from careful monitoring of the impacts backcountry skiers have on wildlife habitats to the increase in annual logging — is aimed at maintaining and improving public benefits of the forest.
In response to requests from Ervin and others, ANR has extended the public comment period for the plan until April 13. The agency will hold an open house focused on long-range planning for state lands on April 24 from 4 to 5 p.m. at the agency’s headquarters on the National Life Group campus in Montpelier.
John Austin, the land and habitat program manager for the Department of Fish & Wildlife, stood in the woods last Thursday with Leonard, his teammates and a reporter. Saplings and thorny berry bushes lined a winding stream ahead. On the other side, an old bird’s nest was suspended in the bare branches 10 feet off the forest floor. Austin and Fish & Wildlife biologist David Sausville noted that insects, reptiles, songbirds, deer, moose and bears have all likely benefited from a logging job five years ago aimed at improving habitat for grouse.
“You’ve created this really healthy, diverse mix of the whole assemblage of the native tree species that you had here to begin with,” Austin said. “Now … you’ve got a variety of [tree] age classes, which has diversified the forest’s structure here.”
As he walked, Leonard pointed to red splotches on a map, which depicted sites of up to an acre and a half that had been clear-cut since 2002. The team was pleased with the results.
“The reality is, it creates diversity in the forest,” Austin said. “When you see these kind of younger forest openings in the larger forest matrix, these are ecological magnets.”
This article appears in Apr 11-17, 2018.
Got something to say?
Send a letter to the editor and we'll publish your feedback in print!
Dont drink the Koolaid.
Governor Scott’s Agency of Natural Resources (the ones blocking efforts to clean up Lake Champlain) do not propose more logging at Vermont State Parks to ‘help” the forests, they do so to let private interests cash in on the exploitation of the public treasure.
Why is there even any commercial logging in a State Park? Isn’t a park supposed to be a refuge from commercial pressures? Even West Virginia just blocked efforts to log its State parks.
Laughable claims by vested interests that more logging is done to help nature are the standard propaganda used by industry and their government lackeys to confuse the public. See:
http://www.maforests.org/Timberspeak-Timbe…
For more about the Camel’s hump plan see:
http://www.vermontindependent.org/vermonts…
The chainsaws are coming for Green Mountain National Forest too, with a vengeance.
In just this one plan, for an area that represents 15% of Green Mountain National Forest, the plan is for logging, including clearcutting, on 9360 acres within an area of 59,400 acres in a 5 to 7 year period! That is extremely aggressive, crazy even, and all of course to “help” nature. See page 13 here:
https://www.fs.usda.gov/nfs/11558/www/nepa…
In perfect Orwellian fashion, they are no longer cutting the forest, they are now making “vegetation treatments”.
To see what that type of logging would look like, see recent similar type of cutting in White Mountain National Forest in New Hampshire at this link below.
http://www.maforests.org/WMNF.pdf
Of course many other areas in Green Mountain National Forest will be on the cutting block also.
Wake up Vermont before it is too late, and protect your golden goose forests.
Pretty poor, one sided article if you ask me. How about a little more input from the folks that love Camel’s Hump and are devastated to see it destroyed. Or the folks who’s lives will be turned upside down when their private roads become trucking routes. That would be one lane, steep curving roads that would not allow a car and logging truck to safely meet. And it might be a bit of a stretch to take credit for deer tracks cause you cut the forest down. The scale and scope of this logging project is just too big!
Kudos to forester Matt Leonard for advancing quality forest management in a world of sometimes narrow minded folks trying to protect their vision of a perfect environmental utopia. His team has clearly utilized sound forest ecosystem principles and has demonstrated a localized track record of success. A lot of so called experts confuse leaving trees in place with the art and science of growing trees for multiple purpose, carbon sequestration and biodiversity included.
Good luck to Matt and team in managing public forest resources for future generations of people and wildlife!!!
We observe a huge mudslide scar on the eastern shoulder the mountain–with larger rain events, winter freeze-thaw cycles, and the plan to cut sensitive glades that out to be left alone, the plan should be moderated. Small patch cuts are one thing (and I am not opposed to cutting in some areas), but larger clear-cuts aren’t smart. Wood prices are so low now as well–and little of the timber will be processed in-State for value add businesses. This mostly benefits loggers and foresters who need work! The cost of the impact isn’t worth it compared to the benefits of maintaining stable tree cover in some areas. Battell also gave the mountain to the State on condition that it and the forests surrounding it remained in a pristine state. We also have no shortage of deer in the area.
The Nation Forests are managed tree farms, so harvesting trees is perfectly normal.
Mother Nature destroyed the woods around my home in Stowe. Mostly 80 year old white pine uprooted and snapped mid-trunk by hurricane force winds last October. All those trees are coming down sooner or later. A well-managed forest presents a better prospect for long term health than an unmanaged one. This isnt about a money grab its about protecting a natural resource. Selective and active logging can be very beneficial to the long term heath of the forest.
The area of greatest concern within the forestry plan is the significant and glaring lack of maintenance planned for early successional habitat. I understand the difficulty of managing a parcel with so much elevation change and varied habitat, however, equally important is the critical nature of early successional habitat to the greatest number of our wildlife species. The plan, as written, prescribes a meager 1-2% of the harvestable lands to be maintained as early successional habitat. This is far too small a percentage. Habitat studies conducted by the Ruffed Grouse Society indicated with a great deal of clarity that a well-maintained forest with 15-20% kept in early successional habitat provided a great deal more benefit to wildlife than large tracts of older growth forests. While this may be a difficult challenge for the unit, it would be good for the stewardship team to reassess the proposed numbers, consider even-aged management in addition to uneven-aged management, and at least make an attempt to get them closer to a desirable percentage. It was suggested by a team member that the small percentage was an attempt to mimic natural processes. We must question why the team is willing to entertain that idea when we have information available which can improve the habitat and experience for both our wild populations and our citizens.