[Maarten]

Today's email from Conservation Northwest and an editorial in the P-I both claim that the expansion plans for the ski areas at Snoqualmie Pass would cut into old growth forest. Is there really old growth at the Pass? That seems really hard to believe. Is it original growth, or mature second growth? PI editorial: http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/259829_skied.asp

[Allison]

Your links don't work. CNW *may* be right about there being a little bit of OG left up there. I seem to recall my dad telling me that when we talked at length about unprotected public OG in WA. Obviously the by far largest pile of this is in the proposed WSW. I'm afraid I don't have an easy way to confirm this except to say that my dad's pretty familiar with the WA timber inventory and I'm pretty sure he told me the same thing. Generally, a distinction is made between "old growth" and "mature second growth." This might spark an argument or a discussion, but that's my answer and I'm sticking to it.

[Maarten]

Link fixed--silly forum software grabbed my closing bracket into the link and I didn't test it. Here's another ski areas expansion article: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2002707550_snoqualmie28m.html

[Snowbrushy]

A recent FS estimate is that in the past 16 years 1.1 million acres of federal forestland in the Pacific Northwest have grown into old-growth status.* *Today's Wall Street Journal p.A9

[connie fir]

Which converts to 1719 square miles. How long does a tree have to grow before it is old growth?

[Snowbrushy]

Wikipedia Says: "Forest regenerated after severe disruptions, such as clear-cut or fire is often referred to as second-growth or regeneration until a long enough period has passed that the effects of the disturbance are no longer evident. Depending on the forest, this may take anywhere from a century to several millennia."

[phillyjon]

[Allison]

[connie fir]

1719 miles is like 100 miles by 17 miles. So if I went from exit 34 to exit 51, and then 100 miles north, and cut all the trees. Could they cut that many in 16 years? Is there that much old growth? Wasn't most of the logging done in the 50's, 60's, and 70's? Is the new old growth what was replaced then, or is it what was cut when the railroads went through? More to the point, why cut these trees, when you can get all the wood you need at Home Depot?

[Snowbrushy]

Chapter 3.9 in the DEIS contains some but not all logging related history at the pass. http://www.fs.fed.us/r6/mbs/projects/summit-at-snoqualmie/download.shtml

[Snowbrushy]

I love this stuff - in the above FS document is a section about 3-fifth's down the page called; 'Logging Railroad Operation' 06-05-05-00087. They speak of finding parts of an old narrow guage railroad. And milled lumber. I'm not a historian but I think that I know what was going on in the 1870's up at the pass - some entrepreneur built a small line to cash in on timber & ore. Maybe there was a lumber mill up there also. The timber and lumber probably went to build farms and towns on the East Side. Imagine, they built a little railroad up at the pass. And they probably logged it for all it was worth! That's my amateur story and I'm sticking to it!

[Maarten]

Oh yeah, there are many places where a temporary railroad was put down for logging and then ripped back up when they were done. East Tiger Mtn's Preston Railroad Grade Trail comes to mind. That's why I started this thread--I took "old growth" to mean "original growth" and I'm really skeptical that any of THAT left was in the Pass.

[Malachai Constant]

There is probably quite a bit because the definition does not pertain to size inly age. When you get up in altitude the trees get small the work hard and not real practical when there was lots of big trees lower. You don't see that many stumps up high in commonwealth basin for example. I doubt if it would have been worth the effort to log around pineapple pass for example.

[Maarten]

In this case, we're talking about trees that are near or inside the ski area and would be affected by new runs or traverses; I think between Summit East and Central. I don't know it well, but I don't think of that as dramatic terrain that's inaccessible.

[Allison]

Mal, that's a given--if it's up high, it doesn't get harvested because it's scrub. Look at the trees in the Enchantment basin. They are dinky trees at and above treeline, but not what comes to mind as "OG". OG traditionally has meant 'never been logged' (with exception above) but has now been expanded, for political reasons I'd suspect, to include mature second growth stands. Personally I prefer the terms "old growth" (never been logged) and "mature second growth" which is self-explanatory.