The fire burning only 40 miles north (approximately) of Joseph, has our valley filled with smoke this morning...We are lucky as we deal only with the smoke, while others, in the path of the fire, loaded possessions, and animals to flee from the advancing flames...Others still wait to get evacuation orders, hoping that the fire will be abated and eventually controlled, before it reaches them...Emotions run high in our valley as the fire rages out of control...Over 20 years ago now, logging was a major occupation in this county, supplying family wage jobs in the woods and the local mills...Fires both lightning and man caused were immediately suppressed and put out.
Environmental practices closed the mills and much of the woods to logging, leaving only private lands available to harvest...Now thousands of acres of designated wilderness surrounds our valley, where fires are left to burn as the "natural way of things..."Forest Service timber sales were squelched with the process of environmental analysis and the many appeals by environmental groups...Basically forest management also came to a halt, no logging, no thinning...Nothing...Now our forests are filled with diseased, dying trees, that with the tightening of regulations, cannot even be salvaged for wood...Our forests in this dry year of 2015 are a tinderbox waiting for the dry lightning to strike and strike it has.
Will we learn from all of this?..What can be salvaged after the fires are finished in October, when snow comes to the high mountains...Is there a middle road?..Why does it always seem to be all or nothing in the USA?..First the logging was fueled by "lumber barons" amassing their fortunes and now the shut down of forests, fueled by "trust funds" of "save the planet greenies"...No one wins in the end, the trees are gone, the landscape is blackened and everyone cries...Hugs To All...OWAV:)
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