Forest access
Sometime ago, a logger called asking for an appraisal of Forest Service timber he planned to harvest in the Columbia River Basin.
It took a week or so to provide an answer.
A few years later he called again saying that the land had jumping slugs, Hemphillia malonei, an endangered species, in part of the tract and would need a re-appraisal of substitute timber that did not contain them.
I have never heard if the slugs are still jumping in the reserved area or not.
Then not long ago, a meeting was held in the Port Angeles Library hosted by federal employees who manage trail systems and encounter endangered species, maybe even jumping slugs.
Under the Endangered Species Act, a project to improve a trail may be halted until an alternative is found even though the trail may have been originally built by the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) in the 1930s, which would indicate that the species has survived quite nicely until now.
Such changes could take months or even years to relocate a trail or a forest road.
Access is essential to effectively control wildfires while they are small.
To deny it could mean that the home of this slug and many other endangered plants and animals are burned while we muddle through such an expensive and time consuming process.
It is said that Nero fiddled while Rome burned.
During recent years, the federal forests are surely burning.
Are we fiddling?
Glen Wiggins,
Port Angeles