Please tell the Flathead National Forest to not approve high-speed mountain bike trails in the area where one of its employees was killed in July when he literally ran into a grizzly bear while "riding his mountain bike at high speed!"
As stupid as it may sound, the Flathead proposes to add 12 miles of user-created bike trails, like the one it photographed above left, to its trail system in the Desert Mountain and Lion Hill areas near Hungry Horse and West Glacier.
One of these "informal" trails was in fact closed temorarily while authorities looked for the bear that killed Brad Treat, a Flathead NF law enforcement officer that ran into the bear with his bike. Things were looking equally grim for the bear, as pictured in the Chris Peterson/Hungry Horse News photo in the Daily Inter Lake (above right), though the bear was not found.
Local mountain bike advocates are now clambering to have these user-created trails sanctified by the Forest Service, as they have for non-permitted trails on other federal, State and private lands in the area, claiming no conflicts with wildlife exist!
Please take a moment to send a short email to help save the lives of bears, mountain lions and people! Tell the Flathead National Forest:
-To not authorize high-speed bike trails in the habitats of bears and mountain lions, as recommended by Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks and the Interagency Grizzly Bear Committee!
-To not reward reckless trail building that endangers other trail users, horses and wildlife!
-To honor the memory of Brad Treat with a public safety program, rather than promote reckless and potentially fatal behavior!
Click here to locate maps and more info about the Hungry Lion Project (a timber sale, road and trail management project).
Comments are due by December 21!
This is not a drill, it is not April Fools, it's a really stupid idea!
Thank you for taking a few moments to speak up for the wellbeing of wildlife and people!
Please DONATE NOW to help us secure quiet habitats for fish, wildlife and people! In 2016 we:
-Helped coordinate overwhelming public support for more wilderness and more watershed restoration in the Flathead Forest Plan!
-Worked with a Swan Valley collaborative to decommission 26 miles of damaging logging roads in Jim and Cold Creeks!
-Filed a lawsuit to decommission more roads to meet Forest Plan standards and get Jim Creek off the list of "impaired watersheds!"
-Filed notice for a similar lawsuit in Coal Creek, another "impaired" critical bull trout watershed, where the Flathead left culverts to blow out in a long-abandoned logging road!
Our work is funded primarily by people like you, not big foundations!
Won't you please join others in supporting our work and help us prepare for the challenges of 2017?
Thank you and Happy Holidays!
Our Holiday Newsletter renews our pledge to fight for public wildlands and restoration, reports on the growing national support for it, and notes the pitfalls of local collaboration!
Please check out our newsletter and DONATE NOW to support our work!
Below is our newsletter's table of contents. Click here to view or download it as a pdf.
We hope you are encouraged by the good news and will join others in supporting our work!
THANK YOU, Happy Solstice, Happy Holidays, and Happy New Year!
Thanks to your comments and grassroots networking, support is growing for our Citizen reVision of the Flathead Forest Plan!
As our Fall 2016 newsletter reports, the Flathead National Forest has received some 35,000 comments supporting the protection of all roadless lands as wilderness and continued wildland recovery via road decommissioning in its revised Forest Plan!
We hope to have more specifics in our Holiday newsletter, but know for now that our Citizen reVision has also been endorsed by 39 Tribal Nations acting together as GOAL: Tribal Coalition to Protect the Grizzly, that our annual meeting is November 13, and that this is your last chance this year to have your donation to Swan View doubled by Cinnabar Foundation!
Below is our newsletter's table of contents and you can click here to view or download it as a pdf.
We hope you are encouraged by the good news and will join others in supporting our work!
Let the Flathead National Forest know TODAY that you support Alternative C's new wilderness recommendations and prohibiting mechanized vehicles in those 507,000 acres/all roadless lands!
The Flathead finds "this alternative would provide the highest habitat security and connectivity for species that may be sensitive to higher levels of human disturbance." (DEIS Vol. 1, p. 27)
But be sure to add that you want the reclamation of grizzly bear habitat security in roaded lands, as promised in the current Forest Plan's Amendment 19, carried forward in Alt. C!
The Flathead NF map above shows in light green Alt. C's recommended wilderness providing habitat connectivity the full length of the Swan Range and improvements thoughout the Whitefish Range, among other areas.
In asking the Flathead to adopt and improve Alt. C, know that you will be expanding wildlife habitat security and connectivity greatly, while also conserving quiet, non-mechanized recreation.
As mentioned in our last alert, BEWARE the Whitefish Range Partnership Agreement you may be asked to support. It asks for little wilderness and would increase logging in grizzly bear and lynx habitat through a combination of de-listing and relaxed management standards! (WRPA pdf page 28).
Simply enter your comment here. If you have any trouble with that web page form, simply email your comment to Planning Officer Joe Krueger at jkrueger@fs.fed.us .
You can also submit our form letter if you wish, or chose the parts of it you like best. A mailing address is included in the form letter if you wish to mail in a hard copy.
Click here for more information and links to the Forest Plan documents.
Comments are due TODAY, October 3!
Your short emails and letters are needed NOW to protect wildlands and wildlife habitat in the revised Flathead Forest Plan!
Anti-wilderness letters are flooding in and, BEWARE, the Whitefish Range Partnership Agreement you may be asked to support asks for little Wilderness and increased logging in grizzly bear habitat via de-listing from the Endangered Species Act. It would also "challenge existing lynx management strategies" to increase logging in threatened lynx habitat! (WRPA pdf page 28)
You can counter these bad ideas with one simple sentence:
“I support Alternative C's recommendation of all roadless areas as Wilderness and ask that the current Forest Plan's Amendment 19 be included to finish securing the grizzly bear habitat it promised.”
If you have any trouble, simply email your comment to Planning Officer Joe Krueger at jkrueger@fs.fed.us .
You can also submit our form letter if you wish, or chose the parts of it you like best. A mailing address is included in the form letter if you wish to mail in a hard copy.
Click here for more information and links to the Forest Plan documents.
Comments are due by October 3, but do it NOW!
Please also Donate Now to support our work and Cinnabar Foundation will double the first $2,000 in donations with a matching grant!
Your support is greatly appreciated and we think the bears and lynx will appreciate it too!
Want to protect all wildlands and restore damaged habitats on the Flathead National Forest? We make it simple in our Summer 2016 newsletter!
The Flathead National Forest is considering an alternative for its revised Forest Plan that would recommend Wilderness designation for almost all roadless lands, immediately protect those lands from motorized vehicles and mountain bikes, and lower the timber sale program to save taxpayers $2.2 million each year!
Your comments are needed by October 3 to see that Alternative C is refined and combined with essential parts of the current Forest Plan to insure damaged fish and wildlife habitats are restored!
Please ACT TODAY and we'll issue further alerts before October 3 to help you refine additional messages to the Flathead!
Our Summer 2016 newsletter provides you a quick summary of the Flathead's Draft Environmental Impact Statement and provides links to important maps.
It also includes a sample letter that you can print and mail - and all the better if you personalize it with remarks about your favorite parts of the Forest!
If you have trouble, simply send an email to Joe Krueger at jkrueger@fs.fed.us.
Below is our newsletter's table of comments and you can click here to view or download it as a pdf.
We hope you enjoy the newsletter, follow the few easy steps to make your voice heard, and will join others in supporting our work (make a donation today and Cinnabar Foundation will double it)!
Fish, wildlife, wilderness, and people are counting on us - and you!
The Forest Service is holding open houses in Kalispell and Missoula, June 20 and 22, to unveil its Draft EISs for a revised Flathead Forest Plan and grizzly bear management amendments on four other Forests.
Fish and Wildlife Service is holding a hearing in Missoula July 7 to take public comment on grizzly bear de-listing in the Northern Continental Divide Ecosystem that includes these five Forests!
While you have until October 3 to comment on how five National Forests, including the Flathead, propose to manage the NCDE grizzly bear, NOW is the time to start learning about it.
At either the Kalispell or Missoula open houses you'll be able to look at maps much larger than you'll find on-line and ask questions of Forest Service staff. Both are from 2 - 6 pm and don't involve formal presentations, so you can attend as long or little as you wish. The Kalispell open house is at the Forest Supervisor's Office, 650 Wolfpack Way. The Missoula open house is at the Hilton Garden Inn, 3720 N. Reserve Street.
You can read two pages about the various documents and open houses here and can download the planning documents here.
We want to keep Flathead Forest Plan Amendment 19 from Alternative A to retain the best management of roads to protect grizzly bears, bull trout and other fish and wildlife. But we want the much larger areas of recommended wilderness that are included in Alternative C, which was written in part to reflect our Citizen reVision alternative and would finally ban motorized vehicles from the old trail network in the Krause Basin Wildlife Management Area pictured above!
We'll have more specific recommendations for your comments later in the summer. But make no mistake about it, Alternatives B, C and D as currently proposed would greatly reduce the broad protection of grizzly bear habitat from what is in the current Forest Plan, pave the way for their de-listing from the federal Endangered Species Act and result in sport killing of them under Montana State hunting management!
To help right away, you can SIGN UP NOW for a ten-minute slot to speak out July 7 in Missoula against this weakening of grizzly bear management and against plans to de-list them! Swan View Coalition will be speaking first-up at the FWS hearing, which runs from 1 - 4 and from 6 - 8 pm at the Double Tree Hotel, 100 Madison Street. Simply email Jennifer Fortin-Noreus to schedule a time slot to speak. You can also submit written comments to FWS by July 22 to Jennifer_fortin-noreus@fws.gov or to Grizzly Bear Recovery Office, USFWS, University Hall, Room 309, Missoula, MT 59812.
You can learn more about the July 7 hearing here and you can email keith@swanview.org if you want suggestions for what to say or write to FWS.
Don't be intimidated by all this - we are here to help you navigate the bureaucracy and do good things for fish and wildlife! THANKS FOR YOUR HELP!
Our Winter-Spring 2016 newsletter releases our new report "Roads to Ruin," describes how our investigations have already helped secure more road decommissioning for bull trout in the Swan Valley, and describes how the report will help us all wrestle with the revised Flathead Forest Plan and Grizzly Bear De-Listing DEISs due out May 27!
Our "Roads to Ruin" report also describes how "collaborative" groups are being misused to promote the notion that the biggest problem in our public forests is too many trees, when research clearly shows the biggest problem is too many logging roads!
Below is our newsletter's table of contents and you can click here to view or download it as a pdf.
We hope you enjoy the newsletter and our new report - and will join others in supporting our work!
Fish, wildlife, wilderness, and people are counting on us - and you!
Your 5-minute letter is needed by February 11 to stop logging damage to a recovering burned area near the Great Bear Wilderness!
But the Flathead National Forest wants to log in them anyway and we need your help to see that they don't! Please take 5 minutes to copy and paste from the letter below (or create your own) and send an email to:
comments-northern-flathead-spotted-bear@fs.fed.us
Include "Trail Creek Fire Salvage Project in the subject line!
OR
Download here as a pdf, print, sign, and post the sample letter to Matt Shaffer, 650 Wolfpack Way, Kalispell, MT 59901.
The Trail Creek Fire Salvage Project can be viewed and downloaded here.
Here's the sample letter:
Matt Shaffer - Project Leader
Flathead National Forest
650 Wolfpack Way
Kalispell, MT 59901
Re: Comments on proposed Trail Creek Fire Salvage Project
Dear Mr. Shaffer;
From the perspective of fish, wildlife, soils, and water quality, your proposal to remove some 1,400 log truck loads of trees from the remote Trail Creek Fire area near the Great Bear Wilderness should be called “Post-Fire Theft” rather than “Fire Salvage.” Trees in burned areas are absolutely essential to wildlife and ecosystem resilience. They are not in need of “salvage.” As 264 scientists told Congress in a letter last September:
". . . numerous scientific studies tell us that even in the patches where forest fires burn most intensely, the resulting wildlife habitats are among the most ecologically diverse on western forestlands and are essential to support the full richness of forest biodiversity . . . This post-fire renewal, known as 'snag forest' is quite simply some of the best wildlife habitat in forests, and is an essential state of natural processes . . . post-fire logging does far more harm than good to public forests."
(DellaSala et al., September 2015, Open Letter to U.S. Senators and President Obama from Scientists Concerned about Post-Fire Logging and Clearcutting on National Forests)
You should focus instead on problems being caused by your logging roads and the noxious weeds along them. You’ve already been awarded Burned Area Emergency Restoration (BAER) money to spray 88 acres of weeds along existing roads, so you don’t need to sell logs to pay for it. The last thing you should do is put logging and road building machinery in there, spreading those existing weeds across the landscape!
Because you did the right thing in the late 1990s and decommissioned 20 miles of roads in the area to protect grizzly bear security and fisheries by removing their culverts, you only have a few culverts causing problems for fish and water quality on the remaining roads. But you now propose to rebuild 7 miles of those previously decommissioned and re-vegetated roads so you can log in Grizzly Bear Security Core and then have to deconstruct these roads again to re-secure bear and fish habitat! This is an unacceptable disruption of Security Core, a senseless waste of taxpayer dollars, and would cause repetitive reconstruction/deconstruction releases of sediment from roads that were previously “waterproofed” and simply need to be left alone.
That leaves the planting of elk forage and trees as the only “restoration” work you say you need money for. Yet your BAER reports, your proposal and news articles say that vegetation began sprouting immediately after the fire. All you really need to do is keep logging and road rebuilding machinery off this area so that natural regeneration doesn’t get trampled and can continue to green up as it has following fires for millennia!
You have already sold three roadside fire-related timber sales in the area since the 2015 fires and you reworked the pre-fire Cedar Chipmunk Timber Sale so it is now logging fire-killed trees - all with no public involvement. Now you want to rule out formal public Objections to your Trail Creek Fire Salvage Project by seeking an “Emergency Situation Determination.” Don’t do it! Moreover, you already have numerous “green” timber sales units authorized near the Trail Creek Fire area.
Don’t waste your time and taxpayer money writing an Environmental Assessment or Environmental Impact Statement that tries to rationalize the need to violate Forest Plan Grizzly Bear Security Core standards for several years with the Trail Creek post-fire logging proposal. Instead, remove or clean the several culverts you are having trouble with, leave the culvert-less decommissioned roads alone, and let the area continue recovering as nature intended.
Sincerely,
Name:
Address:
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