Feather River Action! has been working with Plumas County over the past several months to encourage bicycle improvements on County Rd. A15 and other roads. Bicycle infrastructure is essential to improve local air quality, reduce carbon emissions, and improve local resiliency.
We’re happy to announce that the County recently responded to our requests by installing 3 ‘share the road’ signs along County Rd. A15 (Portola-McLears Rd.) including this one located at the ‘disappearing bike lane’ where many cyclists have reported close calls with cars due to a blind curve and people commonly crossing the double yellow to pass. The vehicle code (CVC 21202) states that when a lane is too narrow to share safely, a bicycle may make use of the full lane, and cars must wait until it is safe to pass.
The share the road signs are not enough by themselves but help raise awareness so that everyone gets to where they are going safely. We are also advocating for “sharrows” to be placed on the roadway to remind drivers that cyclists have a right to the lane, and eventually bike lanes or shoulders added to the roadway, and consideration of a lowered speed limit and/or bicycle and pedestrian facilities. As development at Nakoma and elsewhere ramps up and more traffic comes to the area, it is essential that the safety and quality of the non-motorized experience is not compromised. Join us, make a donation, or volunteer to help us improve bicycle and pedestrian facilities around the Feather River region. The beauty of non-motorized facilities is that they offer an option to locals as well as drawing tourists to the area.- FRA!
The pines in the foreground would be clearcut ostensibly to protect the aspens in the background. This is probably the grove with the largest grove of large trees anywhere around Lake Davis.
If you’ve been on the Lake Davis Trail recently, you probably noticed blue markings on nearly all the trees along the Trail- a planned 90% clearcut in an area that really only needs a light under-burn. On thousands of acres around Lake Davis, the Forest Service wants to come in with heavy equipment and cut down 90% of the forest canopy— way above what even the Forest Service’s own guides instruct.
These trees were marked before the project was even scoped or environmental assessment completed, another case of the Forest Service treating public input as just a formality. This is also a waste of taxpayer dollars when marks have to be undone when plans change.
The most fire resistant trees- that together create a moister shadier understory- are the target of the Forest Service’s “Mapes Crocker” fire resilience project
Blue markings on trees are along the Lake Davis Trail- 90% cut in an area needing only a light underburn. Other trees are in the Crocker Meadows area. Nearly every tree in sight would be cut under current FS plan. These trees were marked before scoping of the project or environmental assessment, showing how important public involvement is to the Forest Service. This is also a huge waste of taxpayer dollars when the FS has to undo marks indicating ill advised devastating clearcuts near public recreation areas.
Logging reduces fuel, but it also exposes the ground to more drying sun and wind, compacts soils, and often makes forests drier and more flammable.
The Mapes Crocker project includes plans to cut one of the largest mature forests near Portola— the “Crocker Grove”— in the name of “Aspen Restoration.” If you look at a satellite map of Portola, Crocker Grove is the dense green patch just north of town.
We need these older forests to retain moisture, store carbon and resist fire. The Forest Service is proposing to cut nearly all conifers- even very old ones- within 150 feet of any aspen stem. Other “aspen restorations” have resulted in a dry wasteland, where thickets of small trees sprout up after the disturbance and become kindling for the next megafire.
This harms Aspens and increases fire risk for Portola. Instead of helping towns become more defensible, the Forest Service is making wildfires worse by cutting large fire resilient trees, damaging soils, causing disturbed conditions where dense thickets of small flammable trees sprout, and pulling off industrial logging as “thinning” while neglecting under-burn plans.
The fire break created last summer to try and block the Dixie from burning Portola was not tested and would not have been necessary had the Forest Service carried out under-burns in this area that were committed to.
Feather River Action! is calling for an under-burn/ hand-thin-only option as an alternative to industrial devastation in the Crocker-Mapes project area. We are also planning a hike and picnic to the Crocker Grove on a weekend in June. The date will be announced on our website.
The Crocker Grove is a local jewel— one of the last older forests in the area — but it is currently under threat from a large tree clearcut plan dressed up as an aspen “restoration” project.
Contact the Forest Service now and urge them to adopt a hand thin/ underburn alternative for the whole mapes crocker area and leave ALL large conifers– including around aspens– in place.
We are planning a free public tour of the area in the near future, so stay tuned to our website. Details to come.
“Aspen restoration” areas marked in purple hash- old growth trees would be authorized to be taken in these areas:
These large trees would all have to go for the scientifically tenuous purpose of “aspen restoration” Any dummy can see that trees cooperate with other life forms, unlike humans
Large 48″ diameter conifer in the project area
These aspens and conifers have coexisted for millions of years- if anything the large trees are providing a microclimate necessary for aspen flourishing.
This Aspen grove was the victim of previous Forest Service “restoration” Note small conifers growing, large sun parched area where trees were removed and the aspens don’t look so great either.
Environmental Violations, Animal Cruelty and Threat to Wolves Cited in New Lawsuit
Quincy, Calif. — Feather River Action! and Project Coyote jointly filed a lawsuit yesterday against Plumas and Sierra counties for violating the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) to stop the illegal killing of wildlife without the legally required environmental review.
The lawsuit challenges the county’s failure to conduct the CEQA review of its $76,623 taxpayer-funded contract with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Wildlife Services program. This contract authorizes Wildlife Services, a highly controversial federal program, to kill hundreds of animals in these counties every year without assessing the ecological impacts of widespread killing and without considering alternative non-lethal management strategies.
Each year, Wildlife Services indiscriminately kills millions of animals nationwide — approximately 80,000 in California alone — largely at the behest of commercial agriculture. Wolves, a protected species in California, are particularly at risk from USDA Wildlife Services’ activities, which killed 1,921 coyotes and thousands of other animals in Plumas and Sierra counties over the past decade.
Records indicate that in just one year, USDA Wildlife Services killed more than 1,100 muskrats in Plumas and Sierra counties. Muskrats play a similar ecological role to beavers, 247 of whom were killed by local Wildlife Services employees over the past ten years. Wildlife Services operates across 35 of 52 California counties.
Across the country, Wildlife Services’ outdated program continues to rely on the use of indiscriminate and often inhumane tools to kill native wildlife including snares, poisons and aerial gunning. Condemned by professional scientists with the American Society of Mammalogists since the early 20th century, this taxpayer-subsidized program continues to focus on lethal and non-selective killing practices despite widespread availability and efficacy of non-lethal methods and husbandry practices.
“In all my years of trying to work with Wildlife Services, I have yet to encounter any willingness from the program to consider the best available science demonstrating that nonlethal is the most effective way to protect livestock,” said Michelle Lute, PhD in wildlife management and national carnivore conservation manager for Project Coyote. “Instead, they consistently insist on retaining every archaic tool in their lethal arsenal even when it repeatedly endangers people’s children and companion animals and does little to protect livestock. Fortunately, California has CEQA, a law that protects people and the environment from a rogue program that should be named Wildlife Disservices.”
Wildlife Services spends more than $100 million annually nationwide in taxpayer dollars to kill over one million animals, including birds, beavers, coyotes, mountain lions, bears, wolves and other animals. These killings occur despite peer-reviewed research showing that reckless slaughter of native carnivores causes broad ecological destruction and is not proven to protect livestock or reduce human conflicts with wildlife.
In 2016, wildlife advocates, including Project Coyote, successfully sued Mendocino County, requiring the county to perform a full Environmental Impact Report of their contract with Wildlife Services pursuant to CEQA. Last year, Mendocino County ultimately chose to end its contract with Wildlife Services and instead pursue non-lethal strategies for wildlife management.
This follows on the heels of Marin County, which ended its contract with Wildlife Services in 2000 and adopted a non-lethal cost-share program to assist ranchers with implementation of non-lethal methods, such as fencing and guardian animals, to reduce conflicts between wildlife and livestock. Non-lethal methods precipitated a 62% decline in coyote predation on sheep in Marin from 2002 to 2011, according to the Marin County Department of Agriculture.
Despite efforts by Project Coyote and Feather River Action! to urge the Plumas and Sierra County Board of Supervisors to follow a similar path and comply with CEQA by considering the destructive ecological impacts of their contract with Wildlife Services, the board chose instead to renew their contract with no environmental review and little to no consideration of effective nonlethal alternatives.
“Many of us were horrified to learn that our local taxes were funding this cruel and unnecessary killing program,” said Joshua Hart, spokesperson for Feather River Action! “While Plumas County is losing county staff due to stagnant wages, a publicly-funded killing program for private ranching interests continues to be fully funded by the Board of Supervisors year after year. Wildlife Services’ methods are cruel, unjust and harm the ecological fabric of the Lost Sierra. Enough is enough.”
Canyon Mansfield with his dog Kasey who was killed by a Wildlife Services planted poison bomb
In the last decade, indiscriminate killing methods used by Wildlife Services have also killed more than 50,000 “non-target” animals, including wolves, companion animals, endangered California condors, bald eagles and other birds. Studies show such mass killing negatively impacts the biodiversity, health and function of ecosystems.
Project Coyote, a fiscally-sponsored project of Earth Island Institute, is a North American coalition of scientists, educators, conservationists, and community leaders promoting compassionate conservation and coexistence between humans and wildlife through education, science and advocacy. VisitProjectCoyote.orgfor more information.
Feather River Action! (FRA!) is a grassroots organization based in Portola, Calif. FRA! monitors, publicizes, and defends against threats to the Feather River watershed including forest mismanagement, harmful wildlife policies and pollution and development threats. Visit FeatherRiverAction.org for more information.
Feather River Action! has been working with Plumas County over the past several months to encourage bicycle improvements on County Rd. A15 and other roads. Bicycle infrastructure is essential to improve local air quality, reduce carbon emissions, and improve local resiliency.
Across the country, Wildlife Services’ outdated program continues to rely on the use of indiscriminate and often inhumane tools to kill native wildlife including snares, poisons and aerial gunning. Condemned by professional scientists with the American Society of Mammalogists since the early 20th century, this taxpayer-subsidized program continues to focus on lethal and non-selective killing practices despite widespread availability and efficacy of non-lethal methods and husbandry practices.
