KS Wild Forest Defenders Take Action for Old-Growth
Written by Alexi Lovechio, December 19th, 2022
This October, KS Wild hosted our first ever Forest Defender Training Series! The series helped community members learn how to advocate for our forests and take action to protect them. We explored topics ranging from understanding the critical functions of old-growth forests, wildfire in the Klamath-Siskiyou, climate adaptation, and the current status of forest protections. Aspiring forest defenders learned how to write personal letters and emails to federal land managers, write letters to the editor of local papers, take action on social media, and how to share their new skills with friends and family.
Collectively throughout the 4 training sessions, we sent a total of 20 handwritten letters to federal land managers and over 50 postcards to the Biden Administration demanding swift action to protect our oldest trees from logging. Additionally, participants gained a deep understanding on the importance of older forests in the era of climate change. It was inspiring to see how dedicated everyone was to understanding the issues threatening our public lands. A common theme among participants was a love for our forests, rivers, and wildlife of the region and a desire to learn how to protect them.
The Forest Defender Training Series came at a critical time in KS Wild’s Old-Growth campaign.
There is a ton of momentum right now to put pressure on the Biden Administration to create permanent protections for mature and old-growth forests. On Earth Day, President Biden issued an executive order calling federal land managers to conserve mature and old-growth forests as a climate solution. This executive order recognizes that preserving old-growth forests is important for clean water, combating climate change, and maintaining biodiversity.
The executive order is a great first step, but we need to ensure that this process leads to meaningful protections for our nation’s oldest trees. There is still plenty of work to do and this campaign would not be successful without our Forest Defenders! KS Wild plans to continue this training series into the new year with more field trips, educational talks, and action oriented training. We are most excited about creating a groundtruthing training program as this is a critical piece in the forest defense process.
Groundtruthing (or field checking) is where people go out into proposed timber sales to get a sense of what federal land managers are planning to do there. This is a time to observe what you are seeing in the forest and to gather data on the ecosystem. The information that is collected in the field may then be used to support KS Wild’s legal efforts to potentially halt a destructive timber sale.
You can read more about groundtruthing in our blog: Groundtruthing 101.
The Forest Defender Training Series was a great success and had a big impact on our Old-Growth Campaign! Forest allies came together, shared stories, and learned from each other. We took action to advocate for permanent protections for our ancient forests.