California Fire Science Consortium
June 2015
Environmental Consequences
Goodbye Girl Timber Sale
California Fire Science Consortium Tour

 

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Eldorado National Forest ** King Fire Restoration 

Project **

 

Eldorado National Forest

100 Forni Road

Placerville, CA 95667

530-622-5061


 
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DEIS Analyzes Environmental Consequences of King Fire Restoration Project
 
The Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) for the King Fire Restoration Project provides the public and the decision-maker with an in depth analysis of the expected effects on the environment resulting from a series of alternatives. 
 
This document contains a lot of information for readers to consider. We hope that if you have a particular area of concern you will be able to find the section of interest, understand it, and share your thoughts through the public comment process. Chapter 3, "Affected Environment and Environmental Consequences" describes effects on air quality, botany, cultural resources, ecological conditions, economics, fire and fuels, human health and safety, pesticide risk, safety and public use, soils, vegetation, watersheds, aquatic wildlife, and terrestrial wildlife. These effects are also compared between the alternatives. 
 
Summary tables comparing the alternatives and environmental consequences are provided at the very beginning of the DEIS. (See examples below.) The deadline for comments on the DEIS is Monday, June 22, 2015. Guidelines for how to comment can be found here  
 
Examples from Table S.2 --
Comparison of Environmental Consequences

 

Resource and Indicator

Alt 1

No Action 

Alt 2

Proposed Action 

Alt 3
Alt 4
Alt 5
Cultural Resources (Integrity of Setting)
Greatest impact
Salvage removal will enhance or protect the integrity of setting

Fewer acres of treatment results in fewer opportunities for enhancment
Better than Alternative 2
Same as Alternative 2
Fire Suppression Capability
Greatest risk to workers and safety

Improves safety and reduces risks to workers over the long term compared with

Alternative 1

 

 

Fewer safety improvements and more risks to workers over the long term compared with Alternative 2

Better improvements to safety and fewer risks to workers over the long term compared with Alternative 2

Same as Alternative 2

Acres of Conifer Reforestation and Removal of Competing Vegetation
0
11,660
8,107
12,218
11,660

 

 

TOP BANNER PHOTO:  California Fire Consortium Fire Ecology Field Trip to the King Fire Burned Area on May 29, 2015. Approximately 50 people attended.  See also article below.  USFS photo by I. Estes

Preparing to load truck

Preparing to load logs onto a truck at Stumpy Meadows Campground. USFS photo by I. Estes
 

 

King Fire Recovery in Progress:
 
Goodbye Girl Timber Sale 
 

Contract work to remove hazard trees and thin the forest for future sustainability at recreation sites in the Georgetown Ranger District started Wednesday May 27, 2015. The Goodbye Girl timber sale is now fully underway, removing fire-killed hazard trees and thinning live trees in and around Stumpy Meadows Campground. The timber sale also includes tree removal in the Black Oak Group and Big Meadows campground areas.

Hazard trees include dead or dying trees, dead parts of live trees, or unstable live trees that are within striking distance of people or property and have potential to cause property damage, personal injury or fatality. Thinning the live trees will increase light, space and water availability to improve forest health at these sites. Under the current contract, a total of 189 acres of treatment will be completed - 148 acres in the Stumpy Meadows and Black Oak Group campground areas and 41 acres in the Big Meadow campground area. This includes 10 acres of thinning in and around Stumpy Meadows and Black Oak Group campgrounds and approximately 15 acres in Big Meadows Campground area. Logging operations will be in progress for approximately 30 days with rehabilitation work to follow.  

 

The contract was delayed in getting underway due to no offers being received the first time it ran for bidding. The Eldorado National Forest re-ran the bidding announcement with a lowered minimum bid due to the hauling distance of the marketable timber. Fox Enterprises, a small business out of Pollock Pines was awarded the contract through the sealed bid process on the second offering. 
 

The marketable pine timber from Stumpy Meadows area will be hauled 187 miles, to the Collins Pine Company Mill in Chester, CA. The marketable fir and cedar logs will be trucked to the Trinity River Mill in Oroville, approximately 100 miles away. The slash and logs that are not of commercial value will be piled and burned or cut and left for use by campers in the campground. The campground concessionaire, American Land & Leisure, will be doing the final cleanup and repairs in preparation of the campgrounds opening sometime in July. 
 

 

 

 

California Spotted Owl
A California Spotted Owl perches on a surviving tree within the burned area. USFS photo by I. Estes

Fire Science Field Trip Visits Owl Study Site in King Fire Burned Area

 

The University of California hosted a Fire Science Consortium field trip to the King Fire burned area on May 29 to discuss fire ecology and research projects being implemented in the fire area. Field trip participants included researchers, students and local Forest Service employees. Specialists discussed fire and fuels issues associated  with the King Fire, highlighting the large run of just over 50,000 acres that the fire made on September 18, 2014.  The weather and fuel conditions that existed during that major event were summarized, noting that the effects of topography in the Rubicon Canyon overwhelmed the effects of weather which were not extreme. The area was densely forested with several thinned fuel reduction areas. Although these treatment areas did modify fire behavior to some degree, the channeling of  wind, heat and fire by the steep, narrow topography led to high tree mortality throughout the canyon, despite the fuel reduction that was done in this area before the fire.   

 

The field trip concluded with an address given by renowned California spotted owl authority, Dr. Rocky J. GutiĆ©rrez, a Professor of Forest Wildlife in the Department of Fisheries, Wildlife and Conservation Biology at the University of Minnesota. GutiĆ©rrez and colleagues have collected 20 years of demographic data at 74 spotted owl territories across two forests, including the Last Chance Study Area on the Tahoe National Forest and the Eldorado Demography Study Area on the Eldorado National Forest.


The last stop on the field trip visited one of the original owl protected activity centers (PACs) included in the Eldorado Demography Study which began in 1987. A California spotted owl was observed in a nearby tree during the talk, validating research that suggests California spotted owls will occupy landscapes that experience low- to moderate-severity wildfire, as well as areas with mixed-severity wildfire that includes some proportion of high-severity fire.

 

For more information on spotted owl research, visit the Sierra Nevada Adaptive Management Project.
 

 

CORRECTION: Plantation Re-Establishment in the Nevada Point Ridge Area

 

Please note this correction to an article in the May newsletter:

 

The statement, "Almost all of the plantations that burned in the Nevada Point Ridge area have been replanted..." was only referring to the 324 acres that were being replanted under categorical exclusion (CE) authority. An estimated 1,900 acres of national forest plantations burned in the Nevada Point Ridge Area during the King Fire, some of which are proposed for replanting in the King Fire Restoration EIS. Approximately, 7,800 acres of national forest plantations burned in the King Fire overall, but some had many surviving trees and are not proposed for replanting. The alternatives vary in how many acres of plantations are proposed for replanting.  Alternative 2 proposes replanting about 4,280 acres of national forest plantations; the other alternatives propose slightly more or less than Alternative 2.

 

King Fire Headlines

 

 

Tree Removal Begins at Campground Burned by King Fire

(June 3, 2015 - FOX 40)
 

Crews Clear Hazardous Trees Scorched by the King Fire

(June 3, 2015 - CBS 13)

 

Massive King Fire Timber Salvage Operation Begins

(June 3, 2015 - ABC News10)

 

King Fire Restoration Project

DRAFT Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS)  


Comments Due: Monday, June 22, 2015

                                                       
 COMMENTS CAN BE SENT BY EMAIL HERE

For more information, contact the Eldorado National Forest
Public Affairs Office at 530-621-5280.