Freshwater Creek Further Imperiled By Logging
CDF Still Pandering to Pacific Lumber

Freshwater Creek, a 20,000-acre tributary to Humboldt Bay, has received more than its share of abuse from the Pacific Lumber Company over the past 14 years. Pacific Lumber owns more than three fourths of the watershed, and since 1987 has logged roughly half of those holdings. This logging blitzkrieg has radically increased sedimentation in the lower reaches of the river, filling Humboldt Bay with mud. Stripping the forest canopy has reduced the ability of the watershed to filter rainfall and buffer the effects of large storms. The result has been increased flooding with higher and more rapid peak flows, as well as degradation of fish habitat. Freshwater Creek is near Eureka, and many residents have experienced more frequent and severe flooding. In fact, recent reviews by federal scientists suggest that 5-year floods now happen there every two years.

In December of 1997, the various state agencies responsible for regulating PL’s logging notified the company that five watersheds on its property were "cumulatively impacted" by excessive timber harvesting. In January of 1999, the California Department of Forestry sent a letter to PL stating that no further logging plans would be approved in either Freshwater or the adjacent Elk River watershed until a Watershed Analysis had been completed

Under the Headwaters Agreement, Pacific Lumber must conduct Watershed Analyses in 22 watersheds across its ownership to develop site-specific information and logging rules. Freshwater was chosen as the first watershed to be analyzed, and was used to develop the methodology to be applied in the other watersheds.

As usual for Pacific Lumber, the process has been contentious and controversial. Reviewers of PL’s draft methods manual criticized the documents for being designed to avoid detecting any problems in the watershed. Many substantive comments were made by various government and private scientists on how to improve the manual, but few of these were incorporated into the subsequent draft. For the past two years PL has been proceeding with its analysis, despite widespread criticism of the process.

Not surprisingly, when PL announced the results of its study earlier this spring, they claimed that Freshwater is in relatively good condition, and that "legacy" logging impacts and poor roads are the main culprits in the demise of the watershed. Based on these claims, the company is now seeking to decrease streamside protections, and to allow more logging on landslides.

The process for watershed analysis is poorly defined, but it was supposed to include independent peer review of the results prior to the development of new logging rules. However, PL and the federal and state agencies involved have already begun writing new, weaker logging standards without waiting for any review.

Science and the public interest have been trampled in the rush to create weaker logging rules for Freshwater Creek. PL has refused to hold off on logging until the review is completed. Instead, over the past two years, the company has proposed twelve new plans for Freshwater--more than 1200 acres of new logging in this already degraded watershed. Of course, these proposed plans have met strong opposition by watershed residents, EPIC and the Humboldt Watershed Council, who all insist that Pacific Lumber is harming downstream property owners and degrading water quality and fish habitat.

Studies by the US Forest Service’s Redwood Science Lab calculated that if all logging were suspended, it would take 13 years for the watershed to recover to a mature condition. Yet, the Department of Forestry plans to allow PL to log 500 acres per year, and projects the recovery rate to be less than 1% annually.

Can the state continue to approve logging plans in a watershed already impaired by logging activities? This may be one of the hottest policy issues in coming years, as more and more watersheds decline. Indeed, the Elk River is in the same situation, with salmon habitat critical and downstream landowners facing more floods and an onslaught of Pacific Lumber plans. The rate of logging in the Elk River is just as alarming as in Freshwater, with 17 plans to log nearly 3,000 of the 22,205 acres that it owns in the watershed.


This article can be found online at www.wildcalifornia.org/publications/article-33