Clear Cut Recovery
I love hiking in the forests of New Hampshire, especially in the White Mountains where it's solid trees as far as the eye can see. But there was a time in the not to distant past when the area was entirely clear cut by lumber companies.
During the second half of the 19th century, the State of New Hampshire sold off it's public lands at very low prices to stimulate economic development in the region. Soon great logging camps were set up and logging railroads were built throughout the mountains to haul timber to market. After huge areas had been devastated, giant forest fires further ravaged the region, fueled by the waste that loggers left behind.
Eventually, there was a great public outcry and a conservation movement was born leading to passage of the Weeks Act in 1911. The Weeks Act authorized the creation of US National Forests to protect these areas for conservation and future generations.
After decades of land acqusition, The White Mountain National Forest is now 770,000 acres in size. Approximately 15% of that area is classified as Wilderness including The Great Gulf, The Presidential Range-Dry River Wilderness, The Pemigewasset Wilderness, the Sandwich Range Wilderness and Caribou-Speckled Mountain Wilderness.
Under the terms of the Wilderness Act of 1964, the word Wilderness has a special meaning in the US. It is a place where vehicles are not allowed, where no permanent camps or structures can be made, and where wildlife and its habitat must be kept in as primitive a condition as possible.
Remarkably, the forests recovered and are a source of amazing beauty and a four season recreational wonderland. The logging industry, however, has not been so fortunate, and is finally dying out due to overseas competition from China.
Related posts:
One place of significant concern to many remains to be the ongoing liquidation logging activities of T.R. Dillon in Success Twp adjacent to the Appalachian Trail corridor lands. Heard just recently from AMC’s Mahoosuc Rover that they’ve cut right up to the boundary line my crew and I fought hard to reclaim in fall 2007.
His unique style of logging was even highlighted on MSNBC:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7722058/
With the ATC’s recent restructuring of their AT Corridor land management program, it’s a scary thought knowing that very real threats to the AT and the adjacent corridor lands are ongoing while ATC Managers sit at their desks far away in WV/VA & continue to remain disconnected from places like the Mahoosucs and the 100 Mile Wilderness. It certainly seems that the new “culture” of ATC has adopted a business approach to A.T. management which equates to simply talking about conservation and stewardship while they continue to move farther and farther away from the vital hands-on component that will always be required to properly care for this amazing resource, the Appalachian national Scenic Trail.