Taylor and Stoner Mesas Vegetation Management Project Scoping Package

Transcription

1 Taylor and Stoner Mesas Vegetation Management Project Scoping Package The Forest Service is seeking input and ideas regarding a vegetation management proposal on the Dolores Ranger District of the San Juan National Forest; totaling 27,680 acres. Contained within the project boundary are 900 acres of aspen and 2500 acres of spruce/fir stands proposed for treatment. This letter and attached maps provide you with detailed information about the purpose and need, the Proposed Action, and decision framework. Comments or suggestions concerning this proposal would be most helpful if received by July 14 th. Please refer to the How to Reply section for additional information about submitting comments. Project Area (see included maps): The project area is located approximately 20 miles northeast of Dolores, CO in the vicinity of Taylor and Stoner Mesas. The majority of the project area is located within Management Area 5 (active management, commodity production in order to meet multiple use goals). A coarse legal description is as follows: Portions of Sections 4, 5 and 6 in T38NR12W; Portions of Sections 19-23, 26-34, in T39NR12W; Portions of Sections 23-27, in T39NR13W, New Mexico Principal Meridian, Montezuma County. Portions of 6, 7, and 18 in T39NR11W; Portions of Sections 1-18 in 39NR12W; Portions of Sections 1, 13 and 14 in T39NR13W; Portions of Sections 19-21, in T40NR12W; Portions of Sections and 36 in T40NR13W, New Mexico Principal Meridian, Dolores County, CO. (Project area and proposed treatment unit maps are attached) Purpose and Need for Action There is a need to improve or maintain the resistance and/or resiliency of forest ecosystems in an effort to increase protection against epidemic insect and disease outbreaks There is a need for: Increased vigor of spruce overstory trees to better ward off environmental stresses, such as insects of diseases Increased amount of young spruce seedlings and saplings in the understory to help ensure spruce would continue to be part of the species composition of this area, even if overstory trees succumb to future insect/disease events. Maintain the existing dense conifer understory and lessen potential for insect/disease agents to move from the overstory to the understory. This understory layer is important wildlife habitat. There is a need for increased diversity of forest ecosystem development stages as represented across the landscape. There is a need for: Taylor and Stoner Mesas Vegetation Management Project Scoping Package June

2 Greater age class distribution in aspen forests (patches of young, mid-aged and mature aspen stands) on the landscape Increase in the proportion of young aspen forests to offset the overabundance of mature age classes on the San Juan National Forest. There is a need to provide economic support to local communities by providing timber products to dependent local industries in a sustainable manner. There is a need to: Support at least the current level of economic activity in the local timber industry Provide wood product for two primary aspen industries in southwest Colorado that create erosion control products, paneling, packaging material, evaporative cooler pads and fuelwood. Take opportunities when they arise to provide wood products to mills in southwest Colorado that produce premium lumber from conifer forests. Proposed Action Aspen In the Aspen forest type there are 33 tentative treatment units ranging in size from 7.2 to 40 acres and totaling approximately 900 acres. This project would use even-aged coppice-clearcut 1 methods to create even-aged stands of aspen seedlings using natural coppice regeneration methods. Preliminary estimates indicate these harvests would produce approximately 24,000 hundred cubic feet (CCF) of mostly aspen products with a small amount of conifer (spruce and fir) included. A combination of ground based mechanized logging and hand falling would be used to harvest merchantable aspen ( 5 diameter) and merchantable conifer ( 8 diameter). Sub-merchantable aspen and conifer would be felled, or masticated on site to promote the maximum amount of aspen sprouting and develop an even-aged structure. Spruce/Fir In the Spruce/Fir forest type there are 26 tentative treatment units ranging in size from 31 to 252 acres and totaling approximately 2,500 acres. This project would use selection harvests with a sanitation emphasis. The selection harvests would be an uneven-age harvest meant to promote regeneration, maintain a multi-aged structure and remove diseased individuals. The harvesting would remove some trees throughout all the different sawtimber size classes (<8 inches diameter) either singly or in small clumps. These treatments are roughly estimated to produce 15,000 CCF to 20,000 CCF of both spruce and subalpine fir sawtimber products. The priority for selection of trees for removal would emphasize individuals or clumps with advanced root disease, fading crowns, budworm damage, broom rust infection or other obvious insect and disease issues. No trees smaller than 8.0 inches diameter would be cut in order to minimize the disturbance to the dense horizontal cover provided by the existing mid-story and sapling layers. To further minimize damage to the understory, skid trails will be limited to 15% of the total harvested area, landings will be limited to 1 Coppice clear-cutting is a regeneration method typically applied to deciduous or hardwood species in which all trees in the existing stand are cut and the majority of the regeneration is from sprouts or root suckers of the pre-existing species. In this case, abundant aspen sprouting would likely result. Taylor and Stoner Mesas Vegetation Management Project Scoping Package June

3 10% of the total harvested area, and skid trails will be predetermined and approved by forest officer s before harvesting occurs to limit damage to regeneration. Areas with dense regeneration in need of protection would be reserved from harvest if needed to maintain minimum standards for understory recruitment. An important component of the spruce/fir treatments is the establishment of new seedlings within the created openings. These treatments would attempt to ensure at least a minimal amount of spruce and fir regeneration and young growth is present in the stands. In the event of a future bark beetle epidemic or disease outbreak with a subsequent die back of the over story. Advanced regeneration and young growth needs to be in reserves to ensure desired stocking levels and species are present (post outbreak). The conifer stands would be treated with the intent of protecting regeneration to maintain maximum cover and stocking standards of 150 trees per acre, however the stands will be monitored with stocking surveys to ensure this standard is met. If natural regeneration in the openings does not occur and results in a stocking level below desired conditions, supplemental planting would be undertaken. Associated Actions Other activities associated with the harvesting operations would include the construction, use and subsequent re-closure of temporary access roads. The exact location and miles of temporary roads are not known at this time. In addition Forest Service system roads that are currently in storage (Maintenance Level 1 roads) may be opened for timber harvest purposes. In most cases these ML1 roads would be placed back in storage once harvest operations are complete. Forest products would be removed off the Forest via the following Forest Service roads, FR410, FR201, FR545, FR547, FR692, FR686, FR875, FR248, FR210 and FR202. Road maintenance activities including surface blading and drainage structure maintenance would occur as needed. Some reconstruction or minor realignment of road prisms may be necessary. Hauling of forest products would most likely be done with full size 18-wheeler tractor-trailer trucks hauling tree length logs. Commonly used stinger-steered log trailers allow for quite long loads such as these to proceed down twisting mountain roads without cutting off corners or switchbacks. No new permanent roads are planned to be built. Normal operating season is proposed as mid-june to November 30 th depending on conditions. Winter harvest could occur from November through the end of February depending on conditions. Operations should not occur when ruts are created 4 inches or greater. Other related forestry activities would include the reduction of activity slash loads through wholetree yarding, machine and/or hand piling, pile burning and post-treatment monitoring of regeneration results. Forestry best management practices and FS standards call for protecting areas next to perennial and intermittent streams, lakes and wetlands by establishing streamside management zones (SMZs). A SMZ is a designated area within a treatment unit adjacent to a stream or water body that contains Taylor and Stoner Mesas Vegetation Management Project Scoping Package June

4 riparian vegetation or special characteristics. The SMZ is not necessarily meant to be a keep out zone, but the protection or improvement of riparian values, water quality, aquatic communities and long-term stream health in these areas must be emphasized. Harvesting within these areas would be done with special care under special restrictions which may include buffer zones that extend up to 100 feet on either side of the stream. Silvicultural prescriptions, timber designations, conduct of logging, acceptable equipment use and/or slash treatment would typically all differ within the SMZ from the rest of the treatment unit. Implementation Methods The method of implementation would likely entail the award of several contracts to qualified businesses using open competitive bidding. This form of contract may be a traditional timber sale contract or a stewardship contract. Under stewardship contracts the values of the timber products is used to either pay for or partially offset the cost of added service work. The term of each individual contract would likely be 1-3 years but under certain circumstances could be extended. Implementation of multiple timber sales over the course of 5-10 years will occur. The number of acres under contract at one time cannot be exactly estimated. Recent sales in other areas have treated less than 500 acres in one contract. Other Resource Protection Measures The proposed action will include but not necessarily be limited to the following design criteria and restrictions: Streamside Management Zones (SMZs) would be established along affected perennial and intermittent streamcourses in accordance with Colorado Forestry Best Management Practices. All off-road heavy equipment must be washed and free of foreign soil or debris before entering the operations area. Contractors will be required to maintain and/or repair any range fences affected by harvesting or hauling operations. After harvest roads would be effectively placed in storage or re-vegetated in the case of temporary roads. Select barriers best suited to maintaining closure and discouraging illegal motor vehicle use. If popular dispersed campsite occur near road closure points consult recreation staff before placing barriers. Where possible, align timber sale cut units and sale area boundaries with pasture boundaries. In some of the aspen clearcut areas, range fences would be removed, the stand would be cut, and the range fence re-built to its original condition and location. As a general rule, cattleguards would not be placed on ML1 roads to be placed back into storage. Taylor and Stoner Mesas Vegetation Management Project Scoping Package June

5 Public Involvement: Your questions, comments and suggestions regarding this proposal are an integral part of the environmental analysis process. This opportunity to provide feedback serves two main purposes: 1) to fulfill the public involvement and scoping for this project as required under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), and 2) to gather constructive ideas that will be used to identify issues, develop Alternative approaches to this proposal or formulate design features. After receiving your comments, the Forest Service will identify and analyze the issues raised, finalize a Proposed Action and design criteria, and if necessary, develop Alternative approaches to the Proposed Action. A draft Environmental Assessment will be published in the future with an additional opportunity to provide comments. Plans are to complete the NEPA analysis in 2016 and make a decision whether or not to implement the Proposed Action or another Alternative during the spring of Implementation could then begin during the 2017 field season. Those people responding to this scoping letter will be included on the mailing list for future information related to this project. Decision Framework: At this time, the Forest Service plans to document and disclose any environmental effects of this proposal in an Environmental Assessment (EA). The Dolores District Ranger will be the Responsible Official. His decision will be detailed in a Decision Notice after the EA is completed. Given the stated purpose and need of the project, the Responsible Official will review the Proposed Action, any Alternative approaches and/or design features in order to make the following decisions: 1. Whether or not to implement the Proposed Action or an Alternative approach and conduct other related activities to address the purposes stated above. 2. If the Proposed Action or an Alternative approach is selected, under what conditions and by which methods would the activities be conducted. The decision framework of this project does not include reanalyzing existing Management Area prescriptions, standards or guidelines already specified in the existing Forest Plan nor will it seek to re-examine federal regulations or Forest Service policy regarding timber harvest on National Forest lands. Objection Regulations That Apply to this Project This project falls under the pre-decisional administrative review (objection) process at 36CFR218 Subpart A and B. In order to be eligible to participate in the objection process comments must be submitted during this or any other formally designated public comment period for this project. Comments should include: 1) your name and postal address, 2) project title (Rico-West Dolores), and 3) signature or other verification of identity upon request (36 CFR (a)(3)). Electronically mailed comments must be submitted in an message, plain text (.txt), Word (.doc or.docx), Portable Document Format (.pdf), or Rich Text Format (.rtf) file formats. Comments received, including names and addresses, become part of the public record. Taylor and Stoner Mesas Vegetation Management Project Scoping Package June

6 How To Reply: Comments should be received by July 14 th, Comments may be submitted as follows: Written Comments via Use the electronic comment form located at Written Comments via the U.S. Postal Service or hand delivered: (Office hours for hand delivery are 8:00 am to 4:30 pm weekdays) San Juan National Forest Dolores Public Lands Office Taylor and Stoner Mesa s Vegetation Management Project Attention: Derek Padilla Highway 184 Dolores, CO Written Comments via facsimile: (970) Attention: Derek Padilla Taylor and Stoner Mesa s Vegetation Management Project Oral Comments via telephone or in person: David Casey (970) USDA Forest Service Highway 184 Dolores, CO For Further Information: For further information about this proposal, please contact David Casey, Project Leader, at (970) or djcasey@fs.fed.us. Taylor and Stoner Mesas Vegetation Management Project Scoping Package June