Letters - Letter to the Editor

GOAL FOR Y3K

editor: I really enjoyed your new feature highlighting notable trees ("In Profile," Spring 2000). The sycamore is one of my favorite trees, and it was good reading. I liked the format and hope you will continue until you have profiled all North American trees.

Jack Bates

Eau Claire, Wisconsin

TYRANNY OF THE MINORITY

editor: Jane Braxton Little's "Flowing from Forests to Faucets," (Spring 2000) does not accurately give credit where credit is due.

The Cedar River watershed has a nearly 100-year history of producing municipal and industrial water with a sustainable forest management program and without costly filtration. In fact, Allen E. Thompson described the program in American Forests in the early 1950s. That program continued until the mid-1980s. when harvesting timber. particularly on public lands, became portrayed as a sin, and habitat protection became popular among preservation-minded people.

Using the Endangered Species Act as justification, these special interests politicized the long-established professional and successful management program for the Cedar River watershed. In the current political climate, I share in advocating for the watershed as an ecological reserve and recognize that such a change in management objectives is a political decision. But the outcome of Seattle's "public" decision process is an unnecessarily expensive and restricted Habitat Conservation Plan detrimental to the city and its water rate payers.

It is unfortunate that the critical topic of forests and waters should be treated as superficially and inaccurately as it was in the article. The role of special interests in determining the program was seriously understated. Fortunately, their mistakes are often tempered by the dynamics of natural processes. Thank God.

Joe E. Monahan

Retired Director of Watersheds

City of Seattle

MISTAKEN IDENTITY

editor: Thank you for the fine article in the spring issue ("Connecticut's Identification Guru," National Register). But I wonder about that alleged tulip poplar at Mt. Vernon ("Witness to History." Spring 2000). It's kind of fun conjecturing what it is, but it is definitely not a tulip poplar. Most likely, it is an American elm, possibly a hickory, of which the best candidate would be the pignut, Carya glabra. But I may be way off base.

Ed Richardson

Glastonbury, Connecticut

editor's response: Thanks to those sharp-eyed readers who correctly ID'd the Mt. Vernon tree as an American elm. The tree was described by the photo agency as a tulip poplar and after a review in-house, we decided to go with their ID. Next time, we'll call Ed!

THE TRUTH ABOUT FORESTS

editor: I take issue with some points in the Spring 2000 issue. The juxtaposition of the story of Julia "Butterfly" Hill crusading to save a large tree ("Clippings") with the National Register of Big Trees highlights a truly dangerous tendency in modern America. Often we equate large trees with old-growth and assume "larger" means "older." That mistake has caused some very damaging management decisions at a national level. While salvaging timber leveled by Hurricane Floyd, I found two black spruce side by side. One was 16 inches at the stump; the other was 5 inches. The smaller one was more than 150 years older!

The ad facing the Register depicts a child in a park-like redwood grove--with not one stick of regeneration in sight. No matter how popular such a vista may be with focus groups, it does not depict a healthy forest.

You also report that 16 million acres of American farm and forest land was converted last year to housing and commercial use ("Clippings"). Although true and interesting, one should, as balance, also be able to learn how many acres were converted into government ownership and therefore lost to our rural economy. American Forests should be more honest with its suburban readers and not pander to their prejudices.

Bruce P. Shields, via e-mail

OPEN THE FLOODGATES

editor: Global ReLeaf is a good cause, but I ask you to also focus on preservation of existing open space.

Remember, the restoration of a forest, wetland, or prairie is never as comprehensive as nature itself. However good our planting and restoring, we can never replicate the planet's natural design. Preservation combined with restoring is the key in my book!

The magazine gets boring if you only discuss tree planting and the kings of tree champions. Open up your editorial message.

Rick, Joan, Brett and Alex Meril

Allendale, New Jersey

A LEADERSHIP ROLE?

editor: We have long been supporters of AMERICAN FORESTS and have enjoyed your magazine. However, over the past few years we have become concerned that much of the American forests are no longer being championed by AMERICAN FORESTS.

AMERICAN FORESTS should devote a significant percentage of its efforts to becoming a champion of independent woodland owners who commit their effort and resources to developing and managing quality forests. Often small woodland owners are wrongly accused of being the villain when they cut a tree. It this doesn't change, these folks will give up, sell, or subdivide their land. All of their stewardship will be lost.