We have incredible news.
It’s been almost a year since you contributed it to help save a 19 acre section of old growth forest, one of the very last in the Deschutes Watershed.
First the ENTIER grove has been protected! …but not in the way we thought. After raising $40,000 to protect the area and spending months in negotiations with the company our campaign drew the attention of the Washington state department of natural resource’s (DNR’s) small landowner conservation program. A biologist with a DNR visited the area, and after deeming the grove of extremely high conservation value, they decided to purchase protection for the area in our stead. If it hadn’t been for this campaign the area would’ve been clear-cut months before the DNR got to it.
This is great news, not only because the Cougar Mountain Grove has been protected for the next 100 years but it’s also great news because it allows us to put the money we raise toward the protection of another forest.
So let’s get you acquainted with the Wynoochee Remnant;
On August 30, 2020 grassroots activists discovered that Green Diamond Timber Company had plans to clear cut an old forest containing old-growth characteristics and trees over 500 years old near Wynoochee Lake on the Olympic Peninsula. On their ground-truthing expedition to the forest, activists found massive Douglas Fir trees and Western Red Cedar within an active Timber Harvest Plan (THP). The area dubbed ‘The Wynoochee Remnant’ is habitat to the endangered Northern Spotted Owl and Marbled Murrelet. The Wynoochee Remnant totals approximately 50 acres and is comprised of a 20-acre old-growth cedar/hemlock forest located next to a high conservation value wetland, as well as several dozen outlying giant Douglas Fir trees and old-growth snags.
We are now offering Green Diamond Resource Company $40,000 for the 31 acre core area of the forest (see map). We are asking them to sell the land so that we can permanently preserve it and we need your help.
We want Green Diamond to accept our offer so please speak up!
Please call Patti Case (Green Diamond’s spokesperson) at 360-790-6182 and tell the company that they need to be a good corporate citizen and sell the 31 acre Wynoochee Remnant so it can be permanently protected!
If you haven’t already please sign and share our petition.
For the forest,
Joshua Wright