Clearcutting

 Meagan Malachite and I drove up to Anderson to demonstrate with Occupy Redding at the Sierra Cascade Logging Conference. I've captured some of the signs but the dynamic was distressing in a number of ways.

 As expected, folks were polarized and there were many more of the people who seemed to be in support of clear cutting than those who did not support it... even though, even if you subtracted all the environmental effects, it isn't in the best interests of loggers because of the mechanization where these monster machines only really need one man to pop a 100 year old tree out of the ground in two minutes. You can't do thinning with these big machines so more workers are needed for thinning.

 At the Forum for the Forests after the demonstration we really got into the ill effects of clear cutting in depth through expert panels. We learned about the threat to our clean air and water--about carbon sequestration, about plantation farming and fire risk, about polluted streams due to herbicides and rodent-cides and sedimentation, about the loss of diversity, about the costs to taxpayers.. a lot of bad stuff. Clearcutting destroys air quality, water quality, depletes the soil, contributes to climate change and destroys biodiversity.

 There were also some lovely fierce defenders of the earth, like this family from Montgomery Creek. People from the headwaters communities live with the destruction and you can see the intensity in these kids who have had to live through what the loss of the forests mean. Check out the website they keep-- www.stopclearcuttingcalifornia.org and get involved.