The US Forest Service has just released a draft plan for WNC’s 1 million acres of National Forest. It opens up 70% of the Forest to logging, including many beloved recreation and backcountry areas. Below are just some of the special places deemed in the draft plan to be “suitable to the purposeful growing and harvesting of crops of trees to be cut into logs”.
Speak out for our National Forests, send your comments TODAY to the Forest Service demanding that the final management plan guides sensible, responsible management of the forests for all who enjoy and depend on them.
Pisgah Ranger District
Multi-use trails
- Trace Ridge
- Spencer Gap
- Spencer Branch
- Fletcher Creek
- Middle Fork
- Bear Branch
- Portions of Laurel Mountain, Pilot Rock, Slate Cove, Bradley Creek
- Hiking trails
- Art Loeb trail (south of Blue Ridge Parkway)
- Bad Fork
- Thompson Ridge
- Cat Gap
- Caney Bottom
- Case Camp Ridge
- Pressley Cove trail
- Clawhammer trail
- Fish Hatchery area
- Daniel Ridge
- Cove Creek
- Farlow Gap
- Kiesee Creek
- Pilot Mountain
- Butter Gap
- Long Branch
- Cemetery Loop
- 475C (sole connection to Brevard via Bracken Mountain trail)
- Black Mountain area
- Black Mountain
- Buckhorn Gap
- Buckhorn trail
- Club Gap
- Bennett Gap
- Avery Creek
- Coontree Loop
- Sycamore Cove
- Thrift Cove
Popular areas
- Courthouse creek/falls
- Kuykendall campground
- Cove Creek campground
Grandfather Ranger District
Trails
- Kitsuma / Young’s Ridge
- Point Lookout trail
- Mountains to Sea trail (east from Table Rock, also Grandmother gap)
- Overmountain Victory Trail (west of Linville Gorge)
- Sand Mountain
Popular areas
- Old Fort picnic area
- Winding Stair Knob / Upper Creek falls
- Boone Fork campground/pond
Appalachian Ranger District
Trails
- Harmon Den / Max Patch area
- Rube Ridge
- Groundhog Creek
- Cherry Creek
- Cherry Ridge
- Cold Springs
- Robert Creek
- Buckeye Ridge
- Shut-in Creek
- Walnut Mountain
- Bluff Mountain
- Black Mountains area
- Lost Cove Ridge (Black Mountain Campground to Green Knob)
- Mountains to Sea trail (Big Laurel Mountain)
- Woody Ridge
- Colbert Ridge (Carolina Hemlocks campground, Celo)
- Big Ivy (Coleman Boundary)
- Staire Creek
- Bear Pen
- Corner Rock
- Walker Creek
- Elk Pen
- Snowball
- Bald Mountains: Jerry Miller trail / Whiteoak flats
- Unaka Mountain
- Lost Cove
- Devil’s Creek
- Shinbone
Popular areas
- Green Knob fire tower (north side of Blue Ridge Parkway)
- Corner Rock
- Cold Springs/Harmon Den
- Bluff Mountain
- Rocky Bluff Campground
- Rich Mountain Fire tower
Nantahala Ranger District
Trails
- Appletree
- Junaluska trail
- Hickory Branch
- Appletree
- London Bald
- Diamond Valley
- Laurel Creek
- Forest Walk
- Rocky Bald
- Wine Spring
- Rufus Morgan (falls)
- Silver Run falls
- Bartram Trail (Wayah Bald to Franklin)
- Foothills Trail (west of Whitewater Falls)
- Mountains to Sea trail (Balsam Gap to Haywood Gap)
- Standing Indian Recreation Area
- Waslik Poplar
- Park Creek
- Park Ridge
- Park Creek-Ridge Connector
- Kimsey Creek
- Lower Ridge (north of wilderness)
- Long Branch
- Hurricane Creek Loop
- Blackwell Gap Loop
- Thomas Branch
- Panthertown
- Turkey Knob
- Rattlesnake Knob
- Yellow Mountain (Shortoff mountain)
- Glade trail (Ammons branch)
- Slickrock (Ammons branch)
Popular areas
- Standing Indian Campground
- Kimsey Creek
- Appletree
- Cowee Bald
- Fontana Lake
- Yellow Mountain firetower
- Silver Run falls
- Balsam Lake, Lodge
Cheoah Ranger District
Trails
- Tsali
- Right Loop
- Left Loop
- Mouse
- Thompson
- Lewellyn Cove
- Fontana Loop
- Shell Stand Creek
- Swan Cabin
- Yellow Creek Mountain
- Lookout Rock
- Wauchecha Bald
- Belding Trail
- Haoe Lead
- Bear Creek
- Snowbirds
- Billy Top
- Valley River Trail (Old Bartram)
- Cheoah
- Massey Branch Fitness
- Cheoah Trail
- Camp Santeetlah
Popular areas
- Cheoah
- Santeetlah Lake
- Santeetlah Creek
- Fontana Lake
- Tsali
Tusquitee Ranger District
Trails
- Jackrabbit system
- Jackrabbit mountain
- Central loop
- Upper Ridge
- Sneaking Creek
- Burnt Tree Peninsula
- Yotee’s Run
- High Point
- Burrell Cove
- SABA Beach, Spur
- Fires Creek
- Rim trail (western half)
- Chunky Gal trail (portions)
- Rockhouse Creek
- Phillips Ridge
- Huskins Branch
- Shortoff
- Ammon Knob
- Cover Trail
- Omphus Ridge
- Hanging Dog
- Ramsey Bluff
- Ramsey Bend, Connector
- Farmer Top
- Nottely River
- Mingus
- Choga horse trail (Junaluska Gap)
- Benton MacKaye Trail
Popular areas
- Hiwassee Lake
- Hanging Dog campground
- Fires Creek
- Chatuge Lake / Jackrabbit campground
ECO is hosting its 6th annual Environmental Film Festival on Friday, Nov. 7 at the Hendersonville Little Theater, 229 S. Washington in Hendersonville. Doors open at 6 p.m.
The first film is a preview of David Weintraub’s soon-to-be documentary film about sea turtles and human culture, “Call of the Ancient Mariner.”
The film project started “as a personal quest to learn about sea turtles along the coast of South Carolina, and it became a study of ecology, environmentalism, culture and human nature,” Weintraub said. “It explores the turtle’s quest, parallel to our own, as we both learn to share this increasingly smaller blue marble in the universe.”
The feature film is “Chasing Ice,” an adrenaline-infused story of a team of photographers that capture the first visual evidence of climate change through time-lapse photography of disappearing glaciers. Since premiering at the Sundance Film Festival in 2012, it has proven to substantially shift opinions about climate change.
Acclaimed environmental photographer James Balog was once a skeptic about climate change. Traveling with a team of young adventurers across the brutal Arctic, he risks his career and his wellbeing in pursuit of the biggest story facing humanity. His hauntingly beautiful videos compress years into seconds and capture ancient mountains of ice in motion. Chasing Ice depicts a heroic photojournalist on a mission to deliver fragile hope to our carbon-powered planet.
Tickets can be purchased here.
Washington, D.C.— State representatives from the National Caucus of Environmental Legislators this week submitted a sign-on letter calling on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) to swiftly finalize strong coal ash and toxic water pollution standards for coal-burning power plants. The letter comes just eight weeks before the agency’s December 19deadline to finalize a rule on coal ash standards.
Delivered to EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, the letter signed by 155 state representatives notes that dangerous waste from burning leaches into drinking water and pollutes the air of communities near toxic dump sites because there are no federal safeguards for disposal. The letter also notes that EPA itself has determined that coal-fired power plants are responsible for at least 50 to 60 percent of the toxic water pollutants discharged into U.S. waters. Yet, at present, four out of five coal plants in the U.S. have no limits on the amount of toxics they are allowed to dump into our water. Many of these toxic pollutants pose serious health and environmental damage even in very low concentrations, which is why, the signatories argue, strong standards are essential to protect our communities, drinking water, and wildlife.
“We urge the EPA to protect our waterways from toxic coal pollution by adopting strong, federally enforceable safeguards for coal ash disposal and reuse under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) and for water pollution discharges from coal plants under the Clean Water Act quickly,” stated the letter. “Without strong federal standards to safeguard our waterways, coal-burning power plants will keep sending toxic sludge into rivers and streams, which provide recreation, habitat to fish and wildlife, and drinking water sources.”
“Right now, the EPA has the opportunity to meet its responsibility to the American people and put into place actual, strong measures that will prevent coal ash disasters that have been plaguing American communities for far too long,” said Dalal Aboulhosn, Senior Washington Representative with the Sierra Club.
Signatories include many distinguished elected officials across the country, including several from North Carolina who have dealt with the lack of federal safeguards firsthand when a burst stormwater pipe underneath an unlined coal ash pit dumped 140,000 tons of coal ash and toxic wastewater into the Dan River earlier this year.
“Our experience in the Southeast, including the Dan River disaster, has shown that communities cannot count on state agencies and state law alone to protect their clean water nationwide. Our communities and our rivers need strong national safeguards to protect them from coal ash pollution and coal ash catastrophes,” said Frank Holleman, Senior Attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center.
“Representatives are asking for strong regulations because they know these rules will protect the health and economic wellbeing of their constituents,” said Lisa Evans, senior administrative counsel at Earthjustice. “Coal ash pollution places a heavy burden on local communities across the nation, but help is on the way.”
“EPA needs to end the “free pass to pollute” that power plants have gotten for the past thirty years. Power plants have gotten special treatment that allows them to dump billions of pounds of toxic chemicals into our nation’s waters, including rivers and streams that are sources of drinking water. This special treatment has come at a huge cost to our nation’s waters and to our health,” said Jennifer Peters, Clean Water’s National Water Campaigns Coordinator.
To read the full letter, please click here.
We’ll have ecological guidance, as well as an interfaith reflection, as we soak in the late colors of autumn. This hike is free and open to all ages.
Registration is required.
Meeting place & time:
1 p.m. Nov. 2 in Earth Fare’s parking lot in Westgate Shopping Center, and organize a carpool to Carl Sandburg Home National Historic Site , about a 35-minute drive. We’ll return to Earth Fare no later than 5 p.m.
What to Expect:
This is about a 1.5 mile round trip hike that starts flat and ends with a moderate climb to the top of Glassy Mountain. We’ll hike slowly on the climb, taking in the beautiful surroundings, before reaching the awe inspiring vista of Mount Pisgah and beyond. Josh Kelly, WNCA’s field biologist, will interpret the flora and fauna along the way, and Pastor Scott Hardin-Nieri of CCAWNC will lead an interfaith spiritual reflection.
What to Bring/Wear:
• Water bottle (and snacks if you like)
• Medications for any allergies, etc.
• Camera
• Supportive shoes
• *Be prepared for rainy or cold weather – raincoat, warm jacket/layers as needed*
We are greatly looking forward to our first ever joint WNCA & Creation Care Alliance of WNC outing!
To learn more about Creation Care Alliance of WNC, click here!
On Saturday, Oct. 25, Environmental and Conservation Organization (ECO) will host an easy half-day paddle trip on the French Broad River to admire the beautiful fall foliage. The trip will start and end at the Oskar Blues Brewery in Brevard.
Canoes will be provided but you’re welcome to bring your own.
Cost is $20/per person and spaces are limited. Please join us for a leisurely day on the French Broad River as we admire the beautiful fall colors!”
Call the ECO office for details and to reserve your space:
(828) 692-0385.
A black bear is caught on a candid camera in the Grandfather District of Pisgah National Forest this past summer.
Over the summer, the U.S. Forest Service in the Grandfather District of Pisgah National Forest deployed 50 motion-triggered trail cameras in the forest to determine how animals use a prescribed burn area compared to a non-burned area.
The composition and function of plant communities has been changed, inadvertently, from fire suppression. This biological shift also affects animals’ foraging strategies, and the USFS is interested in quantifying how animal communities are changed in response to the lack of fire.
WHAT: We many still images as data and we need volunteers to help us look through and count the animals that the cameras photographed in the forests.
WHEN: Between now and Nov. 1. The USFS must present phase one of the results in mid-November. They want to know which species were in which locations and how many times they were photographed. After Nov. 1, there is opportunity to continue working with the data using more refined biostats analysis to get an even better sense of how animals perceive habitat.
WHERE: 29 N. Market St., Suite 610 (WNCA’s office). Volunteers will look over the data sheets and collect some memory cards. Volunteers can work with our Forest Keepers Coordinator Alexandra Guest, or on their own, depending on schedule flexibility and their confidence level in managing data.
WHO: Anyone, particularly those interested in wildlife ecology and data management. This is a great resume builder for students, lifelong learners, etc. Volunteer collaborators’ names will be listed with the project when it’s presented by the USFS.
ITEMS NEEDED: Volunteers need a computer with photo software so that they can pull images off of an SD card. Nothing fancy (We use iPhoto). Also required: Excel and some proficiency using it.
Interested volunteers should contact WNCA Forest Keepers Coordinator Alex Guest at Alexandra@WNCA.org
Yes, we realize that princesses are usually a good thing (at least according to Disney), but when it comes to our natural world—not so much.
Therefore, our first Forest Keepers event of the season will focus on the removal of Princess trees in Linville Gorge. Princesses (Paulownia tomentosa) are non-native deciduous trees, which also happen to be the fastest growing trees in the world.
We’ll meet at 9 a.m. Oct. 19 at the Earth Fare in the Westgate Shopping Center and carpool to Linville Gorge from there.
We’ll hike into a Princess-tree infested site that the U.S. Forest Service recently found and will use handsaws and pruners to cut down the trees, and also collect this season’s seeds to keep them from further invading the site.
Many non-native invasive plants have faster growth rates and higher seed yields than native plants, and the competition for soil resources, light, and area is intense. Also, a number of these species are highly efficient in transporting their seeds and expanding their root systems.
It’s important to identify and manage heavy invasions to protect the great biodiversity we enjoy in Western North Carolina.
We need volunteers for this outing, hosted by our Forest Keepers program. It’s open to anyone who’s interested, although space is limited to eight people.
Volunteers will need hiking boots with ankle support for a six-mile moderate-to-strenuous hike in Linville. (It’s steep out there!) We’ll also work in a post-burn area so everyone should wear clothes that they don’t mind getting get dirty and sooty.
Bring at least two liters of water, lunch (and snacks as necessary) and extra layers.
Cameras are recommended (but not required) because the fall foliage is going to be spectacular and gawk-worthy.
All work equipment will be supplied!
If you want to volunteer, please contact WNCA Forest Keepers Coordinator Alex Guest by emailing Alexandra@WNCA.org or click HERE.
Date: Tuesday, Oct. 28
Time: 5 p.m.
Location: Asheville City Hall Building, 70 Court Plaza, Council Chambers
Duke Energy representatives will present an update to Asheville City Council on the future of the Asheville coal-fired power plant. Duke Energy is required to remove all the coal ash from the impoundments at the Asheville plant and is currently considering the option of retiring the plant.
Come to learn more and show your support as we call on Duke Energy to make the right decision for Western North Carolina and retire the coal plant.
On Sept. 25, a legend and true warrior for environmental justice passed away. Lenny Kohm will be sorely missed by hundreds of friends, colleagues and acquaintances.
During the decades that he traveled across the country to protect the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from oil drilling and later to end mountaintop removal mining in Appalachia, Lenny has touched the lives of tens of thousands of people.
A memorial service will be held in his honor at 3 p.m. Oct. 25 in Boone.
Click here to find out how you can join family and friends to celebrate the life, love, and legacy of the late, great Lenny Kohm.
Next round of public meetings set
The Forest Service will hold the next round of public meetings this October and November to share information about the proposed Nantahala and Pisgah National Forest Plan, including potential management areas and desired conditions.
The plan will guide management of the Nantahala-Pisgah National Forests for the next 15-20 years.
The meeting will open with a presentation on significant issues, management areas, and the development of plan components. The Forest Service planning team will share some proposed desired condition statements and information about watersheds and recreation settings during an open poster session.
Each of the scheduled meetings will be from 4:30-7:30 p.m., will follow the same agenda and present the same information and opportunity for review and comment.
Meeting dates and locations:
- Pisgah Ranger District: Oct. 21 at the Forge Valley Event Center in Mills River;
- Nantahala Ranger District: Oct. 28 at the Tartan Hall in Franklin;
- Appalachian Ranger District: Nov. 3 at Mars Hill College, Broyhill Chapel in Mars Hill;
- Tusquitee Ranger District: Oct. 30 at the Tri-County Comm. College, Enloe Building in Murphy;
- Cheoah Ranger District: Nov. 6 at the Graham County Community Center in Robbinsville;
- Grandfather Ranger District: Nov. 13 at McDowell Tech. Comm. College, Room 113 in Marion
The Western North Carolina Alliance will be informing citizens and facilitating their participation in the plan revision process, which will occur over a three-to-four year period. It begins with the Assessment Phase, which will take about a year to complete. During this phase, the Forest Service will collect and compile data and other information on the current state of the Nantahala and Pisgah National Forests. The Planning Phase, which follows the Assessment Phase, will take two to three years to complete. After the plan is completed, the Monitoring Phase will begin and continue until the next plan revision.
In the coming months, the Forest Service will provide details on meetings and other information that foster public participation in the plan revision process. Information about the plan revision process is available online here.
Originally published in 1987, the plan received a significant amendment in 1994. Each national forest and grassland is governed by a management plan in accordance with the National Forest Management Act. These plans set management, protection and use goals and guidelines.
The 2012 Planning Rule guides the planning process. The rule includes stronger protections for forests, water and wildlife, while supporting the economic vitality of rural communities. It requires the use of the best available scientific information to inform decisions. The 2012 rule strengthens the role of public involvement and dialogue throughout the planning process.
