ASA has been busy this summer monitoring public lands around the Applegate River watershed and Siskiyou Crest region. Our work is vast like the ridges of the Siskiyous! We work throughout the region on a wide variety of issues, which we hope will lead to better land management, wilder, more healthy native landscapes, and more appropriate levels of habitat protection. Below are examples of our summer’s work.
Turtle Tales Field Trip
ASA held an online webinar and field trip to Acorn Women Lake about Western pond turtles—a declining species and candidate for listing as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act—with wildlife biologists Jade Keehn, wildlife biologist for the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, and Erin Considine, wildlife biologist for the US Forest Service. We walked around Acorn Women Lake, viewed pond turtles, learned about their ecology, and also participated in a long-term monitoring project at the lake, where an estimated 200+ turtles live.
Siskiyou Crest Coalition Work
This past summer ASA staff has worked to support the Siskiyou Crest Coalition, including the Acorn Women Artist in Residence program and other outreach work in the area. We also helped to organize a successful “moth night,” surveying for moth diversity on the Siskiyou Crest with lepidopterist, Dana Ross. Additionally, Executive Director, Luke Ruediger and Suzie Savoie have also made multiple showings of their Botanical Areas of the Siskiyou Crest presentation, including one for the Friends of the Ahart Herbarium at Chico State University as part of their “All Things Botanical” presentation series. You can view the presentation here.
SOS Project
We are continuing to track and are ready to oppose the BLM’s SOS Project, which proposes over 5,000 acres of heavy industrial logging on BLM lands throughout the Applegate Valley from Thompson Creek to Ruch, and on to Sterling Creek. This project would riddle our beautiful valley in logging scars and targets mostly live, green forests under a false narrative of beetle mortality salvage. Rather than targeting the dead standing snags (which also has significant environmental impacts), the BLM is targeting many of the live stands that survived the recent beetle outbreaks.
Boaz Salvage Timber Sale
We have continued to monitor the BLM’s disastrous Boaz Salvage Timber Sale. This was likely the most egregious BLM sale in the Applegate Valley in recent history, and ASA has been out monitoring the impacts and documenting the damage of BLM logging operations on Cinnabar Ridge, which divides the Upper Applegate Valley from the Little Applegate Valley south of Ruch.
Cedar Flat Timber Sale
We are currently advocating for the BLM to cancel mature and old-growth logging units in the Cedar Flat Timber Sale above Williams, and instead focus on thinning dense tree plantations developed after historic clearcut logging operations. We are also working to encourage better communication and more meaningful public involvement opportunities around this sale. The project is located in Late Successional Reserve forest set aside to protect old forests for the spotted owl, yet currently targets numerous mature and old-growth stands for logging.
UAW Monitoring
We have been out numerous times monitoring Forest Service logging and fuel reduction projects in the Upper Applegate Watershed (UAW) Restoration Project. Our goal is to reduce the impact of future projects by documenting both where it went right and where it went wrong on the Forest Service’s UAW Project.
Middle Fork Dispersed Camping Issues
We have been working to encourage the Forest Service to address dispersed recreation issues, garbage, and inappropriate public use of the Middle Fork Applegate River area, where disperse campsites are expanding into undisturbed areas and creating environmental damage. Garbage and irresponsible use have been a problem on the Middle Fork for many decades and we would like to help turn things around in what should be the gem of the Applegate on the Middle Fork Applegate River.
Subalpine Fir Discovery
In summer 2024 during our Siskiyou Crest Conifer Field Trip Series, ASA Executive Director, Luke Ruediger found the third population of subalpine fir in the Siskiyou Mountains, and this August we visited the site with numerous expert botanists to verify the find and take a voucher specimen to document the newly discovered population just below Dutchman Peak, at the headwaters of Yale Creek. We are also working on a new Siskiyou Crest White Paper about subalpine fir on the Siskiyou Crest.
Meadow Protection
ASA has been working for years to support the protection of meadows on the Siskiyou Crest and in designated Botanical Areas. This summer we have been monitoring areas with historic off-road vehicle problems and encouraging the Forest Service to enforce existing regulations by physically blocking areas and illegal routes leading into closed areas. Our emphasis this past summer has been the monitoring of meadows and openings throughout the region to keep our native plant and pollinator habitats free from off-road vehicle damage.
Wildlife Monitoring
ASA monitors wildlife in the Applegate with various game cameras around the watershed, from low to high elevation. Our goal is to inform our knowledge of wildlife biology in the Applegate, and help track where they live, what their behaviors are, and what threats to wildlife habitat and populations ASA needs to address. ASA’s wildlife monitoring efforts can help bolster protections for wildlife in public land management, including timber sale proposals and other public land advocacy efforts.
Working through the summer heat for the wildlands of the Siskiyou!
ASA works around the clock, throughout the seasons, in the heat, in the rain, and the snow to protect the wildlands of the Siskiyou Crest and defend the public lands of the Applegate River watershed. Yet, this work requires your support to continue. We are always looking for volunteers who love this region and wish to work for its protection. We also guarantee all donations will go straight into our campaigns to protect, defend, rewild and restore the diversity and grandeur of the region!
To volunteer contact: luke@applegatesiskiyou.org