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Watershed health gets district attention By Vickie Aldous Ashland Daily Tidings With work under way to reduce wildfire hazard on nearly 1,550 acres in the Ashland Watershed, the Ashland Ranger District has turned its attention to the health of the entire Watershed and adjacent lands. The Upper Bear Ecosystem Assessment project is a comprehensive examination of the state of 41,000 acres on this side of Mount Ashland, about two-thirds of which is under U.S. Forest Service jurisdiction. Ultimately, the assessment could lead to on-the-ground work to increase the landscape's resistance to large-scale natural disturbances, especially wildfire. Nearly a century of fire suppression has created an unnaturally dense forest at risk of high-intensity wildfire. "We need to create a resilient system that will withstand wildfire," said Ashland District Ranger Linda Duffy. Not all of the 41,000 acres would be treated, she noted. The Upper Bear Ecosystem Assessment project, scheduled to be completed in May, includes an update of the 1996 Mount Ashland Late Successional Reserve Assessment. That update will feature a description of past and current forest conditions, as well as a preferred future condition for resiliency. Several categories of vegetation types, or Plant Association Groups, will be described in the document. Those descriptions provide a solid foundation for treating the Watershed, according to City of Ashland Forestry Consultant Marty Main, who treats city lands in the Watershed and is coordinating with the ranger district across jurisdictions. Main said plant associations close to the city are dominated by hardwoods, brush fields and dense Douglas fir and pine stands. But farther up in the Watershed, moisture levels rise, high elevation trees grow and the frequency of naturally occurring wildfire drops, according to Main. "Rather than one uniform (treatment) prescription that fits the entire Watershed, you can base your actions on what is appropriate for the changes that are taking place on the landscape as you go from the bottom to the top of the Watershed," he said. Like the work begun on 1,550 acres in the 15,000-acre Watershed, the assessment marks a departure from traditional U.S. Forest Service practices to clear wildfire fuel breaks along strategic ridgetops, Main said. Launched in 2001, the multi-year work currently underway thins small diameter trees and brush across a broader area than just fuel breaks, while leaving trees larger than 17 inches in diameter. Fire experts generally agree that thinning broad areas of forest is more effective - though more expensive - than relying on fuel breaks. Howard Heiner, a retired forester and member of the Ashland Watershed Stewardship Alliance that helped craft the project, said he is pleased to see the ranger district undertaking the expanded analysis. "The present project treats 10 percent of the Watershed over eight years," Heiner said. "My concern is I would like to see the whole Watershed treated in 10 years, as far as the fire risk reduction part of it." Liz Crosson, outreach coordinator for the Ashland and Williams-based Klamath Siskiyou Wildlands Center, said the environmental group supports non-commercial thinning and prescribed burns concentrated on the interface where the city and forest meet. "We would like to see the watershed moving toward a more fire resilient forest. Fire is part of the system," she said. Crosson cautioned that the ecological values of the late successional - or old growth - reserve should be protected and large, fire-resistant trees should not be cut. In addition to an update of the late successional reserve assessment, the Upper Bear Ecosystem Assessment includes a fire management plan, roads analysis, Bear Watershed Assessment update and an integrated assessment of all the components. Work on those documents is not subject to public comment under the National Environmental Policy Act. However, Duffy is keeping members of the Ashland Watershed Stewardship Alliance and other interested members of the public apprised of developments, and is open to input. Forest Service officials will use the documents to guide the development of an Environmental Assessment or Environmental Impact Statement detailing treatment alternatives, according to Duffy. Those environmental analyses, scheduled to begin in May, will be subject to public comment. Forest Service staff plan to complete the analysis process in about six months, Duffy said. "(New Rogue River and Siskiyou National Forest Supervisor) Scott Conroy is very supportive of fuel hazard reduction work in the Watershed," Duffy said. "He's put priority on it for the Forest. He's given me ambitious timelines." In contrast, analysis on the initial Watershed treatment project bogged down for years in controversy until community members and Forest Service staff developed the plan to leave large trees alone and treat broader areas. Whatever treatment plan is eventually chosen, the results should be carefully monitored, preferably by community members who can be trained to do the work, according to stewardship alliance member Richard Hart, an ecologist and expert in biophysical monitoring. "Monitoring reduces the assumptions," he said. "The Ashland Watershed is too sensitive and critical to work based on assumptions. We need to refine the treatments through assessment monitoring. You don't need to be an 'ologist' to do it." Hart said he hopes to develop a monitoring funding proposal to be presented to the local Resource Advisory Committee, which makes recommendations for the distribution of federal funds for environmental and recreational projects. 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