Letter to the Editor: Save our forests

By Sun Advocate

Editor:
What can I say to people that seem to have their heads in the sand? Wake up? Wake up?
Every tree on this planet that is dead or dying should be removed from the forest and taken to a mill to be processed into lumber for building houses, furniture or even a kids playhouse, not left in the forest to infect the healthy trees.
If the enviros were truly concerned about our forests, I am sure they would agree with this type of thinking, but sadly this doesnt seem to be the case, as every attempt to salvage this vast resource is blocked with injunction after injunction until the timber is not only worthless but all the trees are dead due to infestation or disease.
Doesnt it make more sense to harvest a crop for the good of the people and the forest, rather than to do nothing and watch it all go up in smoke?
In the near future, children will see forests in textbooks or on the computer, but not in the mountains.
The people who live, play, work in the forests should have the right to say what can or cannot be done to help the forest.
The people who sit around in the cities, in their coffee shops, or wherever and condemn others for this or that should instead be asking themselves, what have we done to help the forests?
After looking at the forests one can truly see just what great things the enviros have done for us.
Road closures. So no one can go into the forests (public land) unless they are fit enough. What about the grandparents and grandchildren, the old and crippled and the disabled? Are we not taxpayers with the same rights to visit our public lands?
I could go on and on and will later, but for now the sun is setting on the mountains and as I say good night to them from my back porch, I wonder what can I, one man do to help right this terrible wrong that is befalling our great forests? I need your help people; so please wake up and take a look for yourself what is happening to our forests from Mexico to Alaska.
It needs to be treated like the national emergency it is.
My qualifications for speaking out on this issue are that I grew up in the wooded northwest. Fishing, hunting, camping, gathering mushrooms (edible), berries, firewood, were a big part of my life. Kids today havent a clue what it was like before the great enviros made it so much better.
Back to the point. As a ranch hand, logger, and even tree planter, I learned more about mother nature than any classroom can teach, Ive lived and worked in some of the toughest jobs on the planet and loved it. Through the sun, wind, rain, snow, heat and cold. It was a great life until I was injured and weakened.
So now I feel I owe our forests something for the great memories I have of when I worked and played in a healthy, managed, prosperous, environment. Not the neglected, dying forests, I see before me now, so yes I am going to continue to be a voice, trying to give our once great forests a lot of CPR and TLC.
Who knows, maybe good ole common sense will get revived in the process.