Logging in Alaska? (environment, jobs, health)

[Katie_girl]

I was just wondering if there is a very big logging industry in Alaska? I know there is some since a few years ago my dad was offered a job up there, but what about the logistics...few roads, is it mainly helicopter? What about mill work? I've just never seen logging listed as an industry on this forum and was curious.
thanks

[Metlakatla]

.....

don't let me commence.

Or rather, allow me to do exactly that, since the beautiful Tongass National Rain Forest can't speak for itself, at least not in language that most people can even begin to understand.

Start here.

Tongass National Forest - National Geographic Magazine

[DannyL]

the rape and pillage of the Tongass (or rather commonly known as "clear cut logging") has left Ketchican a dying town and POW a shambles.
But who cares, it's only trees and they do grow back, maybe in 200 years that is.......

[mal_flisk]

Old growth clear cut. Yep. A renewable resource. And Japan deserves every bit of lumber we can ship to them. I just LOVE to see a hillside with a solid line of trees on one side and a sharp clear line of scrub and dirt on the other. Makes me proud of all the 3M surveyors and Weyerhauser folks. Yep. Mudslides, due to a lack of roots to soak up and hold water. It's a beautiful thing.

Just ask anyone.

[Glitch]

Originally Posted by Katie_girl

I was just wondering if there is a very big logging industry in Alaska? I know there is some since a few years ago my dad was offered a job up there, but what about the logistics...few roads, is it mainly helicopter? What about mill work? I've just never seen logging listed as an industry on this forum and was curious.
thanks

There is still logging in Alaska, but it is hardly what it used to be prior to 1995. The environmental nut jobs, with the aid of Democrats in Congress, Clinton, and the GOP drafted NAFTA put several thousand Alaskans out of work by 1995.

Despite myths to the contrary, forest growth in the US exceeds harvest by 37%. More than 730 million acres of forest cover the US - that equals two-thirds of the forested area present when Columbus landed in America. There is now 28% more standing timber volume in the US than in 1952.

With 16.8 million acres, the Tongass National Forestis the largest national forest in the US. Although established in 1907, only 400,000 acres have been harvested to date. That's only 4% of the 9.5 million forested acres on the Tongass in almost 90 years.

Only 8% of the lumber harvested from the Tongass National Forest is exported, the remaining 92% stays in the US. People, even Alaskans, have a lot of errorenous misconceptions about logging in Alaska.

[nightphoenix]

Originally Posted by Glitch

Despite myths to the contrary, forest growth in the US exceeds harvest by 37%. More than 730 million acres of forest cover the US - that equals two-thirds of the forested area present when Columbus landed in America.

Take a drive through the lower 48 and you'll see that such a statistic simply cannot be true, unless they're fudging the numbers to include 2 year old growth as "forested land"...or trees in peoples front yards as forested land. Or "plantations" where forests never existed historically....or perhaps they're including Canada in that statistic since "the Americas" is what Columbus landed in, and not the "U.S."...if you include Canada then yeah, 2/3 is still forested....the 1/3 that's gone is almost entirely in the lower 48.

I believe there are dozens of ways these numbers get fudged to make it look like logging was never a threat to the environment, ever. Another point people forget is that things are indeed better than they were say 30 years ago....but the part forgotten is the 'why' this is so..why are things better than say 40 years ago?....That would be because of the laws, protections, education and motivation by environmental "nuts" to plant trees, to reforest land long ago lost to "modernization" etc....without them, the lower 48 would be very, very different than it is today.

There is now 28% more standing timber volume in the US than in 1952.

Considering Alaska wasn't part of the U.S. in 1952, but now is, I have no doubt that that statistic is absolutely true. When you add Alaska into the mix, then sure, things look great in a statistical average. Another example of how the stats can be fudged to make things to be better than they really are.

I have zero knowledge of logging in Alaska, but my perception is that the amount of logging that goes on there isn't detrimental to the ecosystem because Alaska is so darn big. But I do plead lack of knowledge about Alaskan logging....however at least in the midwest and western great lakes regions of the lower 48, the stats are at best fudged to make things out to be better than they really are. How could it even be possible to have more forests, when urban sprawl is taking over the country? (again, including trees in people's front yards [perhaps???)

BTW I'm not anti logging at all....I know several loggers, I heat almost entirely with wood, but simply don't believe all the stats about there being more trees than 20 years ago....my eyes tell a different story, at least in my part of the country. (by trees I mean trees taller than I am...I don't count clear cuts even though I should) Like I said, Alaska is I'm sure a different story, and if I ever lived there I would choose to heat with wood, and maybe have a log home, etc....But clear cutting old growth forests isn't a good thing for the ecosystem, and massive clear cuts destroys everyone's businesses and way of life except for the logging industry. (small clear cuts I find ok as they simulate a small forest fire, especially if the area is burned afterwards when they burn brush)

Anyways, I have to cut this short as company just arrived....hope no one takes this this wrong way, just giving my perspective from the lower 48. thats all!

[Metlakatla]

My home is not a "myth to the contrary". I live in the Tongass and have seen firsthand what has been done to POW. As far as putting Alaskans out of work...the majority of people employed in the timber industry here have always been from the lower 48.

[Metlakatla]

This is an interesting read, nightphoenix...I'm not a Christian scientist myself, but I was looking through material on the subject that wasn't from an environmental nut type of publication:

Tree cutting by the numbers | csmonitor.com

This is interesting too:

Powell's Books - The Book of the Tongass by

[rotorhead]

Like the old Mark Twain adage...

Theres lies, damn lies, and then there's statistics.

Using a "quantity over quality" measure for the health of US forests is disingenuous at best, and more likely a forest products industry-sponsered spin campaign.

The fact that there are a lot of new acres in trees is true, but it's almost exclusively in the gigantic, company owned "tree plantations" that cover huge swaths of the rural Southern US. You can drive for miles and see nothing but sugar pine forest, all the same height, perfectly spaced in laser-straight rows, like evergreen cornfields. The fields are owned by the big timber and pulp companies, and have all the biological diversity of a field of soybeans.

Comparing that kind of pine monoculture to the rainforest of SE Alaska is like comparing a McDonalds hamburger patty to a fillet mignon of Kobe beef. Yeah, they're both technically beef. Yes, they both come from cows. I know which one I'd rather have on MY plate.

Am I saying that there should be NO logging in SE Alaska? No. Am I saying that turning centuries old, fine grained, gigantic Sitka Spruce logs into mass-market 2x4s or pulp for toilet paper is a criminal shame?

You be the judge, but it's not really a very hard call.

[Katie_girl]

Wow, I wasn't expecting the depth of all the comments...they were great. I guess I should have been since from experience I know that this is an emotional subject. My dad logged for years and years in NE Oregon where most loggers practice responsible logging that keeps forest fires to a minimum. I do know that when some logging company from California came in and clear cut an area, my dad, a true logger, would almost cry every time driving by that. In the '90s Andy Kerr moved into our backyard and put my dad and most of the county out of work...pretty much shut down everything except tourism. Since then Oregon's been burning up fast.
A few years ago president Bush came to Oregon and looked over a mountain that had been ravaged by a wildfire. The difference between the part that had been thinned and the part that had been left to nature was extarodianary and he said that he would work to restore these logging practices(still only one mill back open in the county though) because they perserved the forest or something of the nature. When asked what he would do about the enviromentalist protesting any logging he said he'd tell them to come out and stand right where he was standing and see the difference. (I only wish this would have worked and something would have came of it for real not just a good speech).
So, I definetly agree with you, clear cutting a forest should be illegal, but remember that not all logging is hazardous and really is needed for a healthy forest.

But anyway, my original question was just meant to find out more about industry in Alaska, but thanks for all the good information on actual people of Alaska's views on this subject. I love a good discussion and hearing the diversity of everyone's beliefs.