Trail Creek salvage project approved

The Forest Service announced last week it had approved a plan to salvage timber from the 2015 Trail Creek Fire, just east of Spotted Bear and south of the Great Bear Wilderness.

The sale would harvest 834 acres of commercial timber, with a yield of about 4.3 million board feet. The project requires about 3.3 miles of new system road construction on existing road templates and about 1.6 miles of temporary road construction. Roads will not be open to motorized use and will be reclaimed after project use. After the harvest, there will be reforestation, shrub planting and a culvert removal, as well as removing hazardous trees along two miles of roads that are open seasonally in and near developed recreation areas and along approximately 16 miles of system trails, The Forest Service said last week.

“I feel the selected activities balance the comments received by all interested parties, with project design features that limit impacts to all resources yet still have a beneficial economic impact to our local community,” Spotted Bear District Ranger Deb Mucklow said.

Some environmental groups have objected to the sale, because of its proximity to the Great Bear Wilderness.

The bulk of the logging would be in the Bent and South Creek areas, just north of the Spotted Bear River, with a smaller unit near Big Bill.

Several of the units were already slated for logging under the Spotted Bear River project of 2011, noted project leader Matt Shaffer.

The Trail Creek Fire burned about 22,195 acres last summer and was one of the biggest fires in the state.

It burned largely in an unroaded area north of the Spotted Bear River and in the Great Bear Wilderness, where logging is not allowed.

The sale amounts to less than 4 percent of the fire area.