Hungry Lion project includes logging, trails
The Hungry Horse/Glacier View ranger district recently released a finding of no significant impact for the Hungry Lion Project, a blend of timber sales, roadwork and trailwork planned for the Desert Mountain-Lion Lake area.
The proposed plan calls for about 2,614 acres of logging that would produce merchantable timber including 899 acres of “seed tree” logging, which is more intense thinning that leaves just select larger seed tree left.
Most of the logging is in small units along the Emery Creek Road and near Emery Bay on the east side of the Hungry Horse Reservoir.
Other smaller units are just outside the Coram Experimental Forest near Abbot Bay.
The plan also calls for 3.8 miles of temporary roads and the reconstruction of 4.8 miles of old road that will be placed into storage after the project is completed.
The plan also calls for about 759 acres of prescribed burns.
In addition, about 12 miles of historic trail will be added, the longest is a trail that runs through the Coram Experimental Forest on the flank of Desert Mountain.
Sarah Canepa, project team leader for the Forest Service said the trail is currently in use, but is not to Forest standards. As such, the Forest will look to work with mountain biking and other groups to improve the trail in the future so it has line of sight and other standards. When the project was first proposed, some groups criticized allowing mountain biking on the trail, as it’s in grizzly bear habitat and bikers have been mauled and even killed when encountering grizzlies.
Brad Treat, a Forest Service Law Enforcement officer was killed after he ran into a grizzly bear while biking on a system of trails near West Glacier not far from Desert Mountain.
The Flathead Area Mountain Bikers Association supports the addition of the trail to the system.
Canepa said the Forest understood bear concerns, but also noted the trail is already being used. Bringing it up to standards, with better line of sight along its route, and with signage, should make it safer.
“We want to manage it so that we don’t have resource damage,” she noted, but also added that the Forest can’t eliminate risk while recreating in bear country.
To comply with core grizzly bear habitat standards, the Forest proposes berming another old road that runs up the west flank of Desert Mountain.
She said the Coram Experimental Forest is open to recreational uses, but “wants to keep it focused,” so that experimental plots nearby aren’t damaged, which is another reason for upgrading the trail, commonly referred to as the Trough Trail.
The trail is used by hikers, bikers and by horsemen. Canepa said that some horse users have objected to the mountain bike use.
Another interesting aspect of the project is it calls for a fishing pier on Lion Lake. The project now goes through a 45-day objection process. Only parties that commented on the initial environmental assessment can object. After that, the Forest Service takes another 45 days to respond.
Some portion of the projects could happen by fall, Canepa said, as a final decision should come in late August.