POSHARD SEEKS MORATORIUM; LEGISLATOR WANTS DEBATE ON TIMBER CUTS

MURPHYSBORO, Ill. - While touring recent hardwood timber cuts in the Shawnee National Forest Sunday, U.S. Rep. Glenn Poshard called for a one-year moratorium on timber harvesting in the forest.

The moratorium is needed, he said, because the environmental and economic "soundness" of timber harvesting in national forests still needs to be debated. Congress is considering legislation that would impose a moratorium on timber harvesting in the Shawnee National Forest.

Poshard, D-Carterville, Ill., called for the moratorium while viewing hardwood cuts made by the East Perry Lumber Co. of Frohna. The congressman, accompanied by about a dozen members of the news media, observed areas of the forest that had been cut.

The cutting area of 141 acres is closed to the public. Environmentalists have protested the company's cutting of the timber.

East Perry finished cutting the hardwood trees Thursday afternoon and is now in the process of cutting down 43 acres of pine trees, said Mary Mumford of the U.S. Forest Service. The total hardwood cut, she said, came to 74 truckloads, or 322,000 board feet. Twenty-eight separate group cuts were made, she said.

Several Forest Service employees led Poshard and members of the news media over trails and reseeded tracks left by logging vehicles known as "skidders." The group was shown three areas that had been cut. Forest Service employees estimated the cuts ranged in size from half an acre to an acre.

Inside a one-acre cut, Poshard emphasized his concern with timber harvesting in the national forests by relating the recent discovery of a weed in a small area of South America. The weed, now in a protected area, has a gene that is immune to seven of nine major viruses that attack corn, he said.

If that gene can be transplanted into corn, he said, the result of saving that weed might be that billions of people might be fed.

"Maybe the national forests are the areas we need to preserve for the purpose of biological diversity," Poshard said. "I don't know. I'm just saying we need to be debating that issue.

"I've never said I'm for a no cut policy in the Shawnee. I'm saying we do need time to determine what's sound."

Barring a moratorium, the congressman said he would insist that future cuts already contracted for the forest comply with a new forest management plan being recommended by the Forest Service. The Forest Service is recommending that cuts in the forest be no greater than three-fifths of an acre in size, he said.

Up to two-acre cuts can now be made in the forest, said Poshard. Poshard said he hopes the Forest Service management plan will take effect sometime next year. The plan is being finalized now, he said.

Four or five cuts have been contracted under the current management plan, he said. East Perry will also carry out the next cut, he said. Although East Perry does not legally have to abide by the new management plan, Poshard said he feels the company should follow the new Forest Service recommendation that cuts not exceed three-fifths of an acre.

"That's the most economically and environmentally sound cut," he said.

The congressman called the recent cuts "unsightly," but said they looked better than the 30-acre cuts that used to take place in the forest. From that standpoint, he said, timber harvesting in the forest has come a long way.

Poshard took issue Sunday with the estimated size of one of the cuts. Though the original estimated size of the cut was 1.8 acres, Forest Service employee Stephen C. Hupe put the cut at half an acre.

Poshard said he felt the cut was larger than Hupe's estimate. He also expressed an uneasiness with the discrepancy between the original estimate and Hupe's estimate. The congressman said he was concerned if the Forest Service was going to recommend cuts of three-fifths of an acre under the management plan, but then allow larger cuts.

"If that's going to be the case, I have a problem with that," he said. "I guess my concern is all of us have a mental image in our mind (as to) what constitutes a half acre. For me, that's my yard."

Hupe said he couldn't explain how the discrepancy had occurred.

Hupe told the Southeast Missourian that East Perry had made "uneven-age" cuts, as opposed to "even-age" cuts. In even-age cuts, everything is cut down. But in uneven-age cuts, small patches are cut with the objective of creating an area where there are trees of different ages.

Another Forest Service employee, H. Kent Austin, said gaps in the forest occur naturally. The cuts, he said, are made where they will be the most beneficial in regenerating an area.

Hupe said undesirable trees are cut down, while efforts are made to try to keep flowering trees like dogwoods or redwoods.

East Perry made the hardwood cuts properly, he said.

"We had a really good logging crew in there. They did everything we asked them to do," he said. "We'll be coming through in a year or two to see what kind of regeneration is coming through."