Oregon WildBlog

Hi, I am Kelby! I just recently joined Oregon Wild as the Ochoco Mountains Outreach and Stewardship Intern for the 2019 summer. Coming from Colorado, I grew up outdoors and have fostered a love for nature which has pushed me to pursue a career in conservation. This passion for conservation work has come from my love of animals and nature that I have had my entire life. 

Here we are heading into the holiday weekend with another hike to share from Oregon Wild’s recently released book, Oregon’s Ancient Forests: A Hiking Guide, by Chandra LeGue. We hope these hikes inspire you to get outside this summer and to check out the new book! 

HB 2020 wasn’t perfect, but the unholy alliance of logging barons, militia groups, and anti-environmental politicians that killed it should be deeply disturbing to all Oregonians.

I haven’t been out hiking this spring and early summer as much as I’d like. (Most of you readers can probably say the same, right?)

I think many have the wrong idea about what it is that I, and the rest of us at Oregon Wild, do day in and day out. While we do get out to enjoy our forests and rivers every chance we get, the day to day work of protecting our wildlands, forests, and wildlife habitat takes place mostly on a keyboard, on conference calls with other advocates, or around a table with other interested parties - not all of whom agree with what we do. 

The recent decision to adopt a weak Wolf Management Plan wasn’t the outcome we were hoping for, but we’re not done fighting for Oregon’s wolves, and hope you’re not either. The team at Oregon Wild would like to express our sincere gratitude to all of you for the countless actions you’ve taken to ensure that wolf recovery remains on track in Oregon. Onward.

Today, we are presenting to you Kentucky Falls (no, not the haircut), located west of Eugene in the Siuslaw National Forest in Oregon’s Central Coast Range. This out-and-back hike takes you through ancient Douglas-fir forests to three incredible waterfalls. 

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We are excited to be kicking off our summer series of featured hikes! We will be featuring hikes in Oregon’s treasured old growth forests in celebration of our forthcoming hiking guide, Oregon’s Ancient Forests, by our very own Chandra LeGue. We hope these posts will inspire your summer adventures and also give you a little taste of what this comprehensive guidebook has to offer.

Last week, the Wallowa-Whitman National Forest shared remote camera photos of “Stormy,” a wolverine first documented in the NE Oregon forest for the better part of a decade. According to the post from the forest’s Facebook page, Stormy is “recognizable from his unique gular patch, a lighter-colored patch of fur on the throat and chest.”

Working in rural communities on the Oregon coast, I spend a lot of time with folks who, like myself, are impacted by the logging industry in many ways. Everyone I work with suffers the negative impacts of logging: Polluted water and reduced streamflows, landslides dumping mud into rivers and smothering fish eggs, and the mass poisoning of native flora and fauna from the sky. These rural communities are left with crumbling roads and schools as the industry has decreased their own taxes and automated as much of their operation as they could. 

Disappointed and disheartened. Those are the first words that come to mind when I think of the Fish and Wildlife Commission’s decision last Friday to accept ODFW’s indefensible Wolf Plan, affirming what we’ve known for a while: overwhelming public opinion and sound science take a backseat to special interest influence. Unfortunately, it’s Oregon wolves who will pay the ultimate price for this weak management Plan.