As we close our this year and look ahead to 2026, hear directly from Quinn about what’s at stake, and how we’re rising to meet the moment.
Author: Anastasia Kuznetsova
Keep standing with us for our last wild places!
Thanks to advocates like you, the Senate stripped out provisions to sell off public lands from its budget reconciliation proposal. That was a major win for our public lands—and a testament to a growing movement of public lands advocates.
But we cannot let our guard down. Public lands are still under serious threat (here’s a quick run-down), including new attacks on some of our most intact forestlands.
Saving our wild, roadless places
The Trump administration has announced plans to eliminate the Roadless Rule, a longstanding safeguard that protects nearly 2 million acres of Oregon’s forests and 58 million acres nationwide from destructive logging and development. These include beloved places like the Metolius River, Lost Lake, the Oregon Dunes, Mount Hebo, Hardesty Mountain, Tumalo Mountain, and the Upper Hood River Valley.
Roadless areas are some of the most intact landscapes we have left. They provide clean drinking (and brewing) water for communities like Bend, Eugene, and Salem. They shelter fish and wildlife, and offer quiet, wild recreation.
These last, best places need your voice to defend them.
We have an opportunity to push back against eliminating the Roadless Rule AND to pass long-lasting protections for these special places so they won’t be subject to a president’s meddling. Take action now to support these vital landscapes! And please reach out if you want to get more involved in defending roadless wild lands.
We need you for “Call of the Wild”
Each year, Oregon Brewshed® Alliance members help make our annual camp themed fundraiser a success by promoting the event and by donating to the silent auction.
We need ten Brewshed® partners to each donate a $50 gift card and some schwag (pint glass, hat, etc). Click here to let us know if you can donate!
This year’s event – on October 10 in Portland – will be a spirited celebration of the wildlands and wildlife that unite and inspire us – because joy and fun are powerful forms of resistance!
Brewshed® Partner of the Month: Cascade Lakes Brewing
Founded in 1994, Cascade Lakes Brewing Co. is one of Central Oregon’s pioneering breweries, and in recent years became the region’s first not-for-profit brewery!
Since joining the Oregon Brewshed® Alliance in 2023, Cascade Lakes has participated in two Earth Day Wild & Scenic Collaborations (including a delicious Blossom Bar Pale Ale this year) and has donated auction items for Call of the Wild.
Huge thanks to Cascade Lakes Brewing Co. for your continued support!
Featured Brewshed®: McKenzie River
Long recognized for its high quality, the waters of the McKenzie River originate in the high mountains and ancient forests of the Cascades before flowing downstream to provide clean drinking water to over 200,000 people in the Eugene-Springfield area. This Brewshed also supplies several Brewshed® Alliance partners with that same key ingredient to making good beer–clean water.
Check out our recent blog on the McKenzie River to learn more about the McKenzie River, the unique values it provides, and current efforts by Oregon Wild and the Oregon Brewshed® Alliance to protect this important watershed.
Portland, OR April 18, 2024
Statement of Steve Pedery, Conservation Director.
| For More information, contact Steve Pedery. |
On behalf of our more than 20,000 members and supporters, Oregon Wild applauds the Biden administration’s adoption of an important new rule to conserve and protect America’s public lands managed by the US Bureau of Land Management (BLM). This federal rule directs the BLM to ensure conservation and recreation are on equal footing with natural resource extraction. For far too long, destructive uses of these lands by corporations and development interests has been elevated above the American people’s interest in seeing them preserved as legacy for future generations.
The release of the final Conservation Rule is a major step forward in protecting America’s wildlands, wildlife, and waters, as well as protecting and promoting responsible outdoor recreation and safeguarding cultural resources.
We are especially pleased that the rule recognizes the importance of America’s mature and old-growth forests as one of our best natural climate and carbon solutions, as well as vital habitat for countless species. In the months and years ahead, we look forward to working with the BLM to ensure they faithfully implement these goals, and the direction they received from President Biden in Executive Order 14072. The President directed the BLM and US Forest Service to identify threats to mature and old-growth forests, and to develop and implement policies to protect and restore them.
Unfortunately, in Oregon the protection of these critical forests has fallen short. The BLM is currently proposing to log hundreds of acres of mature and old-growth forests on public lands in southwest Oregon in the Poor Windy logging sale. Similar BLM logging proposals would destroy mature and old-growth forests on other public lands in western Oregon.
While we celebrate this announcement, we hope to see the Biden Administration and the BLM go further. America needs a strong, permanent rule banning the commercial logging of mature and old-growth forests on our public lands.
Last year, in anticipation of our 50th anniversary, the Oregon Wild team began working with a local design agency to create a new logo and brand identity, the first update since we adopted the Oregon Wild name in 2006.
Our goal was to capture the essence of this place we call Oregon, of the important role we all play in protecting it, and of the fierce need for our mission to continue. We wanted to feature the untamed wildlands, waters, and wildlife that define Oregon’s landscape while ensuring that our new identity embodied the fighting spirit of our community. As we look to the future, our brand will channel the tenacity, assertiveness, and fierce love required to safeguard the places and wildlife beloved by us all.
At the heart of our new identity lies a representation of our mission.
The bear icon is based on a photo of a black bear taken in the Oregon Coast Range by a friend of Oregon Wild. The bear is both a silent protector of the landscape and asking you what you will do for the wild.
The hawk is an homage to the old mark.
The stylized fringe of the hill marks the shape of the land; it could also read as claw marks, a bird’s wing, a feather, ferns, or other natural elements. The hill breaks the frame that surrounds it as a metaphor for boundless and uncontained (wild) nature.
The orange ring frames our mission’s urgency, a visual alarm calling on us all to take action.
The background blue is inspired by the distinctive aquamarine waters of Oregon’s streams.
Yes, we have a new logo. But, at our core, Oregon Wild remains the same. A scrappy, tenacious group of people standing up for Oregon’s wild places so that nature in Oregon doesn’t just survive, but thrives.
In the coming weeks, we will begin releasing our new brand into the wild. You will notice updated emails, print materials, merchandise, and a new website. We hope that they will ignite your own protector instinct for Oregon’s wildlands, wildlife, and waters for many years to come.
