Seeing the Forest
Almost half of the world’s original forests have been
cleared or degraded. So naturally, most people think of the “forest
restoration” movement as an effort to re-plant these lost trees.
But it’s time to see restoration as more than just the
trees.
Restoration is really about improving landscapes throughout
the world that are deforested, degraded, or underutilized. Boosting the
productivity of these landscapes helps take pressure off the world’s remaining
forests while also providing a host of tangible benefits—from food security to
clean water to carbon sequestration.
"Seeing the Forest" tells the story of how the
Siuslaw became a restoration forest that successfully manages ecosystems while
putting people to work. This 30-minute documentary film features partners,
Forest Service staff and leadership, and Jim Furnish, past Siuslaw Forest
Supervisor and retired Deputy Chief of the USFS, describing how the forest
navigated the last several decades of changing federal forest practices in
collaboration with a wide range of partners.
The Siuslaw National Forest and its partners began working
with community members to restore the natural functions of the estuary to the
benefit of the salmon, plants, birds, animals and people who call it home. Last
week construction begins on an interpretive site north of Lincoln City that
will help visitors and residents better understand the estuary’s significance
and impact.
Residential and commercial development in the mid 1900s
impacted the intertidal portion of the estuary. For more than 40 years the
Siuslaw National Forest, with a diverse range of partners, has been acquiring
tidal marsh in the estuary in order to bring back the tides. The estuary was
restored incrementally from 1978 through 2017. Nearly the entire estuary is now
restored to a natural, historic tidal regime, resulting in significant
fisheries response and native biodiversity.
We're returning natural functions to altered landscapes,
focusing on creating and maintaining healthy ecosystems: estuaries, old growth
forests, meadows, coastal dunes. We are working to repair whole watersheds,
across river basins, from ridge-top to the ocean.
Once widespread old growth forest, coastal meadow and
estuary habitats steadily disappeared, converted to other uses, leading to
‘threatened and endangered listing’ of several species, including Northern
spotted owl, marbled murrelet, coho salmon, snowy plover and silverspot
butterfly.
Watersheds and ecosystems cover large areas, spanning many
different land ownerships. Effective restoration must be a coordinated,
cooperative effort, engaging neighbors to address habitat problems together.
The complexity, size and expense of this type of restoration are beyond the
capacity of any one person or organization.
Partnerships are key to this effort.
Unprecedented agreements between agencies, universities and community members
emerged to implement the work of restoration. Scientific research, technical
expertise and collaboration ingenuity can produce a new model of restoration that
will benefit ecosystems and communities for years to come.
The Siuslaw Watershed Council supports sound economic, social
and environmental uses of natural and human resources in the Siuslaw River
Basin. The Council encourages cooperation among public and private watershed
entities to promote awareness and understanding of watershed functions by
adopting and implementing a total watershed approach to natural resource
management and production.
