Pisgah Old-Growth Forest is Surprisingly Large
11/11/97
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Headline: Pisgah Old-Growth Forest is Surprisingly Large
Source: The Associated Press
Date: 11/11/97
Copyright 1997 The News and Observer Publishing
Company Raleigh, North Carolina
ASHEVILLE -- A first-time, on-the-ground
survey of Pisgah National Forest has
documented 38,900 acres of old-growth forest,
the largest known acreage in the southern
Appalachians outside the Great Smoky
Mountains National Park.
"This old forest is a national treasure.
It's irreplaceable," said Tom Hatley,
director of the Southern Appalachian Forest
Coalition.
Old-growth researcher Rob Messick, 20
crew members and 170 other volunteers
examined 64 sites in Pisgah's Grandfather
District over four years. They measured 2,843
of the largest trees, took 351 core samples
and noted details about the forest ecosystem
of each site.
Messick released the final results
Monday.
"Messick's findings are simply
astounding," said Mary Byrd Davis, editor of
the book "Eastern Old Growth Forests." "Among
eastern national forests, Pisgah now ranks
second only to Superior in Minnesota for
documented old-growth acreage."
Previous old-growth maps of the district
by the U.S. Forest Service were based on old
logging data fed into computers, Messick
said. He said those maps, which show only
small patches of old growth, have led to the
idea that no significant old growth remains
in the region.
But a spokesman for the U.S. Forest
Service in Asheville said a 1994 survey
showed 133,000 acres of potential old growth
in the Pisgah and Nantahala forests.
Spokesman Terry Seyden had seen an earlier,
preliminary study but not the final one
issued Monday.
In addition, Seyden said, the Forest
Service has established zones of forests 80
to 100 years as future old growth.
"Based on the preliminary report, our
understanding is the large majority of forest
identified as old growth ... is not scheduled
for any kind of timber harvest," he said.
The coalition said that of the newly
documented old growth, 26 percent is fully
protected from logging. About 10,000 acres of
that lies within the Linville Gorge
Wilderness Area, the only land in the study
area with full protection.
But Seyden said most of the rest of the
old-growth forests are in areas not
recommended for commercial timber harvest,
partially because they are rugged and
inaccessible. Such areas include the
5,000-acre Mackey Mountain site in McDowell
County, he said.
Messick considers the site the survey's
most significant find. Some of this land was
part of the federal government's first
purchase of under the Weeks Act of 1911,
which established national forests in the
eastern United States.
"Mackey Mountain is a living legacy of
the intent of the Weeks Act, which was to
protect watersheds by protecting forests,"
Messick said.
Mackey Creek, which flows from the area,
provides water for the town of Marion, he
said.
The 189,000-acre Grandfather District is
part of the Blue Ridge Mountain chain in the
southern Appalachians, with some of the
highest peaks in the eastern United States.
The team found eight major forest types
and subtypes in the district. The largest
trees found were two tulip poplars, 5 feet in
diameter. The oldest trees documented through
core samples were a 331-year-old Eastern
hemlock and a 330-year-old tulip poplar.
The coalition clearly hopes to use the
survey results to argue against logging in
the area. Messick said he found that 710
clear-cuts have occurred in the district
since 1970.
"We need a moratorium on logging
activity within or near old-growth forests,"
he said. "These are the last of the great
forests of the upper Catawba River Basin.
There are some of our nation's richest core
areas of habitat, as well an irreplaceable
part of our heritage."