Kings River Project
On February 11, 2008 the Sierra National Forest decided to withdraw the 2006 Record of Decision (ROD) on the The Kings River Project. The Forest Service will be proposing a new Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement which according to Forest Service documents will include new information regarding the status and threats to the Pacific fisher in the plan area. This withdrawal is an important victory for the Pacific fisher and the forest ecosystem as a whole.
Part of the rationale for withdrawing the Kings River decision is the release of preliminary scientific findings conducted by the Conservatio Biology Institute (CBI). CBI has been under contract to conduct a habitat assesment of the Pacific fisher in the southern Sierra Nevada with money allocated in 2006 by the Bush Administration and distributed through the U.S. Forest Service. This $225,000 investment sought to determine the cumulative impacts that logging operations and habitat alteration have on the long-term viability on the remaining (estimated as roughly 350 individuals) fisher in the region. Initial findings from this habitat assessment have at least in part lead the Forest Service to withdraw their Record of Decision and propose a new plan for the Kings River area.
What changes are made to the proposed project in the new plan documents will be an important measure of what impact this new habitat research has had on the decision makers at the Forest Service. Without a significant change to the size, intensity, and scope of the Kings River Project which greatly reduces the potential negative impacts on the Pacific fisher and other at-risk species the forthcoming planning project could again be one which is not supported by conservation organizations and independent wildlife biologists.
The withdrawn Kings River Project was a 131,500 acre logging project planned for the High Sierra Ranger District on the Sierra National Forest south of Yosemite. It is an "adaptive management experiment" that was likely to extinguish two highly at-risk species, the Pacific Fisher and the Yosemite Toad, both of which are candidates for listing under the Endangered Species Act.
The Kings River Project was exempted from the 2004 Framework revisions which itself weakened the conservation-focused 2001 Framework Plan.
Phase I (Alternative 1) of the Kings River Project included 13,800 acres of aggressive thinning of trees up to 35" diameter, and over 600 acres of group selection clearcuts up to 3 acres in size.
Kings River Project is home to the very rare Pacific Fisher (Martes pennanti) which in April 8, 2004 (Federal Register 18770) was determined to be warranted for listing under the Federal Endangered Species Act in the 12-month Finding by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (under the Bush Administration). There was little debate about the risk of extinction of the fisher in the southern Sierra.
While the Fish and Wildlife Service (FR 18773 4-8-04) found logging and openings (forest fragmentation) to be damaging to the fisher and one of the primary causes of their potential demise, the Kings River project would have fostered aggressive logging in the heart of the remaining fisher population.