The Crested Butte News Serving the Gunnison Valley since 1999
Logging to fight fire and beetle danger
As many as four logging trucks per day will be rumbling along the Kebler Pass Road this summer.
Montrose Forest Products (MFP) has been hired by Floresta Partners to thin trees on the private Floresta Ranch, near the Floresta Townsite. Operations are set to begin June 20.
“Government foresters believe it hasn’t burned in 200-plus years,” says Ted Colvin of Floresta Partners.
“One of the primary reasons for this is fire mitigation,” says Bill Gallen, who works with Colvin. A second, related and more pressing reason is the spruce bark beetle, a scourge ravaging Colorado forests.
“The beetle is already there [at the ranch],” says Colvin, “and more are on the way. They’re coming up through the Ohio Creek Valley and they’re going to pop on over and onto us.”
Local Colorado State Forest Service forester Sam Pankratz, he says, has encouraged and supports this thinning project.
“The state is clamoring for private land owners to do this,” says Gallen. Thinning, he says, will reduce the density of the stand, hampering proliferation of the beetle. It will also promote biodiversity and will improve the overall health of the forest.
“We’ve spent $400,000 to-date on forest management work,” says Colvin. With this phase, just over 500 acres will be thinned.
“We’re fortunate a mill in Montrose is now taking sub-alpine fir,” notes Colvin. MFP operates that facility and will contract to cut and haul the usable trees from the property site to the mill.
This, explains Colvin, makes a project of this scale feasible. “It’s revenue neutral,” he says. Proceeds from the sale of the sub-alpine fir will pay for the thinning of other trees, and for any additional chipping, mulching, burning and clearing required.
MFP is the same company associated with some $50,000 in damage to a USFS road on the Alpine Plateau during a log haul last winter, the result of overweight trucks.
“That’s the road that leads from Highway 50 to the Arrowhead subdivision,” says Gunnison Forest District manager John Murphy. “It’s a Forest Service road, but the county maintains it for us. Working together, we put about $70,000 into that road.”
To their credit, Murphy says, MFP is cooperating, and making requested repairs. “So far, so good. Hopefully, the work they do will meet with the approval of the County and the Arrowhead Homeowners’ Association,” says Murphy.
Colvin assures that MFP is aware of the sensitivity of the Floresta area. “They’ve told me these are their best contractors, respectful of the local community,” he says.
The USFS, Gunnison County and the town of Crested Butte will issue separate but comparably restrictive permits for the project. Those permits are expected to mandate $100,000 bonds each from the county and the town to compensate for any potential road damage here. They’ll limit hours of operation—6 a.m. to 5 p.m. is the county restriction—make note of bicycle traffic on Kebler, restrict loads to four trucks per day and impose fines reflective of the state’s protocol for overweight loads.
“They’re thinning, so it will be a challenge for them to fill that many trucks every day,” suggests Gunnison County Public Works director Marlene Crosby. “The permits will also restrict operations during events like the USA Pro Challenge and Chainless Race.”
A short stretch of the USFS Ohio Pass Road enables access to the ranch. “We’re working closely with Gunnison County on that,” says Murphy. “They’re calling the shots.” The Forest Service permit, he says, will mirror the requirements in the permit issued by Gunnison County.
Crested Butte Public Works director Rodney Due says, “We’re requiring them to send tear slips,” which indicate vehicle weights at the point where loads are dropped off. “We’ll also select trucks traveling the road at random and require those to be weighed.”
The permits are currently in draft form, under review by the Gunnison County and Town of Crested Butte attorneys.
Colvin says thinning of the forest is the next best thing to a natural burn and that the forest will be healthier as a result. “There will always be people who don’t like what we’re doing,” he says, “but we’ve been great stewards. We pay close attention to doing things the way they should be done. We try to wear a green hat.”
The Floresta Ranch sits adjacent to wilderness, but has itself been mined, ranched and logged throughout the past 150 years.
Once thinned, the ranch will be less susceptible to beetle infestation and fire. Colvin says it will also serve as a staging area in the event a forest fire breaks out in the surrounding wilderness.
“We’re not a part of the local fire district,” says Colvin, “but here is where the first responders will gather to access a fire on the local forest.” Colvin says Floresta Partners have given the local fire district permission to scoop water from their lake if needed. He says the ranch meadow is large enough to land a helicopter, to drop off and pick up firefighters.
The logging will start next month and is expected to continue into October.
