AN UNLIKELY ALLIANCE: Frustrated by federal inaction, timber companies and conservationists in Montana have forged a partnership that could pave the way for similar collaborations throughout the West

摘要

It doesn't take a forest ecologist to see that the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest is in trouble. Drivers heading over Homestake Pass on Interstate 90 just east of Butte, Montana, look out over a sea of rust-colored, beetle-killed trees stretching for miles in all directions. Silt washes off old logging areas into trout streams. Escalating numbers of off-road vehicles scare wildlife and tear up sensitive streamside habitats. Lacking official federal wilderness designation, nationally renowned roadless areas such as the Sapphire Mountains remain vulnerable to mining and other development. Meanwhile, timber harvests in the forest have declined 80 percent from two decades ago, contributing to local logging business layoffs and closures.