Resources
ForestNews
History of Mill Creek’s Old-Growth by Cliff Shaw
Saving Mill Creek’s Old-Growth Author: Cliff Shaw The Mill Creek watershed in Fannin County contains one of the largest surviving areas of unlogged old-growth forest on the Chattahoochee National Forest. Although part of Mill Creek’s magnificent ancient forest was clear cut by Forest Service timber sales in the mid to late 1980s, the preservation of […]
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Around the Forest
ForestNews
Member Spotlight: Dr. Bill Witherspoon
Member Spotlight: Dr. Bill Witherspoon Author: Anne Heikkila, Board President Growing up in Knoxville, TN, William (Bill) Witherspoon has been interested in geology since he was 10 years old. It wasn’t until he was in his mid-twenties however, that he decided to make a career out of it. His interest was piqued by a London […]
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ForestNews
Around the Forest – Summer 2021
Around the Forest : By Jess Riddle ForestwideFoothills Landscape Project: The Forest Service (FS) took the highly unusual step of issuing a revised Environmental Assessment for the 157,000-acre Foothills Landscape Project. The project’s original review in late 2019 prompted over 2,000 public comments, mostly asking for change. In response to that outpouring of concern and […]
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ForestNews
Interview with Ed Hunter Chattahoochee Oconee National Forest Forest Supervisor
By Marie Dunkle In January 2013 when I first interviewed Ed Hunter for this newsletter, he was fairly new as the U. S. Forest Service (USFS) Chattooga River District Ranger, and I was still in learning mode as the Georgia ForestWatch (GAFW) Chattooga River District Leader. We sat near Stonewall Falls, and I learned that […]
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ForestNews
Around the Forest – spring 2021
Around the Forest : By Jess Riddle, Executive Director National Lawsuits: Several environmental organizations brought suit against the Council of Environmental Quality’s (CEQ) new National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) regulations, which reduce government accountability and place new constraints on environmental reviews. The merits of that case were recently presented in court. Encouragingly, the Biden administration […]
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ForestNews
The Foothills Landscape Project Evolves
By: Jess Riddle, Executive Director After a hiatus of more than a year, rounds of public meetings in April announced major changes to the Foothills Landscape Project. Spread across half the width of Georgia, the Foothills Landscape Project could result in intensive logging of mature forests, include herbicide application on a scale never before seen, […]
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ForestNews
Hiking the Bartram Trail with ForestWatch
By Melanie Vickers : Board Secretary In January 2020, Georgia ForestWatch challenged our membership to hike the entire length (38 miles) of the Bartram Trail in Georgia by offering a series of hikes. In February 2020, we teamed up with the GA/NC Bartram Trail Society (now the Blueridge Bartram Trail Conservancy), and 23 hikers completed […]
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ForestNews
Charlie’s Creek Road – OHV recreation destination causes sedimentation issues
By Melanie Vickers : Board Secretary Charlie’s Creek Road meanders through National Forest land in Towns County between Tallulah River Road and Upper Hightower Road, following Charlie’s Creek, a beautiful mountain stream that feeds into the Tallulah River, a popular trout fishing and camping destination. The road provides a path for power lines to Tate […]
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ForestNews
Old-growth happenings
by Sue Harmon : Board Member Cliff Shaw continues to ramble across his section of the Blue Ridge Mountains in search of new big trees and old-growth areas on the forest. His recent discoveries have prompted him to revise and update his Rambling Through Old-Growth Past and Present: A Personal Survey of Surviving Old-Growth on […]
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ForestNews
How long-gone homesteads led to the Clean Mountain Streams Campaign
By: David Govus Why should an environmentalist care about the condition of a road? Seeing the Flatlands Road is enough to make one care. This eroding nightmare at one time connected several old homesteads to the community of Suches. The Forest Service now owns this land, and the road serves only as an off-road playground […]
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