11/3/20221
My Dear Friend & POTUS, JRB,
I love learning new words. Today’s is “anthropogenic” used by Cop26 authors in reference to greenhouse gas emissions & the need to balance sources & sinks of CO2. I infer it means “made by humans.”
Cop26 reporting about the new deforestation plan has me thinking about forests. Do you spend much time in the forest? I like to, but haven’t had much of a chance recently.
The forest I know best is 80 acres of mixed woods in Dunbar, WI. My husband & I celebrated our wedding ceremony on a walk through those trees. It includes an acre or 2 of red pine planted in rows dug by a tractor 70 years ago. I grew up cutting their lower limbs because my grandpa fantasized, he would make furniture with it someday. He didn’t want any knots.
Unfortunately, in the ‘90s my dad put all of this acreage into the Managed Forest Program to save on taxes, so every 10 years we have to “harvest” some trees. It’s a selective cut which is supposed to enhance things. I am not a fan. Last time the loggers left a giant mess which took me about 5 years to clean up. The worst was the scar left by their rig.
Now that the forest is stressed by CC, I wonder if this cutting is a good idea. It seems we should keep every tree that we can. If theconversation.com is right & a “vast body of research shows planting new trees as a climate action pales in comparison to protecting existing forest,” shouldn’t we just keep our forest intact? Perhaps you can ask your people to look into this for me. It’s urgent because we have a bid to from Frank’s Logging to take down 454 board feet of timber next fall.
Speaking of forests, Myanmar has 3,192,000 hectares of primary forest, the best kind of forest to absorb CO2. If we can help bring peace to the region, that forest can be protected.
As you heard at Cop26, protecting forests starts with protecting the Indigenous people who inhabit them & provide stewardship. I hope you will do what you can to ensure their safety.
PBWY,
RCA
