Log deck within the salvage area. Decisions made in the days and weeks following a wildfire can shape forests and communities for decades. Idaho’s response to the Rock Fire shows how acting quickly after a fire can deliver lasting benefits for forests, workers, and public schools. After the Rock Fire ignited on August 12, 2025…
A new study from the University of California Merced shows that thinning overcrowded forests and using prescribed fire produces a wide range of benefits that reach far beyond reducing the threat of catastrophic wildfire. Researchers found that these treatments strengthen forest resilience, protect valuable ecosystem services and help avoid costly wildfire damage. Led by post doctoral scholar…
In this special presentation, Rachel Lee Hall of Forest Under Stress captures what she calls the forest’s “breathing system”—the cycle of sunlight, air, and moisture that sustains life on the forest floor. The images in this presentation tell the story of forests losing their ability to breathe under decades of overcrowding, and how science-based management…
When wildfires strike our national forests, what happens next determines their future. In Oregon’s Willamette National Forest, the 1996 Charlton Fire burned inside a designated Wilderness area where no trees could be salvaged or replanted. Decades later, it continues to reburn, destroying soil, releasing carbon, and turning forestland into wasteland. Just miles away, the Shady…
When a lightning strike sparked the Katy Creek Fire in northeast Washington, firefighters found themselves facing a landscape that, like much of the West, had gone a century without a major burn. The dense, overgrown forests were the result of decades of fire exclusion and forest “non-management,” policies that stopped the small, low-intensity fires that…
Across the West, counties surrounded by federally managed forests have long supported responsible timber harvests, not just to power rural economies, but to fund essential public services like schools, roads, and law enforcement. For generations, these communities received a share of federal timber revenues as compensation for the fact that they cannot collect property taxes…
The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s decision to rescind the 2001 Roadless Rule is one step towards reversing decades of forest neglect that has left millions of acres vulnerable to severe wildfire, insect infestations, and disease. Enacted during the final hours of Bill Clinton’s presidency, the Roadless Rule unilaterally imposed sweeping restrictions on road construction and…
In the American West, the threat of wildfire no longer stops at the edge of the forest—it’s now hitting homeowners directly in their wallets. The cost of living with wildfire risk is showing up in a place many didn’t expect: their home insurance bills. Across California, Colorado, New Mexico, and beyond, property insurance premiums are…
The Equal Access to Justice Act (EAJA) was created with good intentions—to protect individuals and small businesses from being steamrolled by the federal government. Passed in 1980, EAJA was meant to level the playing field by reimbursing legal costs when citizens successfully challenged government overreach. But decades later, this once-noble law has become a tool…
President Trump’s recent Executive Orders on domestic timber production, followed by USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins’s memo declaring an “Emergency Situation Determination” on over 112 million acres of National Forest land, have sparked a national conversation about the future of our forests. Supporters see this as a long-overdue effort to fix a broken system. Critics call…