Recent press

Here's a recent article about the Sagehen Forest Project:

• Experimental Forests Could Lessen Toll of Wildfires, Live Science

Sagehen Project Decision Notice signed!

Dear Sagehen Project Collaborators and Interested Parties,


The Sagehen Project Decision Notice and Finding of No Significant Impact was signed by Alexander Friend (Director, Pacific Southwest Research Station) and Tom Quinn (Tahoe National Forest Supervisor) on May 6, 2013.

The Sagehen Project Environmental Assessment (EA) and supporting documents are available online at the Tahoe National Forest’s website.

The legal notice of the decision is expected to be published in Grass Valley’s The Union newspaper as soon as tomorrow. The date of the legal notice in The Union will establish the timeframe for the 45-day appeal filing period under 36 CFR 215.

Laurie Perrot
Environmental Coordinator
Tahoe National Forest
631 Coyote Street
Nevada City, CA 95959
lperrot@fs.fed.us
(530) 478-6244

• Decision Letter
• Decision Notice and Finding of No Significant Impact
• Responses to Public Comments Received

30-day public comment period for the Sagehen Project preliminary Environmental Assessment ends soon!

The 30-day public comment period for the Sagehen Project preliminary Environmental Assessment (EA) began on March 5, 2013 and will close soon.  Interested parties who have not yet done so should read this excellent result of over a year-and-a-half of collaborative process and submit your comments.

The EA is now available online at the Tahoe National Forest website.

Associated science in the basin

As part of the Sagehen 50-year art project, we thought it would be a good idea to consolidate in one post a list of all the science projects relating to the Sagehen Forest Project.

In addition to science done to determine the best treatment options, there is a lot going on in the basin to assess pre- and post-treatment conditions going forward into the manipulation phase of the larger project.

The idea of these studies is to actually monitor and evaluate the effects of the forest restructuring on wildlife, water quality, vegetation and people. 

• VEGETATION AND FUELS: the SPLAT project and Vaillant thesis gathered a massive dataset, including fuels and vegetation surveys, LiDAR imaging of the basin with and without vegetation, fire model runs, fire history, etc.
• BIRDS: Researcher Marty Raphael is revisiting bird survey plots begun in the 1960's within the Donner Burn study transects. The Forest Service monitors bird presence in the basin. Goshawk and Spotted Owl surveys occur annually. The Monitoring Avian Productivity and Survivorship (MAPS) project runs annual banding stations at sites within the Sagehen basin. Vladimir Pravosudov's multi-decade chickadee memory research continues.
• SMALL MAMMALS: Calhoun line trapping transects begun in the 1950's are being revisited by PSW researcher Pat Manley.
• FISH SURVEYS: annual fish monitoring continues in various Sagehen Creek stretches.
• AMERICAN MARTEN: monitoring of this indicator species was recently revisited in anticipation of the treatments.
• HYDROLOGY: the USGS regularly samples Sagehen Creek stream water chemistry and remotely monitors flow through their Hydrologic Benchmark Network. Numerous modeling efforts continue. Terry Hogue is evaluating stream water yield. The Forest Service does annual stream condition surveys. Researcher Jim Kirchner is evaluating weather, groundwater and sap flow patterns.
• METEOROLOGY: National Atmospheric Deposition Program precipitation sampling is ongoing. Weather data is continuously collected at 12 towers within the basin.

Did I forget anything?