NEW MEXICO

Gila National Forest

Gila Hoop.  A coil of wire found hanging around a fence post was tied to a log with a shoelace in this beautiful grove of ponderosas. The Gila National Forest recently announced a plan to log 90 million board feet of timber on 65,000 acres over the next eight years. This amounts to 16,000 logging trucks of trees, by far the largest timber project ever proposed on a southwestern National Forest. Logging on this scale is unprecedented in the Southwest and must be stopped. The Forest Guardians have vowed to do just that. They urge you to write, call and fax the Gila National Forest today. Tell them this project called the Negrito Ecosystems Project is ill conceived and should be permanently abandoned:

        Able Camarena, Gila National Forest Supervisor
        3005 E. Camino del Bosque
        Silver City, NM 88061
        Phone: 505.388.8201  Fax: 505.388.8201

For more information on how you can help achieve Zero Cut in Southwestern forests, contact the Forest Guardians.

Apache National Forest

Sunfoil Circle. A strip of foil tape found along a road became the medium for this circle around a stump in a small clearcut. The Southwest's forests are lush islands separated from one another by a sea of deserts and grasslands. As on true islands, isolation has resulted in great species diversity and increased susceptibility to human caused extinction. 100 years of heavy logging in the Southwest's National Forests has pushed the entire forest ecosystem to the edge of collapse. Southwestern songbirds have suffered huge declines in the last 20 years, a sure sign of an ecosystem in a state of emergency. Many reptiles, amphibians, birds and old growth dependent plants are also in danger.

The Southwest Center for Biological Diversity's Mexican spotted owl and Northern goshawk Endangered Species Act petitions have provided Southwest forests with strong protection allies. The Mexican spotted owl is all that stands between the last old growth mixed conifer forests and the timber companies. The Northern goshawk provides the same protection to our old growth ponderosa pine. They have also spurred a series of conservation plans. Forest loss in the Southwest has dropped by 60% since our petitions were filed. Contact the Southwest Center for Biological Diversity to find out how you can help the great "island forests" of the Southwest.

For more information on how you can help Southwestern forests, contact the Southwest Center for Biological Diversity.

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