USFS

USDA is looking at closing the U.S. Forest Service’s Region 6 headquarters in Portland as well as the Pacific Northwest Research Station in Corvallis.

Ag Secretary Brooke Rollins said her agency is deploying resources to assist the wildfire response in Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, and Alberta, Canada.  The Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Center raised the wildfire preparedness level to 5 in late May as the country is experiencing very high to extreme wildfire activity.  US...

Improve the health of America’s forests while reducing the risks of wildfire to communities.  That has been the effort and focus on the U.S. Forest Service’s Collaborative Wildfire Risk Reduction Program, which has focused on 21 specially selected fire sheds.  But Agriculture Sec...

The U.S. Forest Service is looking to shore up its wildland firefighting force in the Pacific Northwest.  Recruitment events will take place across Oregon next month, with stops in Bend, Sandy and La Grande on September 12th, in an effort to hire a couple hundred permanent seasonal positions.   “...

Earlier this week, the Department of Agriculture announced the first investment of a $1 billion effort to mitigate wildfire risks as the nation faces an ongoing wildfire crisis.  USDA announced a $197 million investment for 100 projects that benefit 22 states as part of the Community Wildfire Defense Grant program.  The For...

The USDA is increasing efforts to improve forest resiliency through a variety of programs and approaches. "At the U.S. Department of Agriculture, we believe that with innovate policies and incentives, climate smart reforestation and forest management can be a meaningful tool to increasing forest health," said Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack. ...

With summer here, the Forest Services is warning that the west is approaching the most intense part of the wildfire season.  Forest Service Chief Randy Moore mentioned in recent testimony before the senate Energy Committee.  Notable in the context of an already fast start to the 2022 western wildfire season, featuring extreme fire activity in the Southwest. "They...

Prescribed fires are one tool in the toolbox of land managers, such as the US Forest Service, to mitigate future wildfire incidents and foster improved forest health. Its a method that goes as planned almost 99% of the time. Yet, as US Forest Service Chief Randy Moore recently explained, "We have noticed that there may be a slight trend in the number of fires that are escaping containment ..

The Oregon Department of Forestry will be collecting Oregon Ash seed from across the state for gene pool preservation. ODF’s Jim Gersbach said the Emerald Ash Borer, an Asian based invasive pest, has been wiping out ash trees across the country since the early 2000s. "We know from st ...

he 2020 wildfire season and the recovery to this point was the focus on a recent House Ag sub-committee hearing. "As of September 19th, there have been almost 43,000 fired that have burned more than 7.2 million acres across all jurisdictions ...