I’ve spent a lot of time in Mount Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest. This vast expanse of public lands encompasses most of Washington’s North Cascades, and as such includes some of the wildest places in the Lower 48 states. Now, though, the Forest Service is planning a massive thinning project that involves a vaguely defined plan to log medium-age forests in the name of “forest health.”

Unsurprisingly, environmental groups are skeptical of this new plan–and some fear it will harm imperiled species like northern spotted owls and marbled murrelets. Read more about reactions from the conservation community in my latest piece for Columbia Insight.