SEELEY LAKE - The Forest Service invites the public to provide feedback on the Westside Bypass Wildfire Resiliency Project on the Seeley Lake Ranger District located northwest of Highway 83 and Seeley Lake. The project focuses on addressing hazardous forest fuel and vegetation conditions that contribute to an increased risk of a severe wildfire on national forest lands.
Forest Service managers and partners from the Montana Department of Natural Resources met with the public two weeks ago for a virtual engagement session focused on the project area. Feedback from the virtual public meeting was considered while preparing the project for this 30-day request for scoping input.
“We had an informative and engaging virtual public meeting on this project a few weeks ago,” said Quinn Carver, Seeley Lake District Ranger. “We are now ready to take the next step in the public process and formally scope for input from the public.”
This project proposes about 2,700 acres of commercial and non-commercial vegetation management activities, including pile burning, jackpot burning and under burning to address the fuel loading and forest health concerns within the project area. These activities are mostly thinning or improvement harvests to increase spacing between trees and promote healthy ponderosa pine, western larch, Douglas-fir and a diversity of age classes of lodgepole pine.
Additionally, the project would reduce hazardous dead and down woody material on the forest floor and remove dense ladder fuels, which provide opportunity for a ground fire to move into the tree canopy creating a ‘crown fire’. These crown fires are much more difficult to effectively control during wildfire responses.
How to submit input for this project: Please submit a written comment for this 30-day scoping period to Elizabeth.Tichner@usda.gov by Dec. 2. Include ‘Westside Bypass Wildfire Resiliency’ in the subject line. Learn more about the project by visiting the Lolo National Forest project page at: https://www.fs.usda.gov/projects/lolo/landmanagement/projects. You may also contact Elizabeth Tichner, Project Team Lead, at Elizabeth.Tichner@usda.gov or call 304-282-4064.
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