Days Creek-South Umpqua Harvest Plan EA-REVISED Draft FONSI
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DRAFT Days Creek – South Umpqua River Harvest Plan Environmental Assessment DOI-BLM-ORWA-R050-2014-0008-EA South River Field Office, Roseburg District REVISED DRAFT Finding of No Significant Impact Introduction The BLM signed a Record of Decision approving the Southwestern Oregon Resource Management Plan (2016 SWO ROD/RMP) on August 5, 2016. Revision of an RMP necessarily involves a transition from the application of the old RMP to the application of the new RMP. The 2016 ROD/RMP (pp. 10-12) allows the BLM to implement projects consistent with the management direction of either the 1995 RMP or the approved RMP, at the discretion of the decision maker, if the BLM began preparation of NEPA documentation prior to the effective date of the 2016 SWO ROD/RMP. The South River Field Office began preparation of NEPA documentation prior to the effective date of the 2016 SWO ROD/RMP, as the Field Office initiated planning and NEPA documentation for this project with publication of the project in the Summer 2014 Roseburg District Quarterly Planning Update. The Days Creek – South Umpqua River Harvest Plan was designed to apply management direction from the 1995 Roseburg District Record of Decision and Resource Management Plan (ROD/RMP), which is tiered to the 1994 Roseburg District Proposed Resource Management Plan/Environmental Impact statement (1994 PRMP/EIS). This project meets the criteria described in the 2016 SWO ROD/RMP that allows the BLM to implement projects that conform and are consistent with the 1995 ROD/RMP and does not propose actions that are prohibited by the 2016 SWO ROD/RMP (p. 11). Overview The Days Creek – South Umpqua River Harvest Plan Environmental Analysis (EA) considered a no action alternative (Alternative A; EA Section 2.1.), two action alternatives not carried forward (EA Section 2.5), and two action alternatives carried forward for detailed analysis (Alternatives B Modified and C; EA Sections 2.2 and 2.3.). Alternative B Modified applies upland commercial thinning to 1,301 acres in the Matrix land use allocations; variable retention harvest (VRH) on 571 acres in the General Forest Management Area land use allocation (GFMA); and commercial thinning to 433 acres in the Riparian Reserves land use allocation (RR). Alternative C applies upland commercial thinning on 1,753 acres in the Matrix land use allocations; VRH on 119 acres in the GFMA; and commercial thinning on 433 acres in the RR. The BLM must consider both context and intensity in determining significance of the environmental effects of agency action (40 CFR 1508.27): Context The proposed activities are set in lands managed by the South River Field Office of the Roseburg District, Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in the Coffee Creek, Corn Creek-South Umpqua River, Saint John Creek-South Umpqua River, Days Creek, O’Shea Creek-South Umpqua River, Upper South Myrtle 1 DRAFT Creek, Lower South Myrtle Creek, and Judd Creek-South Umpqua River 12th-field subwatersheds1. These 12th-field subwatersheds, which collectively drain an area of approximately 138,595 acres. The BLM administers approximately 50,593 acres (37 percent) of these lands. Alternatives B Modified and C include harvest of approximately 2,305 acres which represents approximately 1.7 percent of all lands and 4.6 percent of BLM-administered lands in the project subwatersheds. As such, the project does not bear any regional, statewide, national, or international importance. Intensity The Council on Environmental Quality includes the following ten considerations for evaluating intensity. 1. Impacts may be both beneficial and adverse. - 40 CFR 1508.27(b)(1) Alternatives B Modified and C could potentially have impacts that are both beneficial and adverse, but which are not considered significant because they will be within the range and scope of those effects of timber management analyzed in the 1994 Roseburg PRMP/EIS, to which the EA is tiered, and adopted by the 1995 Roseburg ROD/RMP. Thinning and VRH will provide timber for manufacturing that will in turn, provide a diversity of employment opportunities, wages to timber workers and employees in associated industries, and generate tax revenues for local, state, and federal governments. Upland commercial thinning 1,301 acres (Alternative B Modified) or 1,762 (Alternative C) of densely stocked forest stands, approximately 41 to 153 years of age in 2017, will improve the health and vigor of individual trees and the stands they comprise. Thinning will enhance the commercial value of timber in the GFMA, and accelerate attainment of Aquatic Conservation Strategy objectives in the RR (EA, Sections 3.3, 3. 8, 3.9, and Appendix F). Thinning will benefit RR by increasing light infiltration, because when a stream is enclosed by a conifer canopy, the ecosystem shifts to a low-quality food base whereas a more open canopy provides greater diversity of nutrient inputs (EA, Section 3.9.2). A variety of land birds will also benefit from the establishment of diverse understory conditions (EA, Table C-1). Thinning also contributes to the annual Allowable Sale Quantity (EA, Table 2-5) and is consistent with the principles of sustained yield in suitable O&C lands. In 2014 the age class distribution of BLM forest lands in the GFMA in the analysis area was approximately 19 percent in the 0-30 ten-year age class, 28 percent in the 40-80 ten-year age class, and 52 percent in the 90+ ten-year age class (EA, Tables 2-5 and 3-6). Due to fire exclusion and the limited amount of regeneration harvest in the analysis area over the past two decades, there has been an overall decline in the abundance of early-seral forest with a roughly equal increase in mid-seral forest and a gradual increase in mature and late-seral forest (EA, Section 3.4.1). The desired age-class distribution for lands managed by the Roseburg District depicted in the PRMP/EIS (Chapter 4-26 & 27) reflects the entire land base managed by the District. As no regeneration harvest is scheduled or authorized in Riparian Reserves and Late-Successional Reserves, only regeneration harvest 1 The U.S. Geological Survey implemented a new numbering/naming convention for hydrologic units (HUs) such that 5th-field watersheds are now designated as 10th-field HUs; 6th-field subwatersheds as 12th-field HUs; and 7th-field drainages as 14th-field HUs. 2 DRAFT in the Matrix Allocations and the Little River Adaptive Management Area provide the opportunity to create early (0-10 years) and mid (20-40 years) stages of forest succession. Variable retention harvest, under Alternative B Modified, will aid in the development of a more desirable and balanced age-class distribution within the GFMA as described in the PRMP/EIS (Chapter 4-26 & 27), and consistent with the management direction from the Roseburg District ROD/RMP (pp. 601 and 515), by converting up to 571 acres of 66 to 133 year-old stands to age class 0 to 10, representing approximately 1.1 percent of the land base managed by the BLM in the project subwatersheds. This shift in age class distribution will promote development of early-successional forest habitat for pollinators, resident and migratory bird species, small mammals (EA, Section 3.4.2 and Table C-1), and large mammals (EA, Table C-1) dependent upon or associated with this successional stage of forest development. There could be both adverse and beneficial effects on species that are prey for the northern spotted owl. Harvest will displace prey species such as flying squirrels and red tree voles that favor closed canopy forest conditions (EA, pp. 89-90, 103-111). However, populations of prey species such as woodrats and brush rabbits are expected to increase in numbers post-harvest due to development of open early-seral conditions, which could boost local prey availability if increasing numbers of these small mammals move into adjacent forest edges and interior forest stands where they become available for capture (EA, p. 89- 90). Removal of conifer-dominated forest could impact individual land bird, invertebrate and mammal species or their habitat, however the effects are unlikely to result in the decline of populations due to the abundance of potential suitable habitat in the project subwatersheds. Created early successional habitat patches, however, will be favorable to some land bird, invertebrate, and mammal species. Increases in herbaceous growth will improve foraging habitat by providing food sources for insects which form the prey base for other species such as bats. (EA, Appendix C, pp. 196-205) Potential beneficial or adverse effects to species listed under the Endangered Species Act, and critical habitat designated for their survival and recovery are addressed below at consideration 9. 2. The degree to which the proposed action affects public health or safety. - 40 CFR 1508.27(b)(2) The project involves timber harvest in a rural setting, removed from urban and metropolitan areas, on a landscape of Federal and private lands principally managed for timber production, and as such is not expected to have any demonstrable effects on public health and safety. As described in the EA (Section 3.11.1), fifty harvest units are located in the Wildland Urban Interface as defined by the West Wide Wildfire Risk Assessment Wildland Development Areas data layer. Fuels reduction actions will reduce fire risk within these areas (EA, Section 3.11.2). There will be no cumulative or long-term effects on air quality resulting from prescribed burning as the direct and indirect effects from the projects will be local and of short duration (EA, pp. 14 and 41-42). Smoke management from pile burning will adhere to the Oregon Smoke Management Plan (EA, p.