Category: NNRG Member Profiles

Header image via ForestWander. The fisher (Pekania pennanti) is a small, carnivorous mammal native to North American forests, a member of the weasel family with quick reflexes and great climbing skills. It’s roughly the size of a housecat, and is indisputably cute. Though now very rare in the Pacific Northwest as a result of habitat loss, hunting, and rodenticide poisoning, efforts are underway to reintroduce fishers into areas within their historical range. In Washington, fisher reintroductions have taken place in Olympic National Park and in the Cascade range, most recently in November 2021 near Lake Ozette. Gary Elmer and Jackie Gardner

Skokomish Park at Lake Cushman is a scenic, 500-acre forest and campground on Lake Cushman in the Olympic Peninsula. Every year hundreds of campers visit the park to swim and fish on over 8 miles of freshwater shoreline and to hike and bike over 9 miles of trails. You wouldn’t know it from visiting, but Skokomish Park has gone through a number of legal changes over the years, ending in a land transfer as part of a large settlement. This settlement centered around the relicensing of two Tacoma Public Utilities operated dams on the North Fork of the Skokomish River,

In forest systems, hydrology and road systems are at odds with one another. Water wants to run down slopes and avoid barriers, while roads cut across slopes and aim to stay put. Managing your road system to minimize erosion and runoff takes forethought and more than a bit of careful engineering. Kyle Smith, the Forest Manager for The Nature Conservancy (TNC) of Washington, is a self-described road engineering geek and has taken great care in consolidating and updating the road system at Ellsworth Creek Preserve. The 8,000 acre preserve, which is FSC certified through NNRG’s group certificate, is located near

Sarah Deumling has noticed some changes in her forest over the past 20 years.

There’s a little less water to go around, and her family’s land, Zena Forest in the Willamette Valley of Oregon, is a little hotter and drier during the summer. Why? These changes are consistent with climate models’ predictions of the way Oregon climate is shifting under the influence of global warming.

Ayers’ Last Stand has roots that go four generations deep. When Matt Patton and his kids play in their forest, they’re climbing, hiding, and running around some of the same trees Matt’s great-great-grandfather knew. Matt’s kids are the sixth generation in his family to experience the forest—known as Ayers’ Last Stand—and likely not the last. Today the forest’s 210 acres are FSC®-certified through NNRG’s group certificate. But Ayers’ Last Stand came into being long before FSC® existed, when the family of Matt’s maternal great-great-grandfather moved from Connecticut to Thurston County in the 1890s. “They started farming on some of the

There’s a hint of expectation in the air around Lousignont Creek, located in the northern Oregon Coast Range.Sometime in the next two months, adult coho salmon will appear as if out of nowhere and struggle upstream in search of suitable gravel for spawning.

It isn’t always easy to watch trees come down during a thinning, but Paul and Peggy Butler are getting better at it the second time around.

Artemio and Edana Paz have lived on and cared for their forest outside of Springfield for over 50 years. This year for the first time they sought help controlling invasive weeds from a unique source.

Two members of NNRG’s group FSC certficate, Kopel Family Forest and Ferris Family Forest, are both commercially thinning their forests—a strategy that works to achieve both landowners’ goals for their lands. 

Ben Deumling and his family steward Zena Forest, a member of NNRG’s group FSC® certificate. The largest contiguous block of forest in the Eola Hills of the Willamette Valley, Zena Forest has not been immune to the impacts of climate change. Facing large-scale Douglas-fir die-off, Ben describes below how he and his family are experimenting with planting less-traditional tree species—ones more tolerant to a warming climate.

Want to know what a well-managed forest looks like? Walk, run, or ride through one of King County’s forestlands.​

Finding creative ways to derive enjoyment—and a little extra income—from non-timber forest products. Many forest owners enjoy the pleasures and profits that Non-Timber Forest Products (NTFPs) bring. Broadly speaking, NTFPs are forest products or services aside from commercially harvested timber that have potential personal or commercial value.  NTFPs range from foraged berries and mushrooms to holiday wreaths and essential oils, from firewood to agricultural soil amendments, and on and on. Sometimes commercial services like tourism are considered NTFPs.  Two members of NNRG’s FSC® Group Certificate are capitalizing on some of the NTFPs in their forests. We hope their experiences inspire some curiosity in other landowners about the NTFPs

By the time Beth and Mark Biser bought Still Waters Farm in 1990, the 48-acre parcel of forest in Mason County, Washington was a shell of its former self. Its 20 acres of wetlands had suffered two major disturbances.

Pair Family Forest, situated in the Snoqualmie Valley just west of Duvall, had a serious invasives problem when the family purchased the land in 2005. About a third of the property was choked with tangled pockets of Himalayan blackberry thicket. The brambles had muscled out the native shrubbery and posed a serious problem for Wayne, who had visions of transforming his forest into a mixed-age, biologically-rich ecosystem.

Brothers Jim and Ed Merzenich, along with Jim’s wife, Karen Wilson, steward Oak Basin Tree Farm: nearly 1,000 acres in the Coburg Hills outside of Brownsville, Oregon at the south end of the Willamette Valley. Oak Basin Tree Farm is Forest Stewardship Council® certified through NNRG’s group certificate.