from It’s Going Down
Trinidad, CA – Redwood Forest Defense (RFD) has raised another treesit in an active timber harvest area to stop Green Diamond Resource Company (Green Diamond) from clear-cutting the redwood rainforest. The forest defenders are calling for a complete stop to industrial logging during the COVID-19 pandemic, declaring that the timber industry is not an essential business during this time.
“Habitat destruction is not essential business,” stated Walter, one of the treesitters. “In the midst of COVID-19, Green Diamond should cease all operations and support their employees and contractors by allowing them to stay home with full pay.”
The lumber mill owned by Humboldt Redwood Company (HRC) in Scotia, CA where Green Diamond timber is sent to be milled, is currently shut down because of lack of demand for timber products.
“It just didn’t make sense to keep the place running if there was no place to send the lumber,” said Steve Isherwood, a board feeder for the HRC mill, in an interview with Susanne Rust from the LA Times on April 16.
On April 1st, RFD began protecting the area after a Green Diamond contractor, Lord’s Light Logging, clear cut several acres of forested habitat in Unit A. Green Diamond immediately halted logging operations in the unit. This renewed resistance by RFD comes after they defended the same area from 2012-2017 with treesits and road blockades, preventing logging under a former Timber Harvest Plan in the same area.
Those forest defense efforts led to the currently pending land sale between Green Diamond and the Trinidad Coastal Land Trust (TCLT) which will protect the area surrounding, and the trail leading to, Strawberry Rock. RFD says that the TCLT wants to buy more of the surrounding land, but Green Diamond refuses to sell.
“Green Diamond does every single one of us a disservice by continuing to clear-cut redwood rainforests, decimating canopy connectivity and habitat for sensitive species,” says Meredith Dyer, a member of RFD. “The forested habitats that Green Diamond ‘owns’ have been disrupted since Europeans arrived in the area 250 years ago. Green Diamond needs to take responsibility for the land and for the younger generations who face a future of climate chaos and massive die offs. Green Diamond must stop clear-cutting and other forestry practices that strip canopy connectivity and fragment wildlife habitat.”