WildEarth Guardians – Conservation groups late Monday challenged a U.S. Forest Service plan to clearcut more than 5,500 acres of pine forests just outside Yellowstone National Park, in the Custer Gallatin National Forest. The plan also calls for logging across an additional 9,000 acres and bulldozing up to 56 miles of roads in the area, including through old-growth forests.
In their objection to the South Plateau project, the Center for Biological Diversity, Sierra Club, Alliance for the Wild Rockies and WildEarth Guardians said the logging project will destroy habitat for grizzly bears, lynx, marten and other wildlife. It will bulldoze through old-growth forest and remove thousands of acres of mature pine trees.
The plan is moving forward despite President Biden’s pledge to protect old-growth and mature forests and trees.