To the editor: We have in our diverse, healthy, Notch Reservoir forest the best possible intact, resilient, tested and fully functional water filtration and runoff slowing system to keep our drinking water clean and healthy.
I believe that every single act of the proposed heavy logging and aggressive forest management by Mass Audubon currently being contemplated would erode our intact system and its capacity to slowly and continuously deliver purified water to the reservoir.
The logging plans note that they will observe the unenforceable and nonregulatory “best management logging practices.” They aim to limit, if possible, the extremes of inevitable logging damage but not to improve the water quality or that of the forest’s unique capacity to purify water.
Logging will not, and cannot in any manner, better the near perfect functioning natural water management system. That damage and diminishment is a given, on a property where the dam is already deficient for managing anticipated storm events. On a property with shallow, often wet soils, and with steep to excessively steep slopes, the logging plans only aggravate this risk.
We must remember that forest-managed slow release ensures both perpetual water in the reservoir, as with this summer’s extended dry period, and less damage to the dam in extreme storm events.
This near perfectly functioning forest will not be more diverse, carbon storage will be enormously reduced in the near term, thus negatively impacting the climate. I believe the cherished and nationally acknowledged aesthetics of the forest and Bellows Pipe Trail will be gravely maimed. The city will not receive any renumeration but, in my opinion, inherit a considerable debt as well as increased encroachment of invasive species, road repair necessity and premature Reservoir dredging. The risk is enormous and the reward only riding away on logging trucks to Quebec and out to corporate pockets.
We can legitimately ask: What is the opportunity cost of doing nothing, except repairing the dam and perhaps dredging the reservoir and thinking about this in a true public forum? The evident answer is there is no opportunity cost risk, since this plan is discretionary and untouched natural water protecting forest future is already assured, if left intact. The wise mind sees Notch Reservoir as a forever wild forest permanently protected from opportunistic commercial logging interests and their nonprofit associates such as Mass Audubon, The Woodlands Partnership and the New England Forestry Foundation.
Walter Cudnohufsky, Ashfield
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