Old Growth

I just read a FB blurb describing the fate of a guy in the USA who got life with no parole in a Federal Pen for sending a friend 5 grams of LSD in the mail back in 1994. LIFE! He was 24 . He had some priors, selling small amounts of marijuana and acid in 1991. Now he’s 43. 

Something is really wrong with this. 

There has been some remarkable local press here where l live on the Sunshine Coast of BC. The events l am referring to are all about old trees. They are growing just a very healthy hike directly above where l live. These are gnarley old, un-killable Yellow Cedar about 7 feet in the butt and more than 1000 years old. What is remarkable is, that a small outspoken group of people here have made us “locals” aware that every one of these living plants could be gone in a heartbeat, cut and sold to people who don’t live here. Gone for life with no parole. 

Something is really wrong with this.

Well, somehow some of these “cut blocks” have been spared the big saw tooth for now and some have not. Here’s what makes me crazy: How could any of this even be up for debate? I totally understand people need jobs and BC has an enormous resource of trees for lumber and pulp....but l beg to hear from a rational mind a justification for cutting one, even one, of these old growth monuments. Any area above the coast that the current residents could drive their children and grand children to, so as to experience the holy majesty of of one of these remarkable survivors should be considered a sanctuary don’t you think?  Well! Who the hell am l to say such things. Just a person really, one who has lived long enought to have seen a remarkable disregard for ...blah blah blah ...all true but who hasn’t heard it before ad nauseum?  But here’s crazy: l have never met one single solitary person who thinks its a good idea to cut these trees, these last of the old growth, just moments from downtown,  these breathtaking ancients. So I ask, “Where are you? Who are you?” If these forests truly belong to the Province, the people of BC (l could be wrong about that....waiting to hear) then I’ll bet anything that the “Let’s leave the trees in this particular part of our Province” people, far out number the “Lets cut those old trees and sell them to someone who gives us the most money for them” people, I feel really strongly about this, since l have never met one single a“cut ‘em down” type , but I am completely surrounded by the tree hugger types around here of which I am one.

So, here’s what l need to know:

• Who actually owns these trees? 
• If it is my Provincial government shouldn’t we be able to vote on their fate?
• If it is a private interest eg. logging company How did that happen? I missed that probably a century ago, but please catch me up. 
• ok l’m starting to feel like a smart -ass, but I most sincerely love these trees and I 

want to see if we could somehow understand the why and wherefore that justifies the cutting of these beautiful gifts and turning them into 2x4’s

Once they are gone they are gone just like a caught US drug dealer.