from the Oregon.gov website:

Contacts:
Chad Calderwood, Linn County, 541-367-6108
Allison Blair, Benton County, 541-929-9156
Craig Pettinger, Marion County, 503-859-4331

A ban on all open and backyard burning will take effect on Saturday, June 16, in Linn, Benton and Marion counties. The Oregon Department of Forestry and the fire defense boards of the three counties announced the ban, which aims to reduce the incidence of open debris burns escaping control. The restrictions will extend through Oct. 15 or later, depending on fire danger.

“A lot of green-up is occurring due to the current weather patterns,” said Mike Beaver, Linn County Fire Defense Board Chief. “We expect this to result in heavy fuel loading for the grass models as temperatures rise and the fuels dry out.”

The open burning restrictions coincide with the current air-quality rules set forth by the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality. Those rules already forbid open burning within three miles of cities over 1,000 in population and six miles from cities over 50,000 in population after June 15. These burn restrictions expand the geographical scope to include areas outside the three- and six-mile limit.

Benton County Fire Defense Board Chief Rick Smith urged the public to take note of the upcoming multi-county-wide, residential burn ban starting on June 16.

“We hope this ban on residential burning spurs increased public awareness of wildfires and what people can do to help protect their own property,” Smith said. “The work that a property owner does now to maintain a defensible space around their property will make the difference between losing a home or structure, and keeping their valuable investment intact during a wildfire event.”

The fire defense board chief encouraged property owners to explore other options during the burn ban. Alternatives to burning include: chipping, hauling debris to recycling centers, and composting. All of these options are now available to the public year-round.

Rural fire agencies and the Oregon Department of Forestry have the authority to enforce and regulate the burn ban. Under Oregon Revised Statute Chapter 477, the department may issue citations for violation of the burning restrictions.

For more information on the open burning restrictions as well as advice on safe debris disposal, contact the nearest Department of Forestry office or the local fire department.

Do you ever wonder how much of Oregon is forested? Or what kind of jobs are available in the forest sector?

The Oregon Forest Resources Institute launched its first-ever mobile application for smart phones and tablets. Oregon’s Forest Facts & Figures, their most popular publication, can now be downloaded as a free mobile app for iOS and Android platforms.

Information about Oregon’s forest ownership, jobs, products, fire, forest managment and sustainability is available in this new app. Check out the OFRI website to read more about this informative product and to download to your phone.

Benton County Fire Defense Board would like to inform the communities of Benton County of the early establishment of the outdoor residential burn ban. Lane & Linn Counties have already placed bans on outdoor residential burning over the past few days. We have been experiencing usually low relative humidity and dry weather conditions over the past week that have made it unsafe for open burning. Over the next few weeks the weather may change slightly but to open outdoor burning safely, the weather patterns need to change significantly. Your local fire departments will keep an eye on the weather conditions make the appropriate changes if we get measurable rainfall. Benton County is operating a community yard waste chipping program that may help elevate the need for some residential burning. You can contact Chris Bentley at the Benton County offices for more information on this program. Please contact your local fire department before starting any outdoor burning. Thank you for helping us keep you and your neighbors safe from wildfires.

Information provided by the Benton County Fire Defense Board
May 8, 2013

It may be spring in Oregon, but wildfires are popping up like its summer. Last week as temperatures rose into the 70s and 80s, the Honeygrove Hobbit Fire on the West Oregon District burned 25 acres; a 10-acre fire burned in the woods west of Rogue River; a 6-acre fire burned in a forested area east of Prospect, and several other small fires broke out in both Jackson and Josephine counties.

No homes were threatened by the fires, but the blazes illustrated how easily wildfires are starting and spreading during this warm spell.

Meteorologist Jim Little with the Oregon Department of Forestry is concerned about the heat and relative humidity this coming weekend. “Eastern Oregon’s relative humidity will be in the teens, and the 100-hour fuel moisture in single digits.” 100-hour fuel represents the modeled moisture content of dead fuels in the 3 to 8 inch diameter class. The amount of moisture in fuel is the major element that will determine how much of the available fuel will burn. According to how much moisture is in the fuel, all will burn, only part will burn or, if wet enough, none will burn.

Oregonians are reminded that campfires must be drowned with water, stirred with a shovel, and drowned again, over and over, until the fire is dead out. Abandoned campfires became the number one cause of wildfires in Oregon during the 2012 fire season.

Those who wish to burn debris are asked to call their local fire district to determine whether or not burning is allowed. Fire officials urge residents to either chip their debris or haul it to a landfill. Gas powered equipment should be used early in the morning before the sun dries the grass.

From Keep Oregon Green Association

Starker Forests was selected for the 2013 Oregon Chapter of The Wildlife Society’s Private Landowner Stewardship Award.

The award was presented to Starker Forests forester Mark Gourley at the Joint Oregon-Washington Wildlife Society meeting on February 14 at Skamania Lodge.

The civic award recognizes private landowners for implementing positive wildlife conservation programs or actions on their land in conjunction with their commercial operations.

For over seventy five years, managers at Starker Forests have been producing sustainable timber, wildlife habitat, clean water and recreation on its 80,000 acres of forestland.

Our latest Tree Planting Day was a great success. Check out the pictures and video!

Happy New Year 2013! We have several items to tell you about this January.

First, our annual Tree Planting Day for boy/girl scouts is Saturday, January 26th. Call our office at 541-929-2477 for more information or to sign up.

Most of our recreation permits that are issued expire at the end of each calendar year. Please come by our office to get a new permit for 2013 if you recreate on our lands. You can change the location or tree farms that you are permitted to use anytime during the year by calling our office.

Each summer we hire a seasonal crew of mostly college students to assist us with our forest management objectives. The work period is mid-June to mid-September. The work can include firefighting, brushing roads, tree farm maintenance, and sampling our tree stands to measure tree stocking and growth. Applications will be accepted for these positions until February 19, 2013. Call our office for more information.

Lastly, we issue firewood cutting permits during the non-fire season. Recently we have had a number of storms that have caused blowdown (trees falling over) on our forestlands. We have suspended all firewood permits until we can salvage the blowdown. This means that we cut the fallen trees to proper lengths so that we can sell them to mills. That makes the tree much more valuable than cutting it up for firewood!

Now that the rain has been falling for a few weeks, it is easy to quickly forget about fire season. The Oregon Department of Forestry provides landowners with a update about the 2012 fire season. This year, there were 23 human caused industrial fires on ODF protected lands that involved 66 acres. The causes for the largest fires in this industrial category included a warming fire, logging equipment fires and a fire caused by a cable logging system. ODF reports that the 10-year average is 26 fires and 338 acres burned. Of note is that there were no fires between the middle of September and the middle of October, when fire danger was extremely high.

Forest landowners and operators work hard to stay prepared for fires by training, maintaining equipment and carrying the proper firefighting equipment on logging operations. Their hard work pays off when there are very few fires or very few acres are burned during the fire season.

Effective Monday, October 15, 2012, Starker Forests lands are open to the public for recreational use.
Gates will be opened as we are able to open them. Walk-in hunting ok. Please do not block gate. For those driving in, please avoid logging operations. Log trucks have the right of way on forest roads.

Due to the lack of any precipitation, the managers at Starker Forests have made a decision to keep our lands closed to recreational use until at least Monday, October 15th.
Our lands will not be open for hunting this weekend. This does not mean the lands will open on Monday. Decision to open lands to hunting and other recreation is weather dependent. We will let you know right here or you can find us on Facebook.