Adirondack Park view from Hurricane MountainIn recent weeks, the Adirondack Park has become involved in a new debate over clearcut logging. But a growing coalition of environmentalists, industry leaders, government officials and academics agree on one thing.

More than a million acres of the Park’s privately-owned timber land is deteriorating — turning into what some critics describe as “junk” forest.

That trend threatens the long-term environmental health of the Adirondacks, as well as the health of the North Country’s logging industry.

“All you have to do is look at the stands throughout the park and you find that poor genetic stock was left [and] you have a reduction in maple,” said Ross Whaley, former APA chairman and the former head of the SUNY college of environmental science and forestry, who now represents the Adirondack Landowners Association. “So if you look at that history, it looks to me like we’ve been practicing bad forest management here.”

From North Country Public Radio: Ray Brook, Feb 14, 2013

Photo by Johnathan Esper, www.wildernessphotographs.com