Nerditorial: Lake Whatcom and Tree Stump Memorial Park

It has been literally hours since I wrote about Lake Whatcom and the Reconveyance. Where are my manners?

The Reconveyance can be, and has been, viewed in many ways.

One way to look at this matter is as choice between:

1. Lake Whatcom Forest Preserve or 
2. Tree Stump Memorial Park.

The zealous foes of the Reconveyance argue fervently that the land being considered for Reconveyance can be used for recreational purposes now... so there is no reason to reconvey the land... just work more with the DNR and make the same robust recreational use of this land without reconveying it. Win-win.

Cool.

But the problem here is that so long as the land remains actively commercially forested, we will have Tree Stump Memorial Park, effectively.

It's not all going to be Tree Stumps, mind you. The area will remain dominated by acre upon acre of mature forest canopy. The Tree Stumps will seem to slowly migrate from one harvested parcel of the land to another as years pass. And the Trees Stumps will slowly be replaced by maturing saplings over decades as they approach sufficient maturity to sustain a mature forest canopy... coincidentally at the same time those trees become harvestable. And then... again with the Tree Stumps.

Commercially forested land is harvested such that the land will never reach "old growth" status. By unavoidable necessity, commercially forested land is forest that is kept in a Peter Pan like state of artificially perpetual youth. The trees are destined to be harvested before they get to be 100 years old. Any given acre of this land will become a field of tree stumps sooner or later... and when the trees are harvested, so goes the mature canopy cover on which those trees are based.

I can see it now...

"Come, Tourist, to Whatcom County," we will say, "Visit Lake Whatcom and it's Majestic and Commercially Forested Tree Stump Memorial Park. Witness the Tree Stump Migration Patterns of our indigenous Lake Whatcom Tree Stumps. Who knows where they will turn up next?"

And in reply, the Tourist will say, "meh."

Because who spends their vacation visiting commercial forest lands?

Nobody. That's who.

Because who wants to spend vacation time looking at a bunch of migrating tree stumps?

Again, nobody.

Daddy... can we come back and see the Tree Stumps next year? PLEEEEEEEZZ...

If the land is reconveyed, it will be taken out of active commercial forestry. The trees will live their natural lifespans, and the mature canopy will be allowed to remain in tact indefinitely... eventually achieving "old growth" status.

That would be a Lake Whatcom Forest Preserve.

An 8,800 acre forest preserve would prove to be cat-nip to tourists visiting Whatcom County in a way that no commercially forested land could, no matter how well that land were managed.

'Nerd Out.