MEDIA RELEASE DATE: September 3, 2001 CONTACT: Patty Clary, Californians for Alternatives to Toxics 707-445-5100 or 707-498-7817 Don Jacobson, Forest Issues Group 530-272-1433 Vivian Parker, California Indian Basketweavers Assoc. 530-622-8718 Herbicide use in Tahoe National Forest blocked: Federal judge stops spraying until impacts are assessed. A federal judge in Sacramento barred the Forest Service from using herbicides to kill brush and grasses on 10,900 acres in the Tahoe National Forest. Judge Lawrence Karleton said the Forest Service cannot proceed with the plan until it assesses how use of the herbicides would affect the spread of noxious weeds and considers new information that calls into question earlier Forest Service findings that use of the herbicides would not harm humans and wildlife. The Forest Service had planned to use the herbicides to kill brush around pine seedlings planted in the 44,000 acres that burned in the Cottonwood Fire in 1994. The area contains the largest high- elevation wetlands in the Sierra Nevada and includes sensitive habitat for a number of rare and threatened animals. Under the judge’s ruling, the Forest Service must evaluate the herbicides' potential to encourage the spread of noxious weeds, particularly cheatgrass, the most dangerous fuel for early-season fires. “Studies show that what grows back after forest herbicides are sprayed often creates a situation far worse than what was there before,” said Patty Clary of the lead plaintiff group Californians for Alternatives to Toxics (CATs). Clary added that cheatgrass, which is rapidly advancing through the Sierras, ups fire danger in forest areas because it is a thick grass that dries up before native grasses do. “The fire season can begin six weeks earlier than it did historically once cheatgrass gets established by disturbances such as the use of herbicides,” said Clary. In designing the herbicide project, the Forest Service had relied on a 1988 Environmental Impact Statement that found that the agency’s use of the herbicides would not harm humans or wildlife. But the judge decided that the study’s conclusions were outdated in light of new information that indicates that the herbicides adversely affect immune, nerve and endocrine systems of animals and humans. The full effects of the chemicals is not completely known, but the judge noted that scientists have established that that chemicals that affect the endocrine system can cause the “feminisation of fish and amphibians at very low doses.” The court also ordered the Forest Service to evaluate whether use of the herbicides was even needed. The Forest Service had claimed that herbicides were needed because brush threatens the survival of conifer seedlings. But the court noted there was evidence that brush growth would not harm the seedlings. According to a CATs forestry expert there was evidence that denuding the soil will impair the growth of conifer seedlings. “On the ground conditions in the proposed Cottonwood spray area show that brush may be actually enhancing conifer seedling growth,” said forestry expert Dan Zimmerman. CATs was joined in the lawsuit by Forest Issues Group and the California Indian Basketweavers Association. All three public interest organizations had studied and critiqued the plan through almost four years of its development. “Though we told them from the beginning that this plan wasn’t needed, the Forest Service spent an enormous sum developing and defending their plan while ignoring the reasoned input of an interested public” said Don Jacobson of the Forest Issues Group. The Forest Service hopes to address the judge’s concerns in the next eight to ten months. ********************************** Californians for Alternatives to Toxics (CATs) has advocated for the use of safe and effective alternatives to pesticides for its members from throughout northern California from its office in Arcata for twenty years. California Indian Basketweavers Association is based in Nevada City and Forest Issues Group is based in Grass Valley. Sam Wilbanks is District Ranger for Sierraville Ranger District, Tahoe National Forest and can be reached at 530-994-3401. For quotes from Wilbanks and U.S. Attorney Edmund Brennan see the Sacramento Bee article which can be accessed through CATs website at http://www.alternatives2toxics.org/