Sierra Club Hails New Sequoia National Monument
Sierra Club Hails New Sequoia National Monument Saturday, April 15, 2000 GIANT SEQUOIA NATIONAL MONUMENT -- President Clinton today fulfilled the century-old vision of permanently protecting California's Giant Sequoias by designating their groves and surrounding forests as a National Monument. The President's action is the capstone to a conservation campaign begun by Sierra Club founder John Muir to ensure these giants can inspire future generations of Americans just as they awed Muir. "John Muir ended the 19th century fighting to protect the Giant Sequoia -- we are thrilled to see President Clinton start the 21st century by giving the Giant Sequoia forests the protection they deserve," said Joe Fontaine, a Sierra Club past President who has worked nearly 40 years to protect the Sequoia. "Some of those old monarchs are over 3000 years old, over 30 feet in diameter and taller than the Statue of Liberty. A walk through a Giant Sequoia grove is a humbling experience," Fontaine added. "God put us on this earth to be stewards of his creation, not to destroy it. Some doubted we would accept the challenge. But today, President Clinton is shouldering that responsibility to leave a priceless, irreplaceable gift to future generations of Americans." Last week, the Sierra Club presented Congress and President Clinton with 600,000 postcards from people across America calling for permanent Sequoia protection, while California Assemblymember Dion Aroner gathered support from more than 50 members of the state legislature. While U.S. Forest Service policy protected the Sequoia trees themselves, it permitted other trees surrounding the Giant Sequoia groves to be logged. However, because the shallow-rooted Sequoias are so vulnerable to human impacts on their environment, nearby logging can damage the majestic trees by disrupting water flows, exacerbating erosion and altering the fire conditions. "Logging around the Sequoia groves has the potential to kill the Sequoia just as an ax or a chainsaw does," said Dr. Edgar Wayburn, Sierra Club's Honorary President and a recent Presidential Medal of Freedom winner for his conservation work. "A hundred years ago, John Muir walked these woods, marveled at these ancient wonders, and dreamed of protecting America's majestic sequoias forever -- now President Clinton is fulfilling that dream." One critical decision will be the role fire will play in allowing the Sequoia forests to flourish in their natural state. In Sequoia National Park, adjacent to the National Monument, the National Park Service has relied on controlled burns to keep the forests thriving. Healthy Giant Sequoia forests depend on fire to clear out competing undergrowth, and Sequoia cones release their seeds when activated by a forest fire's heat. "The final step to granting Giant Sequoias full protection is to select an appropriately qualified scientific panel to determine how to allow the natural process of fire to shape these forests," Fontaine said. "We urge the panel be built on the experience of scientists at the National Park Service, which has demonstrated its ability to create an appropriate fire environment using controlled burning without relying on logging." Protecting the sequoia forest ecosystem has been one of the Sierra Club's top goals for a century. As Muir wrote in The Mountains of California in 1894, "Walk the Sequoia woods at any time of the year and you will say they are the most beautiful and majestic on earth. Beautiful and impressive contrasts meet you everywhere -- the colors of tree and flower, rock and sky, light and shade, strength and frailty, endurance and evanescence." When President Clinton initiated the Sequoia National Monument process, he wrote to Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman that he did so at Dr. Wayburn's urging. Clinton wrote: "I want to ensure that these majestic cathedral groves, which John Muir called `Nature's masterpiece,' are protected for future generations to study and enjoy. ... Dr. Edgar Wayburn, Honorary President of the Sierra Club, mentioned this to me when I awarded him a Presidential Medal of Freedom last summer, and he also has written me about the subject." "The late Congressman George E. Brown, Jr. realized these forests were part of our nation's spiritual heritage, and when he died, his colleagues Congressmen Sam Farr and George Miller carried the baton to fulfill his vision," Wayburn said. "The names of Congressmen Farr and Miller will be forever linked to those of John Muir and George Brown when future generations remember those who saved the Sequoia." For more information, contact: Joe Fontaine Sierra Club 661-821-2055 Web site: http://www.sierraclub.org/chapters/ca/sequoia/ |