On Saturday, after Humboldt Redwood Company (HRC) started logging on Long Ridge, a forest defender climbed into an old-growth tree in the path of a proposed road and has refused to come down since.
The forest defender is going by the name Rook and is choosing to remain anonymous. The activist avoided the HRC company security, ascended the old-growth Douglas fir that HRC plans on cutting down, and remained there undetected until Rook hailed the guards the next day. The guards are hoping to make an arrest as soon as they can get the tree sitter on the ground.
Rook intends to stay in the centuries old tree until it is saved.
Rook made a statement from the tree, “I’m up here because we need intact forests more than we need forest products. HRC wants to say their logging is sustainable but they didn’t plant the trees they’re cutting. This tree is 200 years old and they’ll invent some technicality so they can fell it to build a road and still say ‘we don’t log old growth.’”
On Monday shortly before 5am, four Petrolia residents were arrested for blocking the main logging gate. The residents who blocked the gate are a part of the conservationist organization Lost Coast League. A statement was released as to why the residents took direct action. Since the 80s, “residents have campaigned to preserve this heritage landscape from industrial logging.”
Photo: “Humboldt Redwood Forest Single_tonemapped” by Daniel is licensed under CC BY 2.0
ANARCHIMEDIA 