Late January 2004: US Forest Service Uses Misleading Pamphlet to Promote Bush Administration’s Forest Policy

[pictures rearranged for display purposes] Series of photo shots included in the US Forest Services’ “Forests with a Future Brochure” brochure [Source: US Forest Service]The US Forest Service distributes a pamphlet promoting the agency’s amendment (see August 6, 2004) to the 2001 Nevada Forest Plan, which calls for more logging. In one section of the pamphlet, put together by a public relations firm, there is a series of six black-and-white photos taken at different times over a span of 80 years. The first picture, taken in 1909, shows a forested area with large trees spaced far apart. Each of the following pictures, taken at the same spot, show how the forest became denser over time. The photo-chronology suggests that the first picture represents how forests should appear in their natural state. But in Spring 2004, it is learned that the first picture had been taken after the area had been logged. Furthermore, the pictures were actually taken in Montana, not the Sierra Nevadas. It also turns out that the photos had similarly been used before by the agency to promote other forest-thinning initiatives. [USDA Forest Service, 1/2004 ; Associated Press, 4/12/2004]