The public is frequently told that clearcut logging in Southeast Alaska is harmful to deer, and that unless timber harvests are reduced and constrained in the Tongass National Forest, deer populations in the region will decline. This, we are told, also has ramifications for other species, especially wolves, for whom deer are thought to be the principal food. The Forest Service has used this idea as one justification for scaled back logging on the Tongass, and the Fish and Wildlife Service has pressed for more protection of old growth habitat on the premise that it is needed to sustain deer and wolf populations. 

The Forest Service uses a habitat capability model to predict the effects of a given harvest scenario on deer. Unfortunately, the science behind the model is weak and the result has been overprotection of habitat at the expense of timber related jobs. The question remains, then, what really is the effect of timber cutting on deer who live in Southeast Alaska, and what is the value of second growth habitat for those deer? The Alaska Forest Association and several member companies have decided to find out. 

In a cooperative agreement hammered out last month, AFA and member companies have launched a 3-year study to evaluate second growth deer habitat in Southeast, and try to develop some models for second growth management that can maximize wildlife values while still managing the land for timber production. The study will be conducted by Ken Raedeke, a wildlife scientist from Washington, and Rick Johnson, a researcher from Fairbanks. It is expected to cost approximately $300,000 over the three year period. 

Raedeke is the principal in Raedeke Associates, Inc., a Seattle-based firm which provides consulting services on wildlife and wildlife resource management issues. He is also a professor of wildlife at the University of Washington’s School of Forestry. Johnson is a research biologist at Alaska Biological Research, Inc. ( ABR ). Located in Fairbanks, ABR is a respected Alaska natural resources research firm. Johnson did field work in Southeast Alaska for his post-graduate studies at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks, and has worked on wildlife issues throughout the state. 

In late August, various members of the AFA Science Committee and I spent two days with Raedeke and Johnson looking at second growth on Sealaska and Forest Service land near Hoonah. This area has been chosen as the initial site for the research for several reasons. Among them is the fact that Hoonah tends to get fairly heavy snowfall, and winter forage availability is one issue the study will examine. The Hoonah area also provides a variety of landscapes and harvest configurations, as well as access control that make it a particularly suitable site for this type of research. 

The week following the field trip, Raedeke wrote a summary of the Hoonah visit. "I was impressed," he wrote, "with the diversity of habitat that remained on Sealaska lands, even after the intensive timber harvesting that has occurred. As noted in your timber inventory data, there was a substantial amount of commercial forest retained, interspersed with non-commercial stands and other non-forested communities. This should be beneficial both for wildlife in general, and also for our future study, since there should be adequate examples of all forest stand conditions for sampling purposes." 

Johnson, in his own summary of the trip, noted that "the West Port Frederick area offers a good selection of stand types, elevations, and aspects with convenient road access. . . . the study area probably has more documentation on its timber types and stand histories than areas available on public lands; this documentation will be relied on for selecting areas to sample and later for the application of our habitat quality model across the study area." 

The AFA study will focus on the nutrition needs of deer, based on a model suggested by USDA Forest Sciences Lab scientist, Tom Hanley. Hanley has been a critic of the model currently used by the Forest Service and has identified its scientific weaknesses. As Johnson pointed out, "Hanley’s model is a more productive approach with three advantages: it directly measures habitat quality based on deer foods, it is supported by sound research, and it is an alternative model that avoids the obvious deficiencies of the [current] USFS model." 

Raedeke Associates is presently developing the experimental design of the AFA cooperative study, and it is hoped that Johnson will begin doing initial data gathering this winter. As a result of this effort, by the turn of the century we should know a great deal more about deer and how they and logging can successfully coexist.