Bark Alert: Flash Mob against Nestlé Friday

Dear Barker,

Please join me this Friday to stop Nestlé from taking our Mt. Hood water. This is the single most important - and creative - action you can take to help stop Nestlé, so please read below and email Meredith to sign up today.

Alex P Brown, Executive Director


Bark-Out: Aerial Art Mob against Nestlé Friday!  
Bark-About:  The Valentine’s Day ‘Heartbreak Hike’
Giving Tree: Thank you for giving in 2012
Bark Tales: Welcome to Bark with a volunteer orientation
Bark Bites: Announcing new recommendations for protecting Mt. Hood's water resources
Hood Hydrology: Oregon's state animal is also nature's watershed biologist

Bark-Out
Aerial Art Mob and Day of Action Friday!

It’s been almost four years since we discovered Nestlé had plans to bottle and sell Mt. Hood water in the Columbia River Gorge for a massive profit, and we are still fighting! Meanwhile, the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife (ODFW) has been dodging its involvement with the Nestlé permits and has continued to cancel opportunities for a public discussion of its role in the issue at its Commission Meeting. This Friday we will stand together to create a visual representation that the people have spoken and we say 'No' to Nestlé's water grab in the Gorge.

There are three ways to take action on Friday, February 8th! Better yet, start today by helping spread the word.

1) Friday morning bridge visibility: 7:30-9am Gather at the Hawthorne Bridge (at SE Madison and Grande Ave) to raise awareness of the campaign to keep Nestlé out of the Gorge. We will provide signs and donuts for you. Nothing gets your morning started right like the cheers and honks of am bike commuters!

2) Friday Aerial Art Mob!!!: 12-1pm Don’t miss this! Come one, come all, to Lower Macleay Park in Northwest Portland where we willl form ourselves into a giant 'No Nestlé' symbol (visible from the air) for a fun photo shoot. Then we’ll need your help afterward to make this powerful image go viral! Check out directions by bike and car here.

3) On Friday check your inbox for a special message with instructions on how to contact state decision makers and help pressure the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife to drop Nestlé’s permits.

Email [email protected] or call 503-331-0374 for more info, or to sign up for the art mob.



Bark-About
The Heartbreak Hike: Post-logging at the Annie’s Cabin Timber Sale

Bark fought every step of the way to stop logging in the Annie’s Cabin Timber Sale, even taking the Bureau of Land Management to court. Yet logging proceeded nonetheless. For a special February Valentine’s Day themed ‘Heartbreak Hike’ volunteer Jos Vaught will help us explore the devastating toll that logging has taken on this recreation area near the Molalla River. Despite the heartbreak, there is great importance in witnessing the impacts of logging on the forest landscape to draw inspiration to fight for the special places that remain.  We hope that you will leave this hike fired up to help protect Mt. Hood‘s forests this spring. (See Bark Tales below for info on how to start now.)

Please bring food, water, hat, rain/snow gear, sturdy hiking boots, and be prepared to hike off trail. Bark-Abouts are led on the second Sunday of every month and are free to the public.
Click here for more information about this month’s hike.


Giving Tree
Thank you supporters for a great year!

In 2012, Forest Sustainer members constituted 44% of Bark’s budget, other member donations 35%, and private foundations 21%. Bark is grateful that 79% of our work is powered by people like you who care about Mt. Hood National Forest. Thank you!

A big “you rock!” also goes to the following foundations for their support of our programs in 2012: 444S Foundation, Astrov Fund, Ben & Jerry’s Foundation, Bullitt Foundation, Burning Foundation, Charlotte Martin Foundation, Jubitz Family Foundation, Klorfine Foundation, Lazar Foundation, Mazamas Conservation Committee, Mitzvah Fund of the Oregon Community Foundation, Mountaineers Foundation, Patagonia Portland, and Wilburforce Foundation.


Bark Tales
Get plugged in with a volunteer orientation and open house

Spring will be here before you know it, which means its time to gear up for a busy season of work in the forest! If you want to get involved and start volunteering with Bark then don’t miss this Volunteer Orientation and Open House, Tuesday, February 26th.

Our office space houses a library of resources: binders full of documentation about every timber sale Bark has monitored during our 15 year history, field guides and resources on forest ecology, and even a ‘lichen library’ that holds samples of many varieties of lichen you may encounter in Mt. Hood National Forest. Stop by and see for yourself! Forest Watch Coordinator Gradey Proctor and Grassroots Organizer Meredith Cocks will highlight ways Bark volunteers contribute to our work. Then we’ll discuss upcoming ways to get involved.

Can’t wait to meet you!


Bark Bites
We are proud to announce the publication of our Water White Paper!

Protecting Freshwater Resources on Mt. Hood National Forest: Recommendations for Policy Change is the result of a multi-year partnership between Bark and Pacific Rivers Council, produced through expert scientific research and policy analysis. This report is a great resource for understanding the current condition of water resources in Mt. Hood National Forest and how those resources can be protected to ensure the legacy of clean, cold, abundant water in Portland's backyard forest.

As the Forest Service gears up for a long-overdue revision of its outdated Mt. Hood Forest Plan, scheduled to begin in 2016, Bark is laying the groundwork to ensure that the revised plan prioritizes management for clean water and avoids the pitfalls created by the current 1990 Forest Plan. We have seen the effects of an outdated management paradigm in Mt. Hood National Forest in the form of degraded water quality, dwindling wildlife habitat, privatization of recreation management, and massive timber sales that threaten destruction of the forest. This report, Protecting Freshwater Resources on Mt. Hood National Forest: Recommendations for Policy Change, provides a starting point for securing management policies in the next Forest Plan revision that will protect the drinking water source for more than one million Oregonians, critical fish habitat, and the waterways of an ecosystem worth preserving.

Please contact Program Director, Olivia Schmidt, at [email protected] or 503-331-0374 with questions about the report or to request a printed copy.


Hood Hydrology
Restoring beavers to restore salmon habitat

Beavers aren't just Oregon's state animal, they are also a critical part of maintaining and restoring healthy watersheds. These amazing critters create and maintain wetlands as a part of their own survival, using and growing native vegetation to provide valuable complex habitats for salmonids and other wildlife while simultaneously providing flood control and lowering baseflow temperatures in fishbearing waters. Beavers still inhabit parts of the west side of Mt. Hood National Forest, but their populations are greatly reduced and eliminated from much of their natural range on the east side of Mt. Hood.

Restoring beavers to the landscape of Mt. Hood National Forest is one of the recommendations in our recently published report Protecting Freshwater Resources on Mt. Hood National Forest: Recommendations for Policy Change. Read the report to learn more and check out this news story about a team of biologists on Oregon's north coast leading the way with a project that employs beavers as an economic and ecologically savvy means for restoring wetlands.