Logging Road Vandalized In Cove-Mallard Area

Someone vandalized a logging road being built into the Jack timber sale portion of the Nez Perce National Forest’s controversial Cove-Mallard area.

Timber company employees found several piles of slash on the road last Friday and a trench about two to three feet wide and two to five feet deep, Red River District Ranger Ed Wood said Monday.

“It certainly was not a job you would complete with one shovel and two hours,” Wood said. Contractors had nearly completed repairs on Monday.

The road is about two-thirds complete and is being built by Shearer Lumber Co. of Elk City, which bought the Jack timber sale along with the Noble and Grouse timber sales in the Cove-Mallard.

The Cove-Mallard timber sales have been the focus of five years of protests and lawsuits by environmental activists.

Earth First!, one of the activist groups, plans a national rendezvous at Dixie in June. About 300 people are expected to attend the gathering, which is advertised as non-violent civil disobedience to protest road building and logging.