Cascadia Scorecard News
December 2005 

Most northwesterners can recognize a forest clear-cut when they see one. But few of us can describe what an ecologically complex, sustainably managed forest looks like—or even know, perhaps, that such a place exists.

Longtime Sightline friends Peter and Pam Hayes, who manage 800 acres of working forests called Hyla Woods in the northern Coast Range in Oregon, are trying to change that with a strategy they call community-connected forestry.

Similar in concept to community-supported agriculture, community-connected forestry aims to increase consumers’ connections to local, sustainably managed forests. In the Hayes’ case, it means they actively encourage people to visit Hyla Woods; to help out with everything from planting and ecological monitoring to milling and wood cutting; and to buy wood directly from the three forests that make up Hyla Woods, all of which are located within an hour’s drive from Portland.

“There seems to be a need for experiments in what a responsible, working forest looks like,” Peter says. “We know what we say ‘no’ to, but do we know what we can say ‘yes’ to?”

Peter Hayes’ father, a fourth-generation Oregonian, acquired the forests that now make up Hyla Woods some 20 years ago. He incorporated sustainable forest practices from the beginning, and in the late 1990s, Hyla Woods became one of the first timberlands in Oregon to earn Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification, the most rigorous and independent standard for sustainable forestry.

Peter and Pam became more active with Hyla in 2002, when they left Seattle, where Peter worked as an educator, to move to Oregon. Their two teenage children, Ben and Molly, also help out, and other family members are involved.

Though the Hayes have worked on educating consumers since the beginning, they expanded and formalized their community-connecting activities in 2005. Upcoming activities range from a December celebration of the annual return of coho in one of their forests, to a series of tree-planting days, to annual bird counts in May. They also welcome students of all ages; and are working to connect local builders with locally grown woods through a Build Local Alliance.

The end result, Peter and Pam hope, is that consumers will begin to value wood from a multi-aged, diverse native forest. Hyla Woods, for example, grows not only Douglas fir, but also grand fir, maple, alder, cedar, hemlock, and Oregon white oak; and the average age of their trees is around 60 years (compared to 30-40 years for industrial timberlands). Their annual harvest is approximately 250,000 board feet a year.

“As with organic food, we need to expand our definition of what quality means,” Pam says. “We encourage people to look at whether their choice of wood maintains and builds the qualities of the place it came from. Maybe it’s better to use what’s here instead of getting a bamboo floor from Vietnam.”

Hyla Woods is part of Northwest Sustainable Timber Growers, a recently formed co-op of Northwest sustainable forest keepers. Members also include Zena Timber, near Salem, Oregon; and Oneil Pine in the Centralia, Washington, area. Another positive sign is that the number of acres in the Northwest that are FSC-certified has increased rapidly in recent years (as documented in Cascadia Scorecard 2005).

The Hayes family hopes that the market for responsibly managed wood will grow just as rapidly, and convince more forest owners that sustainable management can be economically viable.

“A similar challenge,” says Peter, “is to convince Northwest consumers that the wood-buying choices they make directly shape the future of local forests and communities.”

“We want to create a culture where you feel better about your house because it is built from responsibly grown local woods,” he says. “It takes a long-term perspective.”

To learn more or to sign up for an email newsletter from Hyla Woods, email Peter Hayes at peter_hayes@comcast.net.

More information on FSC certification and community forestry projects:
Forest Stewardship Council
NW Natural Resources Group
Healthy Forests Healthy Communities, a program of Sustainable Northwest
Certified Wood Warehouse
Ecotrust Forestry Program