Oregon Department of Forestry announces top forest operator in Eastern Oregon for 2024
By Garrett Christensen on Friday, November 15th, 2024 in More Top Stories Northeastern Oregon News
ENTERPRISE – (Release from the U.S. Forest Service) BTO Forestry Solutions, based in Enterprise, has been chosen as Operator of the Year for Eastern Oregon. A regional advisory committee to the Oregon Board of Forestry earlier this fall selected the logging company for the honor. The firm and its owner, Mike Wiedeman, will be recognized in Salem at the January meeting of the Board along with honorees from northwest and southwest Oregon. Those are:
- Northwest Oregon – R.D. Reeves Construction, Inc., based in Rainier, Ore. in Columbia County
- Southwest Oregon – D & H Logging Company, based in Coos Bay
The Operator of the Year award recognizes forest operators who, while harvesting timber or doing other forestry work, protect natural resources at a level that consistently meets or goes above and beyond requirements of the Oregon Forest Practices Act *. That law requires people to manage forests responsibly and protect streams and water quality, protect and enhance habitat, and reduce landslide risks. The law also requires landowners to replant forests after harvesting.
Mike Wiedeman first started working in the timber industry in 1966 soon after graduating from high school. Eventually he became owner of his own logging firm. He was nominated this year for using long-span cabling to tackle a timber harvest on steep slopes leading down to a fish-bearing stream in canyonlands in Wallowa County.
“Mike had to carefully place his yarder in order to get enough lift to suspend logs over distances of close to a mile in some places,” said ODF’s Wallowa Unit Forester Tracy Brostrom. “This protected the soil and reduced the risk of erosion by avoiding gouging.”
Brostrom said Wiedeman also used his decades of logging experience to overcome other challenges, such as the lack of stumps that could anchor his rigging lines (called tailholds). “Instead, he secured them with large bulldozers,” said Brostrom.
View a video of BTO Forestry Solution’s work at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZcE22ZAA8I8
Merit Awards were also given to two other eastern Oregon companies.
- Arrowhead Logging, LLC, of Prineville for a thinning operation on private forestland that included removing encroaching junipers to improve habitat for deer and elk, increase fire resilience, and reduce drought stress among remaining trees. Video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9msKbdSvsA
- Green Diamond Resource Company in Klamath Falls for the thinning work it did to reduce fire risk in Lake County forests, and for helping the community reforest in the wake of the Bootleg Fire, as well as restoring fish habitat by placing logs in streams to provide shade after buffers burned up. Video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQmGq-Ou8Os
ODF Forest Resources Division Chief Josh Barnard said, “There were so many great nominees to pick from this year, it made the work of the selection committees very hard.”
Barnard said nominees showed they could meet the challenge of working under new rules that came into effect this year. The updated Oregon Forest Practices Act rules provide more protection for forest resources, such as wider stream buffers and limitations on equipment use around tributaries of fish-bearing streams.
“We saw a lot of innovative technology and techniques being used to protect water quality. On challenging harvesting sites, the Operators of the Year showed extraordinary care and diligence to protect resources and meet landowner objectives. We’re proud to recognize those efforts.”
