Nation’s Forests Yielding Hidden Treasures But Little Interest Found In Specialty Products, Such As Mushrooms, In Idaho Panhandle National Forests

The patch of manzanita shrubs was just a nuisance to the owners of forest land near Ashland, Ore. They enlisted the help of local ecologists to clear the 3- to 6-foot-high shrubs that grow throughout dry regions of the Pacific Northwest and can help fuel forest fires.

They were going to trash them until one of the ecologists, Melissa Borsting, learned from a friend that a Japanese pharmaceutical company wanted to buy 3,000 pounds of dried manzanita leaves.

It turns out the leaves can be used as a natural sunscreen.

Borsting, of the Rogue Institute for Ecology and Economy, recently told her tale at a congressional hearing at which critics questioned whether the U.S. Forest Service realizes the value of herbs and other products that can be harvested in national forests.

Focused for decades on logging trees, the agency lacks the know-how to deal with hidden treasures, from mushrooms and wild berries to Christmas-wreath materials and medicinal herbs, critics said.

Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources subcommittee on forests and a frequent critic of the Forest Service, said the agency does not even know how many specialty forest products are being harvested.

Craig said the current management approach reminds him of the saying, “When you don’t know where you are going, any road will get you there.”

Forest Service deputy chief Ron Stewart acknowledged that with the exception of traditional products such as Christmas trees and firewood, the specialty forests program “has been carried out locally, with little systematic tracking, budgeting, trained personnel or management guidelines.”

He added that there is no way to calculate how much is lost from illegal harvesting.

Stewart said the Forest Service has been overwhelmed by the sudden surge in interest in huckleberries, mushrooms, mosses and lichens.

Fewer than 1 million pounds of matsutake mushrooms were harvested in national forests in all of 1995, but 1.2 million pounds were harvested during an eight-week period alone in 1997, providing $366,000 in revenue from permit sales, he said.

“We are overhauling our thinking based on the increasing demand for these products,” Stewart told Craig’s subcommittee. For example, the Forest Service handbook is being updated to direct service managers to obtain fair market value for all products used for commercial purposes.

But the surge in demand for specialty forest products isn’t affecting Idaho Panhandle National Forests. Commercial mushroom harvesting is so infrequent, for example, that no permit is required, said Terri VanGundy of Sandpoint ranger district.

Beargrass is the most popular nontraditional commodity. As many as 200 beargrass harvesters a year come to North Idaho, primarily from the Tacoma area, VanGundy said.

They pay $50 for a five-day harvesting permit and sell the beargrass for floral arrangements.

The Sandpoint ranger district has had one request for a permit to harvest yew bark and one for a medicinal plant called St. John’s wort.

This picture is reflected across the rest of the forest. An occasional high-elevation hemlock or subalpine fir tree is shipped to Seattle for a landscaping job. The trees’ stunted growth makes them attractive to that market, said Steve Johnson of the Idaho Panhandle National Forests.

But at this point, “it’s nothing huge - just filling a little niche in the market hear and there,” Johnson said.

However, Idaho’s neighbors see greater demand. The harvesting of specialty forest products is worth at least $200 million a year in Washington and Oregon, said James Freed, a forester with Washington State University Cooperative Extension.

Borsting, whose Rogue institute is compiling a database of special products including more than 100 species, said, “One of the big limitations around special products is the lack of information.”

The nonprofit institute was formed following the “spotted owl timber crisis when a group of people came together who were tired of the perceived polarity between environmental and economic issues,” Borsting said.

Some of the biggest growth in demand is for medicinal plants, more than 100 fungi and other plants that routinely are exported to Asia, said Keith Blatner, a forestry professor at WSU.

“Although many people question the value of these products, there has been a dramatic surge in public interest and in the market for these products over the past few years,” Blatner said.

One of the most popular is St. John’s wort, a noxious weed often referred to as “nature’s Prozac” for its anti-depressant effect, he said.

Blatner said he wants the Forest Service to invest fees from harvesting permits in the management of specialty forest products. The proceeds now go straight to the general federal treasury.

Meanwhile, American Indian tribal leaders are concerned their treaty rights will be trampled by new entrepreneurs in the woods.

And environmentalists warn that specialty products may be overharvested in the same way excessive logging has taken a toll in the past.

, DataTimes MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: NORTH IDAHO Beargrass is the most popular nontraditional forest commodity. As many as 200 beargrass harvesters a year come to North Idaho. The Sandpoint ranger district has had one request for a permit to harvest yew bark and one for a medicinal plant called St. John’s wort.

The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = From staff and wire reports Staff writer Ken Olsen contributed to this report.