We have admired Bob Devlin from the moment we first met, not long after he was named Forest Supervisor on the Umpqua National Forest, based at Roseburg, Oregon. He was refreshingly candid - even when we didn't like his answers to our questions - which only added to the respect he had for him.

On Nov. 10, the Oregonian, Oregon's largest daily newspaper, published a column Mr. Devlin wrote concerning what he called "forest conditions as bad as they get in our national forests. Although he editorial concerns the Umpqua National Forest, he could just as easily written about dead and dying timber in any of the West's national forests. All of them are being overtaken by insects and diseases for which the only safe and reliable remedy is thinning.

We have been writing about the deplorable state of the West's federally-owned forests for more than 20 years. In that time, woefully little has been done to arrest the spread of insects, diseases or inevitable wildfire. Although most of the damage has occurred in dry site, mixed conifer forests in the Intermountain West, Mr. Devlin reports that almost 40 percent of Oregon's forests are now in what fire ecologists call "Condition Class 3," meaning they are ready to burn.

Mr. Devlin is a New Jersey native and a Penn State forestry school graduate, class of 1958. He worked for the Forest Service in Regions 5 and 6 until his retirement in 2000. At the time of his retirement, he was Director of Natural Resources for Region 6.

Devlin-Umpqua National Forest

Tags: Forest Health Umpqua National Forest Insects & Diseases Lodgepole Pine