Environmentalists are lobbying the University of Kentucky (UK) to reverse its decision to commercially log 800 acres of Robinson Forest.
The forest, managed for research, teaching and extension education by the university’s Department of Forestry, covers 14,800 acres and is one of the largest education and research forests in the eastern US.
In 2004, the university’s board of trustees agreed the Comprehensive Timber Management Plan, which allows researchers to log the site for the benefit of evaluating forest management schemes and showing the effect of logging on perennial streams.
This will allow for the removal of up to 800 acres of woodland, which will then be sold commercially to generate income for UK.
However, environmentalists, including the campus-based campaign group Greenthumb and local poet Wendell Berry, have called on the department to use existing logged forests to assess the impact of felling on perennial streams and not disturb up to a 10th of Robinson Forest for one project.
