JoSo Ranch: Loggers Bob and Jim Zacharias - September 7, 2004
by Sarah McConnell

     We visited the JoSo Ranch in Wallowa County primarily so that we could meet loggers Bob and Jim Zacharias, a father and son operating separate timber businesses out of Joseph, Oregon. Jim Zacharias currently runs a small mill, and provided Whitman College with sustainably grown lumber for the newly created Environmental Studies wing. Jim's father, Bob, has traditionally had less than fond feelings for the environmental community- however with some persuasion from Jim he agreed to meet our group. Bob employs twelve through a small logging operation that bids on, and harvests various plots in and around Wallowa County. (Unfortunately Bob did not express his personal feelings about environmentalists.) Accompanying Jim and Bob were Bruce Dunn, an outspoken forest manager, John Williams the county extension manager, and Oregon Department of Forestry employee Mike Shaw.

     The men described JoSo Ranch as a "true working ranch". Owners Joe and Doug Lynn of Walla Walla run cattle on 6500 acres, 4500 of which also support timber harvest. Dunn estimated that 16 million board feet remain standing; harvesting is contracted to loggers like Bob Zacharias who remove an average of annually one million board feet according to 7-10 year rotations. The trees are regularly thinned, primarily to maintain what is considered an optimal amount of growth (5-6 growth rings each year). The oldest tree on the ranch is only an estimated 120 years old; the presence of old trees does not make sense economically because of the current timber mills are designed to process logs measuring 33" in diameter. The forest was run on economic terms- any use of the word sustainability referred to sustainable yield; the men wanted to harvest an equal or greater amount of timber each year. Forest management was central to the amount and quality of the wood they harvest not only from JoSo, but from any timber stand. The men understood forest health to be dictated by an either or situation: either a logger manages the forest, or it burns. Both Dunn and Bob Zacharias wore hats embroidered with flaming trees and the statement, "So many trees, So little time". The message Dunn, Bob Zacharias and the others wanted to convey was simply that and 'unmanaged' forest wasn't suitable for wildlife, recreation, or timber harvest because it would inevitably burn.

     The men at JoSo Ranch were concerned not only with the maintenance of the timber industry, but also with the preservation of their culture. Although Bob Zacharias harbors immense pride in the fact that his two grandsons, aged 22 and 26, are the youngest loggers in Wallowa County, he wonders where the other young loggers have gone- but mostly he laments that logging is no longer considered a viable occupation to Wallowa County youth. There is a definite air of resentment toward the government's role in preventing loggers from managing all of the public lands, especially in the face of other hardships such as globalization and the replacement of employees with technology. As Dunn repeated several times, "You can't legislate natural resource management." If loggers are unemployed, and forests are going to burn without their help, then why does the government continue to disallow logging in the most productive areas? The men wanted local control- the loggers who understand the land should be making decisions about how it is managed, not "some guy from New York City". All of the men were aging, and recognized that their lifestyle was aging along with them. There was uncertainty expressed about the future of logging, and sadly the future of counties like Wallowa County that have traditionally relied on natural resource extraction.