Disconnect - POWER POLES and other thoughts

Driving down the hill to Sonora I passed the area where the dead trees are being processed, chipped for shipment to Ultra Power so they can become ELECTRICITY!  And across the highway dozens of new STEEL poles which PG&E will be using to replace the current wooden poles.  I understand that this is a regular maintenance project; wooden poles have a "life" just like everything else on this planet.  After a certain period they do rot, but is the life expectancy of a steel pole a lot more?   We have so MANY trees being cut thanks to the FIVE kinds of beetle attacking our forests partially due to the DROUGHT but also because we "forgot" that this area can only support so many trees.  The motto of the USForest Service used to be "land of many uses" but not any more, timber cutting is a thing of the past except NOW!  Of course, the USFS isn't in the tree cutting business, they are leaving that up to CalTrans and PG&E.  Will BLM and USFS be as diligent removing the dead pines, firs, and cedars?  Good question, we will have to watch and wait.

One of my Post Office customers said that he and his two neighbors just had to remove 225 trees from their five lots (1/4 acre) in Cold Springs, just down the highway.  PG&E has allowed all the private loggers to use their crane and operators when they are not actively using them!
It will be green again by the time our grand children are adults, but possibly we might have learned not to let every little tree grow to the 60 foot heights of these now dead trees.

Even CalTrans was experiencing a "disconnect" as they had scheduled a paving project for the same area of highway that is being logged - 150 feet from the center line!  Often the loggers must drag the fallen trees down the highway to where they are stacking them for removal.  It is very interesting watching them "dance to the music of chain saws" while stopping traffic totally if it is a logging situation, or escorting one line of vehicles if it is a repaving crew!

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