Several years ago, I started a project to create a portrait of the Anacortes Community Forest Lands, a 3000-acre community forest located in my hometown of Anacortes, WA.  The ACFL is a second growth forest that was intermittently logged until the 1970s when the community came together to protect this local treasure.  Today it is a very popular "park" managed by the City of Anacortes.

That project, which continues, has morphed into a project that includes second growth forests in the Pacific Northwest.  That region was heavily logged from the 1880s well into the twentieth century.  Photos made 100 years ago show a devastated landscape devoid of trees.  Today, the region is once again covered with forests, some well over 100 years old.  In much of the region, the forests are on a path to becoming old growth again. With this expanded project, I hope to encourage and inspire a better path for our resurgent forests than we followed a century ago.

The images in this portfolio were made in July 2024 in along the Middle Fork of the Snoqualmie River, Mt Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest, near North Bend, WA.  The show a recovering forest with lots of larger trees and a lush understory amidst huge stumps, most of which are in various stages of replenishing the forest's soil.  

Click on any image to browse through the full-sized images.  Thanks!