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The following correspondence was sent to WDFW Director Jeff Koenings. The property mentioned by Ms. Engle is currently owned by Western Pacific Timber who purchased most of Boise Cascade's Washington holdings. It is included in an exchange proposal between Western Pacific and the Department of Natural Resources (DNR). DNR and WDFW are also discussing a large land exchange which will consolidate public ownerships in many other areas of Eastern Washington.
June 12, 2006 Jeff Koenings, Director
Dear Director Keonings: This letter is to acquaint you with our involvement with WDFW managers about the Wenas Creek watershed between Umptanum Ridge and Clemans Mountain. The Hazel Wolf Wenas Bird Sanctuary and campground was created in the late 1960s by Boise Cascade for Hazel and her large managing committee for the Annual Audubon Wenas Campout on Memorial Day Weekends. Since the mid 1960s about 200 Auduboners from all over the state (and sometimes Oregon) have gathered for birding, botanizing and socializing for three days, in what can only be defined as a “primitive” campground. (We rent over a dozen portable toilets for the 4-5 days our families are there.) Field trips are scheduled to range widely throughout the Wenas watershed and adjoining ridges and canyons (Manastash, Umptanum, etc.). We have always kept accurate citizen science lists of all our sightings. We have display boards with about 100 specimens of wildflowers and other flora, we have workshops and mini-classes for kids and grown-ups on the subjects around us -- entomology, geology, human history of the area, etc. Our campfire circle programs are entertaining, informational, and inspiring. We are working with WDFW and DNR to secure the future of the public’s use of their lands for a wide diversity of outdoor recreation, and to protect the wildlife and cultural history of this wonderful place, AND to guarantee Audubon’s place on the shores of Wenas Creek every Memorial Day Weekend. The actual ownership of our campground was Boise Cascade and they were wonderful hosts for our event, even sending a forester to join us at our campfire circle each year. Now that B-C is gone, we are unsure about our status and have been lobbying for the land swaps explained to us by Ken Bevis, WDFW Regional Biologist. We are hopeful and want to be supportive of the land swaps in the Wenas area. We really appreciated having Ken Bevis at our evening “campfire” on May 27. He did a wonderful job of explaining to 100+ Auduboners what the Department’s management for wildlife is all about in his Region. We hope to keep in touch as the land swaps progress under the tight schedule of 15 months. If there is an opportunity for us to register support, please let us know. Sincerely,
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