America Wastes a Second Chance

We have a great deal of wildlife in America today -- a situation far different from 100 years ago when our Eastern forests were all but gone, and wild game was entirely shot out by market hunters.

We were given a second chance.

Not everyone else has. Take Scotland.

The Romans called Scotland "Caledonia," a term that means wooded heights. But the forests of Scotland were cut down for pasture, and with the loss of forest came the loss of soil. Short-term profits led to long-term environmental destruction -- destruction that continues to grind the Highlands to this day. With the trees went the soil, and with the soil went any hope and all memory of what once had been.

In the U.S., we were headed down this same road until the Weeks Act -- the first huge Government bail out -- resulted in the U.S. Government buying up all of our denuded eastern slopes in 1911. In time this land reforested itself and become the backbone of the National Forest system in the eastern United States.

Less we pat ourselves on the back too much, however, let's remember that we can quickly lose what we have regained. Today in Appalachia, we are once again ripping up and ruining vast swaths of wild lands.

Just take a look at the Mountaintop removal efforts going on in Kentucky and West Virginia.

Mountaintop removal is a radical form of coal mining in which entire mountains are blown up and the overburden is pushed into creeks and hollows, poisoning and suffocating the headwaters of rivers and creeks.

The land is inexorably and permanently altered. Once you have lost a mountain, you have lost it forever.






So far, more than 450 mountains have been destroyed by mountaintop removal coal mining, and more mountains are being targeted every day. The short-term economics of mountaintop removal benefit a small cadre of people who generally live far from the mines.

Almost none of the money stays in the states where it is made -- this is robber baron economics at its worst.

Due to the use of massive machines, automation, and explosive charges, very few jobs are created. This is mining without miners and with almost no economic benefit to the poor people of eastern Kentucky and West Virginia.

Along with massive environmental destruction and the loss of the mountain top itself, the forest too is generally lost. Mountaintop removal sites are "reclaimed" by simply pushing a thin layer of soil over the top of hard rock and rubble and then sprinkling a little nonnative grass seed so that it "hairs over" in a few weeks.

For more information about how we are ruining Eastern Kentucky, West Virginia and parts of Tennessee, and what you can do to help stop it, see >> Appalachian Voices or their sister web site >> http://www.ilovemountains.org/