King County has postponed a 45-acre logging operation in Island Center Forest until next summer due to the number of comments it received about the project and its impacts on local wildlife and human health, according to the county’s lead forester.

The county received 12 comments in its environmental review process, about twice as many as usual for a forestry project, said Paul Fischer, King County’s senior forester.

“Our internal review (of the comments) took a month or two. We had to think through all the options, and we just ran out of time,” Fischer said.

The comments are also leading the county to change its policy around thinning projects, he added. Among those weighing in was the Vashon Bird Alliance (formerly Vashon Audubon), which expressed concern over the county’s failure to consider research on nesting seasons for forest-dependent birds in its plans. Fischer said he found the comment compelling and plans to work with the Bird Alliance and others to change its policy.

“I’ve been aware that this is an area of concern for a lot of people, and it’s just the responsible thing to do — to heed the suggestions that came up” in the environmental review process, Fischer said.

“That’s what it means to be a good steward, and we’re committed to good stewardship,” he said.

Pieced together over the years, Island Center Forest now comprises 440 acres of public ownership, a beloved place for walkers, runners, horseback riders and other users. Ten miles of trail lace the forest, skirting past two ponds, through ravines and near wetlands.

The county announced plans last spring to conduct an ecological thinning project in Island Center Forest, its third such project and the largest since the county took ownership of the forest 20 years ago. The equivalent of 110 loaded log trucks will remove Douglas fir, red alder and other tree species from 45.4 acres, a project meant to address a number of problems in a forest once owned by the state Department of Natural Resources.

Fischer and Derek Churchill, a state forester who lives on Vashon and who is acting as a consultant to the project, have identified areas with root rot, which is causing conifers to die; dense patches where the trees struggle to grow; and even-aged stands that lack the structural diversity needed for forest health.

The goal is forest health, Fischer said, or what he calls “a self-sustaining forest ecosystem” that can naturally recover from an array of expected climate-induced threats – longer, drier summers, high winds, intense heat, even fire.

The county had anticipated putting the project out to bid in June, with logging beginning as early as July. At the time, Fischer said, the county believed it was properly considering impacts on nesting birds – the county’s biologist said that window is April 15 to June 15.

But the Vashon Bird Alliance, in comments submitted last June, said research shows that birds nest in regional forests as late as the end of July or even into August. As a result, according to the Bird Alliance, other government agencies, including the City of Seattle and the City of Portland, have developed “best management policies” that limit forestry work between April 15 and July 31.

“Protecting breeding habitat during the primary nesting season is important because the populations of many forest birds, including migratory songbirds, have been shown to be in decline over the past half-century. … We strongly recommend King County to adopt this guideline as a best management practice to protect nesting birds for this and all future forest projects,” the Bird Alliance wrote.

Fischer said he plans to follow the bird alliance’s recommendations when it conducts the project next year. “Going forward,” he added, “we plan to start talking to wildlife biologists and formulate an official policy.”

The county also received comments from the state Department of Ecology, urging the county to take measures to address potential arsenic in the soil, a legacy from the Asarco copper smelter that dropped pollutants on Vashon for decades until its closure in 1985.

Fischer said he thought the project was far enough north to be outside of the plume’s historic reach. “But Ecology recommended that we test, so we’re going to do that — we’re going to follow their protocol,” he said.

Leslie Brown is a former editor of The Beachcomber.