QUEETS — The state Department of Natural Resources has purchased 1,720 acres of forest north of the Quinault Indian Reservation along the Queets River for $5.2 million.
The land was not part of a 3,184-acre purchase by The Nature Conservancy on March 30 that created a 32-mile conservation corridor along the Hoh River.
The DNR bought the 1,720 acres from The Conservancy, which had bought it as part of a 2,320-acre, $7.65 million purchase from Rayonier in 2013.
The Conservancy said its aim in both the Hoh and Queets watersheds is to protect and restore the rivers for salmon habitat.
However, “our science tells us that only part of that property is significant in terms of its conservation values,” David Rolph, director of forest conservation and management for The Conservancy’s Washington chapter.
“We feel that we can sell the parts of the property that aren’t so critical for conservation to DNR to manage with their Habitat Conservation Plan.”
Of the purchase price, $4 million was the value of timber that can be harvested in 10 to 20 years.
Rolph said The Conservancy would recycle that money into other preservation projects in the state.
Rolph said the sale met The Conservancy’s secondary goals of pubic access to and recreation on the land.
“Those uses will be maintained,” he said.
DNR communications manager Bob Redling said the department would close some road and bridge access to the tract from the west but that the land probably would be more accessible than it was under private ownership.
“We’re grateful for the partnership with The Nature Conservancy in purchasing this land,” said Commissioner of Public Lands Peter Goldmark.
“It will benefit future trust beneficiaries and our conservation commitments on the Olympic Peninsula.”
Redling said there were no immediate plans to develop the land, which will become part of DNR’s Olympic State Experimental Forest project that is headquartered in Forks.
If harvested, any timber sales would benefit the state’s Common School Trust.
