![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/spirit-hollow-4-20251222-1200x798.jpg\")
Tracey Forest, who runs Spirit Hollow, a silent nature-based retreat in Shaftsbury, described on December 22, 2025 how she needed to re-locate her business during logging in the adjoining Green Mountain Forest. Photo by Glenn Russell\/VTDigger<\/p>\n
In late November, Tracey Forest heard loud grinding and beeping and raced down the road to find a fleet of logging trucks with giant claws and saws near where she runs Spirit Hollow, a silent retreat.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The loggers with machinery were traveling toward the Green Mountain National Forest, bordering Spirit Hollow. In the days that followed, the retreat programs were relocated after guests were upset by the sound of falling trees,\u00a0 according to Forest, her given name.<\/p>\n
Forest said it was a \u201cbig shocker\u201d to see the large number of felled trees, with only a few left standing in the clearings, littered with branches and debris. \u201cTo place such a giant, loud factory operation right at our border \u2014 it seems unconscionable to us,\u201d Forest said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The logging on Grass Mountain is part of a 15-year U.S. Forest Service plan called the Early Successional Habitat Creation Project to create young forests by allowing logging on over 14,000 acres<\/a> on the southern portion of the Green Mountain National Forest. The idea behind the project, approved in 2019, is to help create forests with trees of different ages and promote habitat for wildlife, like songbirds. Notably, certain game birds benefit as well, some conservationists said.\u00a0<\/p>\n In essence, the Early Successional Habitat project calls for sections of the Green Mountain National Forest to be logged using various forestry methods, including clearcutting in patches,\u00a0 and other types of logging that sometimes leave only a few trees behind. Such habitats look like\u00a0 shrubby clearings without a mature tree canopy, according to a report<\/a> on the federal website.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n The project rekindles an ongoing debate<\/a> in Vermont between forest conservationists \u2014 who would let the forest grow wild \u2014 and loggers, foresters and state biologists who argue cutting down trees benefits the forest in the long run. Both believe their methods \u2014 rewilding or active forest management \u2014 improves the forest\u2019s overall health. At stake is the future of Vermont\u2019s forests, one of the state\u2019s most prized natural resources and recreational assets.<\/p>\n Forestry practices and management are facing a broader deregulatory push on the federal level, including through the Fix our Forest Act<\/a> currently before Congress that would streamline National Environmental Policy Act review of U.S. Forest Service logging projects as a wildfire prevention strategy, among other measures of the bill.\u00a0<\/p>\n In the rollout of the Early Successional Habitat Creation Project, the Forest Service implemented a new approach in Vermont to its environmental review process known as \u201cCondition-Based Management<\/a>.\u201d The approach has faced legal challenges in other states<\/a> and allows the Forest Service to change elements of a project after a decision, without getting public feedback on the changes.\u00a0<\/p>\n Environmental activists and some lawyers worry use of the \u201ccondition-based\u201d approach violates the cornerstone environmental review laws by limiting public input and allowing plans to morph after an initial decision.\u00a0<\/p>\n Vermont lawyer Andrew Cliburn said the condition-based approach allows the possibility of circumventing \u201cburdensome and lengthy environmental review\u201d under the National Environmental Policy Act for the Forest Service, which is \u201cunder pressure to increase logging,\u201d especially after the Trump administration\u2019s call for a 25% increase in timber production<\/a>. But, that\u2019s the point: \u201cDemocracy slows things down on purpose,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n The Forest Service maintains on its website that condition-based management \u201cis a method to meet NEPA\u2019s requirements, not to avoid or shortcut them.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Ruffed Grouse Society and the silent retreat<\/p>\n Forest has run the Spirit Hollow silent retreat since 2000, offering guests \u201cmeditative soul work\u201d in nature and in yurts on her 100 acre property. Forest offers nine months of programming for peri-menopausal women, \u201cearth crafting,\u201d which involves creating art from natural materials, wilderness immersions and \u201cvision fasts,\u201d which involve multi-day fasts in the wilderness, she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n Once the logging trucks showed up adjacent to her property, Forest relocated her programs after fundraising in her community. She said she shouldn\u2019t have been forced to rely on community support to stay in business.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThe bigger issue too is this kind of lack of transparency, difficulty to get information and the lack\u00a0of communication,\u201d Forest said. \u201cWe weren\u2019t consulted, and if I didn\u2019t have a generous community, it would literally put me out of business.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n On the other side of the divide on Grass Mountain is the Ruffed Grouse Society<\/a> \u2014 a hunting and conservation group \u2014 which has joined hands with the U.S. Forest Service in an alliance to push forward projects that create early successional habitat. A ruffed grouse is a game bird found widely across North America, and is somewhat larger than a pigeon with long and shiny black and chocolate-colored neck feathers, according to the Ruffed Grouse Society website<\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n In 2019, the Ruffed Grouse Society entered an agreement<\/a> with the Eastern and Southern regions of the Forest Service around the same time the decision notice<\/a> for the Vermont Early Successional Habitat Project was issued. Under the pact, the Forest Service and Ruffed Grouse Society agreed to restore the \u201cproductivity of ruffed grouse habitats and woodcock on landscapes within the National Forest System,\u201d according to the agreement with the Forest Service.<\/p>\n Amelia Napper, who works as the Vermont public lands forester for the Ruffed Grouse Society and American Woodcock Society in conjunction with the Forest Service, said the concerns at Spirit Hollow amount to a \u201cshort-term pain.\u201d Napper said she expects that once the timber sale is completed, Grass Mountain residents will be delighted by the \u201csounds of birds that they\u2019re hearing, and see the beauty that comes on to the landscape.\u201d<\/p>\n The logging on Grass Mountain involves roughly 110 acres in the Manchester Ranger District, or southern half of the Green Mountain National Forest. The logs cut through the Grass Mountain timber sale will be sold to a Vermont-based logger and proceeds from the sale will pay for tree planting and stream restoration on the land after the timber harvest, Napper said. Early this year, logging on Grass Mountain ended for the season but will resume in the summer, according to Napper.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Zack Porter, executive director of a public and state lands protection advocacy organization Standing Trees<\/a>, said the Early Successional Habitat Creation Project is \u201cbearing down on some incredibly important landscapes and destroying the livelihoods of Vermonters as at Spirit Hollow, and so the ramifications are immediate.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Porter also criticized the Forest Service\u2019s partnership<\/a> with the Ruffed Grouse Society, saying the bird gaming and conservation organizations are \u201cheavily embedded with the Forest Service and with state agencies around the eastern U.S., trying to increase logging on public lands for hunting.\u201d<\/p>\n Ethan Ready, public affairs officer for the Forest Service, wrote that the agency has many conservation partnerships, including with the Ruffed Grouse Society, which all follow \u201capplicable laws and policies\u201d and do not supplant the federal agency\u2019s work.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u201cEarly successional habitat \u2014 young forest after regeneration \u2014 provides important food and cover for many species and supports pollinators,\u201d Ready wrote in an email response to questions from VTDigger.\u00a0<\/p>\n Karl Malcolm, vice president of conservation at the Ruffed Grouse Society and American Woodcock Society, said he feels \u201ccommon ground\u201d with Forest and the Spirit Hollow community because \u201cthey obviously cherish that landscape.\u201d<\/p>\n Picking Winners and Losers\u00a0<\/p>\n In the late 1800s, much of Vermont was cleared for agricultural use. Napper said that left many unhealthy trees to grow up in a homogenous, 80-year-old forest at Grass Mountain. To create young forests, Napper said the foresters leave a small number of healthy trees in clearings. The trees allowed to stand have a high value as a seed source to help regenerate future generations of trees. The strategy also helps neotropical migratory birds like warblers and tanagers, she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n Alexandra Kosiba, University of Vermont forest ecophysiologist and assistant professor of forestry, said Vermont\u2019s forests have not experienced a lot of natural disturbances such as trees dying from windstorms or insect outbreaks. Efforts to create young forests aim to emulate natural disturbances, accelerating the development of more complex, resilient forests as well as harvesting wood products, she said.<\/p>\n So-called early successional habitat formation is not new to other states: The Forest Service has implemented over 20 similar projects across more than 370,000 acres<\/a> of national forest land from Maine to Michigan<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n In the first six years of the plan, there have been seven timber sales across more than 1,600 acres in Vermont such as Southfork in Sunderland and Weston Priory in Weston, according to Ready. The total acreage cut on the 14,000 acre swath of forest included in the project will be less than the maximum allowed, due to limited capacity and the pace of environmental review, Ready wrote in an email.\u00a0<\/p>\n Other sections of forest in Rutland and Bennington Counties have had patches clearcut, along with other methods, according to project maps and documents. Another timber sale called White Hill is expected to be awarded this year, Ready wrote, and there are six more timber harvests planned in coming years.<\/p>\n Some conservationists are critical of the approach. John Terborgh, a professor of environmental science at Duke University and a conservation biologist, agreed game birds like ruffed grouse benefit but said there are scores of species that would benefit if public lands were spared from logging and road building. Terborgh said it comes down to whether you value the forests as working lands or as a hub for diverse flora and fauna.<\/p>\n \u201cMy sympathies are wholly with nature and not with the destruction of nature,\u201d Terborgh said. He added that he believes logging projects can \u201cdo great damage to the rest of the biodiversity.\u201d<\/p>\n Michael Kellett, executive director of the wildlife conservation group Restore: The North Woods<\/a>, said there are rare, threatened and endangered species that will not benefit from cutting for early successional habitat, unlike the ruffed grouse, which can be found across the state<\/a>. \u201cIt\u2019s just picking winners and losers,\u201d Kellett said. \u201cThe losers are the wildlife that like big trees and interior natural forests. The winners are a few species that don\u2019t need help.\u201d<\/p>\n Spirit Hollow silenced\u00a0<\/p>\n Forest, a Bennington County resident, says she did not see the public notice about the 15-year project in the Rutland Herald in 2019<\/a>, nor the comment period<\/a> held for the Grass Mountain timber sale in 2023. She said she only found out about the project after she ran into foresters near her property in 2024. They told her she would be placed on a public notice list, she said, but she didn\u2019t receive notice for the 2025 comment period<\/a>. Forest said she only found out the operation was starting on the day the machinery arrived.\u00a0<\/p>\n By the time the logging started, the federal agency and loggers could not accommodate Spirit Hollow\u2019s calendar or reimburse costs for relocating because the three-year federal contract with designated costs had already been finalized, Napper said.\u00a0<\/p>\n Other state organizations have objected to the Forest Service curtailing public comment, including the Vermont Natural Resources Council and Vermont Audubon, both of which formally objected<\/a> to the project, in part due to the Forest Service\u2019s use of the \u201ccondition-based management\u201d approach, which limited public engagement.<\/p>\n Vice President of Vermont Audubon Jamey Fidel, who worked for the Vermont Natural Resource Council at the time of the objection, said the organizations have generally seen the value of creating young forests for bird species, which may require some clearcutting. But Fidel said it\u2019s important to identify and mitigate public concerns about these projects.\u00a0<\/p>\n Fidel said the condition-based management process allows changes to projects as they roll out without public input if unexpected challenges arise. This differs from the typical practice of disclosing the cumulative effect on humans, wildlife and the environment, and allowing the public to make comments on specific impacts, according to the objection.\u00a0<\/p>\n After an environmental assessment of the project, the U.S. Forest Service issued a Finding of No Significant Impact<\/a>, which waived the need for further review, meaning \u201call required steps,\u00a0 including public involvement and environmental analysis, were completed,\u201d wrote Ready.<\/p>\n The two organizations were also alarmed by the proposed 75 miles of road construction, which was not consistent with the federal 2006 forest plan<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n After the organizations persistently lodged concerns, Ready wrote that the Forest Service collected additional information and scaled back construction to 25 miles of temporary roads for the project, removing some logging areas as a result.\u00a0<\/p>\n This means lands used for temporary roads can \u201crecover, re-vegetate and be monitored and wouldn\u2019t have the lasting impact of new permanent roads,\u201d Fidel said.\u00a0<\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/spirit-hollow-3-20251222-1200x798.jpg\")
Forest in one of the yurts at her retreat on December 22, 2025. Photo by Glenn Russell\/VTDigger<\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/welch-protest-5-20260218-1200x798.jpg\")
Zack Porter of Standing Trees speaks at a protest in Burlington on Wednesday, February 18, 2026. Photo by Glenn Russell\/VTDigger<\/p>\n