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Not long ago, ancient forests blanketed the Pacific Northwest. These days, hikers often need a good guidebook to find one. Old growth at low elevations — prime spots for logging — is even more rare. But two hours north of Seattle, on the western edge of the Mount Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest, the Boulder River Trail is part of the protected Boulder River Wilderness. The trail winds through groves of trees that are upward of seven centuries old.

I met Todd True recently at the trail to talk about the environment and the overturning of many regulations that are critical to its protection. Todd is an environ-mental lawyer for the Seattle branch of Earthjustice, founded in 1971 as Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund. With eight regional offices, it is the largest environmental law firm in the nation. It operates as a non-profit, employing lawyers to represent clients — free of charge — in an effort to uphold laws that safeguard forests, streams, parks, wildlife and people.

While the four-mile Boulder River Trail begins on an old railroad bed in a stand of second-growth trees, within a mile we are in the Boulder River Wilderness, where the forest has a deep understory. That, along with the towering trees, makes me feel like I am standing in the center of a deep green bowl, the sides of which are teeming with life. The contrast between this and the clear-cut state land that I had driven through to get here is extreme. Unlike the layers of sword ferns in the ancient forest, the ferns in the clear-cut are spaced far apart, their fronds curled and brown. Todd wants to protect forests from that sort of devastation.

At any given time, Earthjustice is involved in over 250 lawsuits across the country. They are fighting to protect sea turtles in the Atlantic and the Gulf of Mexico; defending wilderness from development in Utah; challenging a permit that allows a refinery to release unsafe levels of dioxin into San Francisco Bay; and fighting clearcutting in Alaska's Tongass National Forest.

When Earthjustice opened their Seattle office in 1987, Todd decided to try environmental law. Seventeen years later, he's still glad that he did. He works mainly with laws passed during the environmentally conscious 1970s: the Clean Air Act and National Environmental Policy Act (1970), the Clean Water Act (1972), the Endangered Species Act (1973) and the National Forest Management Act (1976). "These were visionary environmental laws. They were promises we made to our children: 'This is the world we're going to leave for you.' My job is to push us to live up to the goals we set for ourselves," he explains.

Forests like these are important to Todd, who has been involved in a number of significant lawsuits. Some of his cases have even taken him before the U.S. Supreme Court. In the late 1980s, he fought to protect the northern spotted owl and ancient Northwest forests. Currently, he is litigating to protect and restore wild salmon on the Columbia and Snake Rivers. He is also helping to prepare cases having to do with threats to the "roadless" initiative and the Northwest Forest Plan.

In the last several years, undercuts to the Northwest Forest Plan have been quiet and severe. Since 1994, 24 million acres of public land in Washington has been managed under the plan. At its inception, the plan prohibited 80 - 90 percent of the type of rampant clear-cutting that had occurred in the previous two decades. But the timber industry began asking to have the plan's regulations loosened. And in the 2000 presidential campaign, Bush promised to increase logging on federal land.

Since then, the administration has asked consultants to review whether the spotted owl should remain on the endangered-species list. In March 2004, the Bush administration amended the Aquatic Conservation Strategy within the Northwest Forest Plan. Now neither the Forest Service nor the Bureau of Land Management is required to ensure that timber sales will not degrade water quality. Agencies are no longer required to survey for uncommon or rare species in old-growth forests and establish buffered areas to protect them. According to a recent press release by Earthjustice, an estimated 47 species are now at high risk for local extinction.

I wonder if I am the only one who feels that these changes are happening without notice and without understanding of their implications. The changes are so piecemeal that I don't think we are even aware of their sum-total effect. But as I look around me, I see how much could be lost. In some areas along the trail, the moss-draped trees filter the sunlight. In other areas, only thin shafts of sunlight can cut through the thick canopy. Delicate, light green huckleberry bushes grow out of the tops of nurse logs. In shaded spots, the forest floor is a sea of sword ferns. Salals, white trilliums and pink bleeding hearts line much of the trail.

Todd explains that the intention of the Northwest Forest Plan is to help keep the important ecosystem of old-growth forests like these intact. There is a direct relationship between salmon and forest, between the spotted owl and forest, he says. Todd has learned more than a little science in his years protecting the earth.

"Salmon spawn in cold, very clean water and lay their eggs in gravel. If the gravel gets silted up, they suffocate. Old-growth forests are probably the best water filters in the world. In an ancient forest, you don't get sediments flowing off into the streams. It's a very rich environment and the salmon do well in it. The ecosystem works the other way, too — the salmon feed the forest. In a natural system, as the adults die, they are an incredible source of nutrients; they get plowed back into the system."

Understanding some of the science helps Todd interpret and communicate the significance of the changes in the laws so that people can understand that it's not just one species or even several species that are at risk, but the entire ecosystem that is in jeopardy. "It's very important to be able to explain to people what is going on in the courts. Otherwise, you end up with the timber industry saying it's the spotted owl versus jobs. Or it's an inedible suckerfish versus farmers. It's very important to be a good communicator," he says.

Todd has worked on many cases over the years, winning some and losing others, but he says he never gets discouraged. He believes that the laws are strong enough to protect the environment. "Sure, this administration has made a remarkable effort to roll back 30 years of environmental progress, but I don't think they'll get away with it. I think the people in the Northwest want to protect it. They'll say that these forests are more valuable as forests than they are as two-by-fours. The timber industry always wants to get their hands on big trees. If they went back to clear-cutting like they did in the '70s and '80s, the people in Washington would have a fit."

Some of that indignation may resurface again, especially in the Western states. On July 12, 2004, the Bush administration announced that it would overturn the "roadless" rule. This rule has protected nearly 60 million acres of national forest from logging and road building since its passage by Clinton in 2001. As one of the 2.5 million Americans who commented on the issue I feel discouraged, especially since the vast majority of Americans supported this protection. But Todd doesn't think it's the public sentiment that has changed. "That was not a loss of public support, but a manipulation of the legal system by an administration that is very tied to resource extraction," he says.

Todd's sure-footedness on the Boulder River Trail echoes his confidence in the laws and in people's ability to ensure accountability. He is an indefatigable hiker, and appears equally unfaltering in his pursuit of justice. He is passionate about his work, but it must be a slow-burning, sustainable passion because after all the battles in courtrooms, he doesn't appear tired or disheartened. I am glad that a man like Todd is so dedicated to this work.

He pauses to quote Aldo Leopold, considered one of the first America wilderness conservationists. In Sand County Almanac, Leopold wrote, "...who but a fool would discard seemingly useless parts? To keep every cog and wheel is the first precaution of intelligent tinkering." Todd's focus isn't on naming all the parts, or even on comprehending their interconnectedness beyond the understanding of an educated layman. What he does know is that we need to hold on to all the parts and then use the law to keep them safe.

As we stand looking at one of the lacy waterfalls cascading near the trail, Todd recalls how he used to take his sons here when they were boys, carefully placing M & Ms along the trail to keep them moving. I tell him that during the fall, huckleberries along the trail keep Dylan traveling at a good pace. We agree that it's important to bring our children to visit places like the Boulder River Wilderness, so that they can spend time in nature and know what it feels like to be in an ancient forest. How else will they know what's at stake?

Lee Revere's work has been published in Washington Wildlands, High Country News and The Seattle Times. She lives north of Seattle with her husband and two-year-old son.

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