Whatcom Million Trees Project

08/31/2026

If you've ever spent time in a national forest or wilderness, there's a good chance you've been in or near a special place protected by the 25-year-old Roadless Area Conservation Rule. In the Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest alone, 19,200 acres are protected by the Roadless Rule, and the areas adjacent and downstream benefit from these protections, too. These pristine backcountry areas cover 45 million acres across the nation and include the headwaters for the drinking water of more than 60 million people, maintain contiguous habitat for at-risk wildlife species, reduce the spread of wildfire, provide rest and recreation, and support robust outdoor tourism economies. Now, the USDA wants to eliminate the rule and we only have until September 21 to protest this potentially devastating decision.

Please submit your public comment today to urge the USDA to keep the Roadless Rule at the link below! And if you have any photos of places or creatures protected by the Roadless Rule, please share them with the hashtags and urge your friends and followers to comment by Sept. 21 too!
See maps.roadless.org to find out which areas are covered by the Roadless Rule.
Submit comment here:

08/29/2026

If you've ever spent time in a national forest or wilderness, there's a good chance you've been in or near a special place protected by the 25-year-old Roadless Area Conservation Rule. In the Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest alone, 19,200 acres are protected by the Roadless Rule, and the areas adjacent and downstream benefit from these protections, too. These pristine backcountry areas cover 45 million acres across the nation and include the headwaters for the drinking water of more than 60 million people, maintain contiguous habitat for at-risk wildlife species, reduce the spread of wildfire, provide rest and recreation, and support robust outdoor tourism economies. Now, the USDA wants to eliminate the rule and we only have until September 21 to protest this potentially devastating decision.

Please submit your public comment today to urge the USDA to keep the Roadless Rule at the link below! And if you have any photos of places or creatures protected by the Roadless Rule, please share them with the hashtags and urge your friends and followers to comment by Sept. 21 too!

See maps.roadless.org to find out which areas are covered by the Roadless Rule.

Submit comment here: https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/tell-the-usda-keep-the-roadless-area-conservation-rule-intact

08/28/2026

Last year many talented local photographers entered our first Treasured Trees of Whatcom County contest. The community voted on the entries, and the winners were selected to represent every month of 2026. We're ready to do it again! If you didn’t get a chance to have your photo featured or if you missed the deadline to order a calendar, you're in luck! We're bringing the contest and the calendar back this year.

To enter the contest, submit a photo of your favorite tree in Whatcom County along with a brief story (no more than a few sentences) that explains why it's so special, at this link: https://secure.lglforms.com/form_engine/s/klDDwAzTlnpsWoaK30yZmg. Community votes will select the 12 contest winners, which will be featured in our 2027 calendar. The limit is three submissions per person. The photo submissions are open now until September 15th!

BONUS: If any of your photos are from Roadless Rule-protected areas in Whatcom County (see our post from August 26), you can feed two birds with one scone by sharing those photos and stories on social media NOW and urging your followers to submit a comment (also at the link in our bio) to the USDA to tell them to keep the Roadless Rule, which protects over 19,000 acres of precious forest, wildlife, and clean drinking water right here in our backyard.

08/27/2026

On Saturday, August 22nd, we had our last work party of the summer at Bellingham's Euclid Park, where 21 tenacious volunteers removed about 45 cubic feet of ivy and freed an incredible 136 trees from the vines! We're celebrating this fantastic team effort in service to our parks, trees, and the Lake Whatcom Watershed. Thank you, volunteers, for your caring and hard work!

See more photos at https://whatcommilliontrees.org/community-events/gallery/
Sign up for our next work party September 26 - National Public Lands Day! https://whatcommilliontrees.org/volunteer/ -parties

08/26/2026

The time is now to speak up for the Roadless Rule! 19,200 acres of the Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest are included among the 45 million acres of national forest which have been protected by this rule since 2001. If the USDA rescinds this rule, we could see increased wildfires and smoke, habitat fragmentation threatening the survival of at-risk wildlife, and increased pollution of salmon streams and drinking water in Whatcom County.

Please submit your comment by Monday, September 21, to tell the USDA to keep this rule in place and protect our forests from further harm!

Comment writing resources and comment submission link here: https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/tell-the-usda-keep-the-roadless-area-conservation-rule-intact. Note: Please put a comment in the box provided. Signatures alone will not be counted.

Other important actions you can take include sharing this and urging your friends and family to comment, and calling your Congress members to request they make the protections of the Roadless Rule permanent.

08/22/2026

We want to recognize our newest local business partner for their generous financial support of our mission: Wildflower Funeral Concepts in Ferndale. Thank you, Wildflower! We also appreciate their commitment to being eco-friendly and to creating space for community and honoring life through their events that bring people together. We are grateful for this partnership! 💚🌳🌎

08/19/2026

Join our partner Sehome Eye Care for an exciting Trunk Show next Thursday, August 27, and you can enter a WMTP benefit raffle to win a FREE pair of glasses!

This is one of the many ways Sehome Eye Care supports our mission and trees in our community, and we're so grateful for their partnership!

08/18/2026

The repeal of the Roadless Rule could open more than 400,000 acres in the Mt Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest to roads and logging. Wildfires are four times more likely to ignite within 50 meters of a road than in similar forested areas that have no road access. Please speak up in defense of the Roadless Rule by September 21!

The Trump administration has moved to gut the Roadless Area Conservation Rule, a bedrock environmental regulation that protects nearly 60 million acres of our critical forests from roadbuilding and logging while providing refuge to countless endangered species like grizzly bears, wolves, and salmon.

This is a blatant attempt to open some of our treasured forests to polluting corporations. You have until Sept. 21st to submit a comment to help us fight for our forests: https://on.nrdc.org/4x2VX9p

08/14/2026

Read up on our summer news in the latest edition of The Canopy! Make art and save trees, inspiring ivy removal, celebrate National Public Lands Day, support trees with your grocery shopping, and a tree photo contest!

August 2026 Newsletter: Make art and save trees, inspiring ivy removal, celebrate National Public Lands Day, support trees with your grocery shopping, help young trees survive drought, and a tree photo contest!

08/12/2026

A small but mighty crew of 14 early birds joined us Saturday morning, August 8, at Halverson Park in Birch Bay to remove ivy. Halverson Park is a green and shady oasis in the middle of a neighborhood along the shore of Birch Bay, full of majestic mature conifers. It’s substantially less full of ivy now, thanks to these volunteers’ efforts! They removed ~95 cubic feet of ivy and freed 41 trees! If you live in or visit Birch Bay, be sure to take a walk in the park in the next couple of months and you’ll see the dying ivy on tree trunks as evidence of a job well done. Thank you, volunteers!

(The pink ribbons in the photos were used to mark which trees to work on and make it easier to get an accurate count of freed trees.)

Photo credit: Jacob Forrest O'Donnell. See more photos at https://whatcommilliontrees.org/community-events/gallery/?gallery=august-8th-halverson-park #2026