The Flathead National Forest has released an environmental assessment for a forest treatment planned in the Martin Creek area near Olney in the Tally Lake Ranger District.

The Martin Creek project is about 10,800 acres in size and is in the area drained by Martin Creek. The area is located in the Salish Mountains on the northern end of the Tally Lake Ranger District.

The proposed action includes a variety of vegetation treatments on 1,432 acres of forest service land. The total includes 868 acres of fuel reduction and timber stand health improvement through commercial timber harvest, and 564 acres of non-commercial thinning in sapling-sized stands using primarily hand tools.

The proposal also calls for construction of less than one mile of temporary road and about three miles of permanent road. Other improvements include the closure of three miles of road for big game security, 150 feet of new trail construction to access Upper Martin Lake, along with tree and shrub planting.

The purpose of the proposed treatments, the Forest Service said, is improve forest health while also reducing hazardous wildfire fuels. Structural development has occurred on private land in and around the project area, raising concerns about risk to human life and property when wildland fire occurs, the assessment states. No large wildfires have burned in the Martin Creek area since 1926.

The majority of the project area has mixed species stands. Typically, Douglas-fir and western larch are the primary species in the sands.

Most of the recreation in the Martin Creek area is dispersed. Two popular points of interest are Martin Falls and a dispersed camping site located on Upper Martin Lake.

A draft decision notice and finding of no significant impact for the Martin Creek project is expected to be completed later this summer.

Comments on the assessment are being taken until July 18. Written comments must be submitted to Project Leader Bryan Donner at 650 Wolfpack Way, Kalispell, MT 59901 or by email to comments-northern-flathead-tally-lake@fs.fed.us.

For detailed information on the assessment, visit www.fs.usda.gov/goto/flathead/projects.