A citizen advisory board will tour parts of the Norbeck Wildlife Preserve on Wednesday to get an idea how it might look after a proposed timber cutting, tree thinning and prescribed burning project to improve wildlife habitat.

The tour is open to the public. It will allow the public and members of the Black Hills National Forest Advisory Board to look at areas that were treated in previous projects, as well as areas proposed for such treatments, officials say.

The emerging plan for the Norbeck, which Black Hills National Forest officials have been working on for about three years, could include thinning and logging of pine stands, as well as prescribed burns.

Specifics are still being worked out and the draft environmental impact statement will be released next month.

The 27,000-acre Norbeck lies southeast of Hill City and northeast of Custer. It includes the 13,500-acre Black Elk Wilderness Area.

Forest Service officials, and others say the Norbeck and the Black Elk both have become thick with dense stands of pine trees. A major infestation of mountain pine beetles and the threat of wildfire are major concerns.

However, any plan in the Norbeck, by law, must have as its first priority the improvement of wildlife habitat. Congress in 1920 set aside the Norbeck specifically to benefit game animals and birds. The Forest Service and the state Game, Fish & Parks Department two years ago developed a list of focus species in the Norbeck to help guide the new plan.

"The wildlife biologists are driving the bus on this," said Lynn Kolund, Hell Canyon District Ranger.

Any other benefits, such as reducing the danger of catastrophic wildfire or slowing the spread of beetles, must be secondary, Kolund said.

But Kolund said conditions in the Norbeck have changed dramatically in past decades. "The high quality habitat that was there when Senator (Peter) Norbeck first rode those ridges to establish that special area is now largely gone, replaced by dense vegetation, partly as a result of suppression of forest fires in the area."

He said options being considered include prescribed fires and removing pines from hardwood stands, removing pine trees from meadows, and removing pine from areas with shrubs to encourage shrub growth and improve forest diversity. The project also could include removing smaller trees in some areas to encourage existing larger trees.

"It will be very much a nontraditional type of a prescription," Kolund said. But the project will include some commercial logging, he said.

"Some of these treatments for wildlife habitat improvement will also reduce the spread of pine beetles," Kolund said. "Those are secondary or other benefits as a result of these treatments, both in the form of healthier trees and of reduced fuels."

The options are further limited in the Black Elk Wilderness, but the Forest Service is considering prescribed burns along the perimeter of the wilderness to protect outside areas, including Custer State Park.

"The mountain pine beetle has caused some significant changes in the wilderness," Kolund said. "Nothing we'll do will change that."

The Sierra Club has a somewhat different view of the situation in the Norbeck, according to Jim Margadant of Rapid City, a conservation organizer for the Sierra Club.

Margadant said the group is concerned about the plan but is withholding judgment until the details are released next month. "A lot of our members feel that the Forest Service is being irresponsible in some respects with the tone of hysteria in regard to bugs and fire in that area."

Margadant said the area might not need extensive treatment.

He said the Sierra Club has not filed appeals on Black Hills National Forest plans for several years. But he said the group would examine the proposal closely.

"We expect to see something other than business as usual," he said.

On the other hand, the Black Hills Forest Resource Association wants to see something done, even though it won't cure all the problems, said Carson Engelskirger, forest programs manager for the association.

"We really don't care what the treatments are but the area is way overstocked, and it is definitely a fire hazard," Engelskirger said.

He said the prospect of a prescribed burn in the Black Elk Wilderness is scary. "But you'd hate to see something happen in a lightning storm." Engelskirger said a catastrophic fire could threaten Keystone, Hill City, Custer and Mount Rushmore National Memorial.

"Let's not nitpick this or that. Let's just get something done," he said.

Kolund said the draft EIS should be out in September, followed by a 45-day public comment period. He expects to make a decision on the plan before Christmas. Timber sales could be awarded next spring and work could begin by mid-July, before the pine beetles fly, he said.

On the Web: For more information go to the Forest Service site, www.fs.fed.us/r2/blackhills.

Contact Steve Miller at 394-8415 or steve.miller@rapidcityjournal.com.

Tour available

The public is invited on a tour of the Norbeck Wildlife Preserve on Wednesday, Aug. 19, to look at areas that have been treated with thinning and prescribed burns and other areas that are proposed for such treatments. Also on the tour will be members of the Black Hills National Forest Advisory Board.

The schedule includes:

* 10 a.m. Meet at Black Hills National Forest headquarters at 1019 N. Fifth St. in Custer. The public may follow Forest Service personnel to the first stop, the Needles area. People are encouraged to ride together to reduce the number of vehicles in sensitive areas.

* 11:30 a.m. Return to Custer, drive to Willow Creek Horse Campground, followed by lunch there.

1 p.m. Palmer Gulch Trailhead.