Once-logged coastal land set to be sold to save redwoods

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A conservation group plans to purchase a scenic stretch of the Lost Coast in remote Northern California to save it from logging and preserve it for public use.

Save the Redwoods League planned to announce Thursday that it’s agreed to purchase the historic DeVilbiss Ranch timberlands for $37 million if it can raise the money by the end of the year.

“This is a piece of California that inspires,” said Sam Hodder, the league's president and CEO. “It’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”

The property sits at the southern end of the Lost Coast, an area named for its rugged inaccessibility and lack of roads. The Pacific Coast Highway, which hugs cliffside bluffs in places, was routed inland for a 100-mile (160-kilometer) stretch to avoid the forbidding shoreline.

The 5 miles (8 kilometers) of coastline on the ranch is breathtaking, with forested hills plunging to isolated beaches. Waves crash into sea stacks. Lush forests teem with green ferns and thick moss. Redwoods and firs up to a century old tower overhead. Two creeks harbor coho salmon and steelhead trout. Coastal prairies, meadows and woods are home to Roosevelt elk, deer, and mountain lions. Endangered species such as the northern spotted owl, marbled murrelet and Pacific fisher also live there.

Some old-growth redwoods remain on the ridgeline where strong winds snarled their tops, making them less valuable as lumber and sparing them the saw blade.

The property 155 miles (250 kilometers) north of San Francisco is the largest privately owned section of California coastline in the the redwood range that runs from Oregon to Big Sur, Hodder said.

It's being sold by Soper Co., a 160-year-old family owned logging company that's getting out of the industry,

“You’d be hard pressed to find 5 miles of...