Plum Creek Timber Company (PCL) announced on Oct. 27 that it reached an agreement to sell approximately 165,000 acres of Montana and Washington forestland to The Nature Conservancy for $134 million. The agreement includes higher elevation timberlands with slower growing trees. Although less productive for timber operations, these forestlands offer forest conservation, recreation, public access, and ecological protection, and are among the most ecologically diverse and intact biological systems in the Lower 48. They include tracts in the Lower Blackfoot Valley near Missoula and property on both sides of Interstate 90 between Snoqualmie Pass and Ellensburg in Kittitas County, Washington. Plum Creek owns approximately 6.7 million acres of timberlands in forest ecosystems across the Northern and Southeastern US.