Happy May from the lush, wet depths and clear, open heights of Pisgah in late Spring. These are the days! Be sure to get out and enjoy them as the green creeps up the mountains, wildflowers open up, and our cold, clear rivers become ever more inviting as we move into summer.
Thanks to all of you who came out and helped make Pisgah Project Day a success! It was our biggest PPD to date, with a total of 392 volunteers directly contributing to 25 projects across the Pisgah Ranger District. With your help, we built bridges, improved trails, installed turnpike, removed non-native invasive plants, tended the Ranger Station garden beds, constructed split rail fence, built a rain garden, cleaned up trash, removed graffiti, and more on one beautiful spring day in Pisgah. Many thanks to all that attended and special thanks to our many partners whose participation, leadership, and organization are crucial to the success of this big day of giving back to Pisgah. We’ll see you again next year for another great Pisgah Project Day.
Photo by Angelina Bruno
Photo by Angelina Bruno
Fresh on the heels of PPD, on Wednesday April 24th, TPC unveiled a new kiosk at the Cat Gap Loop trailhead and new wayfinding signage on the Cat Gap Loop and John Rock trail system. Replacing a kiosk with outdated information and a map unhelpfully showing large areas of Western North Carolina and Tennessee, the new three-paneled kiosk features information about the area’s geology and human history, safety information for visitors, and a large trail map focused on this specific trail complex. This marks the completion of TPC’s first visitor information project, with additional signage and a focused map slated to be installed along the Art Loeb and Ivestor Gap trails near Black Balsam and Tennent Mountain later this year.
Local trail builder Shrimper Khare and his crew completed construction of the Searcy Creek Connector trail this past month, adding his signature flair for high-quality rock work to this 1.15 mile connector trail between FS road 5095 and the top of Butter Gap. This important piece of trail opens up new large loop opportunities through a truly beautiful region of the Forest while keeping riders off of open roads as much as possible. It has thus far been a popular addition and will receive more traffic and attention in the coming months as Pisgah Area SORBA completes their work on Butter Gap trail and the revamped trail complex is complete. Be sure to get out and check it out. Thank you to the Fernandez Pave the Way Foundation for their generous support of this project and to the Hub and Cane Creek Cycling Components, whose generous support over the years has made projects like this one possible.
This past month has also seen us gearing up for the summer season, onboarding employees in our Invasive Plant Management and River Ranger crews and getting them kitted out to accomplish great work. Brendan Gilbert has joined our Invasive Plant Management crew as a seasonal technician, working with crew leaders Sam and Will in their efforts to rid the Catheys Creek corridor of noxious invasive plants. Having attended the University of Cincinnati with a major in Biological Sciences, Brendan joins the TPC crew after working as a Habitat Technician for Boone County Parks in Kentucky, where he gained experience managing invasive plant infestations in addition to performing trail work and developing a new signage plan.
The River Rangers are also up and running with Lead River Ranger Stephanie Adams being joined this week by 4 River Ranger interns: Alexandra Parker, Madalynn Elliott, MJ Pedigo, and Autumn Wright, who is returning for her second River Ranger season. You will see them out and about regularly throughout the summer as they clean up trash and remove rock dams along the Davidson, perform creel surveys, assist in research and fisheries projects, and deliver a wide variety of educational programs both in the forest and across the community at large. Stay tuned for next month’s newsletter to learn a bit more about this summer’s River Rangers.
After completing two significant turnpiked reroutes to the Exercise trail beside Davidson River campground, the TPC Trail Crew has moved on to machine work, renting a mini-excavator to address trail issues needing more than shovels, chainsaws, and locust logs. They have begun by improving drainage and grade dips on FS road 471D, which has seen significant use and associated wear and tear over the last year as it has been the main access point for the reconstruction of Butter Gap trail shelter as well as the recent construction of the Searcy Creek Connector and Butter Gap trails. After this, they will be doing work on sections of the Cat Gap Loop and Daniel Ridge trails. As legacy trails, old roadbeds and rail grades brought onto the system, their width presents real challenges for maintenance, especially with hand tools alone. The goal is to reestablish positive drainage on these sections of trail through the construction of reverse grade dips, berm removal, and the addition of trail structures where appropriate so that we can establish a new baseline from which volunteer hand crews can effectively maintain these trails for years to come.
Here’s to a great green season filled with good work, good friends, and the finest of mountains. Thanks, as always, to you all for your continued support of The Pisgah Conservancy and Pisgah National Forest!
