Author: Friends of Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument

January 20 & 21, 2023 – Hike and Learn

We kicked off our 2023 season of programming with a bang! Not only did our Bryophytes and Lichens of the Monument Hike & Learn with Scot Loring sell out, but each one of us who attended got to deepen our appreciation and knowledge of these wildly diverse and resilient organisms.

On Friday evening, we enjoyed a two-for-one lecture from Scot. He gave one lecture on bryophytes (mosses, liverworts, hornworts) and a second lecture on lichens. Scot taught us what each of these organisms are, explained the many ingenious ways they reproduce, and shared that they can live in the hottest, highest, coldest, and harshest places on Earth! Scot brought along some specimens that he’d recently collected so we got see, smell, and touch several different types of bryophytes and lichens.

On the following day, 18 of us donned snowshoes and took a relaxed walk on the Pacific Crest Trail near the Hyatt Lake Campground in the sun and sparkling snow. Scot stopped us all along the way to look at the incredible variety of lichens and a few bryophytes we found growing on tree trunks and branches, rocks, stumps, and more. We used hand lenses, magnifying glasses, and the “magnifier” on our iPhones to get a close up look at some of the ones we spotted. We lunched under a lovely old conifer covered in lichens and shared stories, browsed through field guides, and basked in the warmth of the sun.

We’d like to give a shout out to the Medford District BLM and the US Forest Service for the loaner snowshoes. And, of course, a huge thank you to our Board member Scot for sharing his passion and expertise with us!

October 14th/15th Hike and Learn

The weekend of October 14 & 15, a small group of us were deftly guided by the dynamic writing workshop facilitator, Katie Boehnlein, to slow down, pay attention to nature through our senses, and write from our experiences and creative impulses. On Friday evening, Katie started by sharing with us some of her Monument-inspired writing to give us an idea of what is possible as well as to give us permission to play and be free with our writing.

Then, she prompted us with photos of different places and plant and animal species in the Monument as well as clips from the movie “Deep Green: Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument”. Deep Green, produced by Mark Tribe, is a 24-hour-long, single-take landscape film with immersive sound. She gave us time to write for several minutes after each prompt and when we were done, she invited us to share what we’d written with the group if we wanted.

It was fascinating to hear about what caught other people’s attention and to start to see things from their perspectives while listening to them read what they had just written. While it took a bit of courage to read aloud, Katie encouraged us to share the things that we liked about each other’s writing, which was both uplifting and emboldening. It definitely made us want to write more!

On Saturday morning, we drove to the Pilot Rock trailhead and made our way to the Lone Pilot Trail where, once again, Katie brought things to our attention that we would have missed without her. She flexed her naturalist and outdoor educator muscles to talk to us about the history, geology, and wildlife of the place. She had us be still and free write about what we experienced or write using the prompts she offered us. We got to share our writing again with one another and ended up feeling like New York Times bestselling authors when the other participants shared what they admired about our pieces.

It was a spectacularly beautiful day, and in the meadows and forest extending south of Pilot Rock, it felt downright magical, as we put pen to paper and wrote poems, creation stories, love letters, private thoughts, and more.

Words by Collette Streight, photos by Jonnie Dale Lieberman.

At our 2022 Gala on November 11th, the Friends of the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument presented Suzi and Bob Given with a dramatic photograph of their property, taken from the top of Hobart Buff. The photograph is a 10-photomerged panorama taken by Al Case, photographer and SOU faculty, and fabulously printed to archival standards by Tom Glassman of Medford.

The photograph came with the following framed inscription: “We Honor Your Support, Inspiration, and Vision of the Friends of the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument and Your Efforts to Protect and Increase Awareness of the Monument’s Biological Diversity, Landscape, and Cultural History”.

The Friends Board of Directors also announced that it has named all of its outreach programs in Suzi’s honor. From now on they will be called THE SUZI GIVEN COMMUNITY EDUCATION PROGRAMS, which will include: Youth Summer Camps, Summer Interpretative Ranger Programs, Inspiring Connections Lectures, Hike & Learns, and the Sunday Hiking Series. This will include our collaborations with SOU’s Environmental Education Program, Environmental Science & Policy Program, and Native American Studies.

There are few people that have done as much as Suzi and Bob to support the Monument and the Friends of the Monument. Besides their support for our mission to inform, educate and support the protection of the Monument, Suzi and Bob have supported and funded both land acquisitions and conservation easements in and around the Monument, environmental education programs with the Friends of the Monument, and many other programs in our community and elsewhere.

Both of them are leaders in the Green Springs Community. Bob has been instrumental in his work with the Green Springs Rural Volunteer Fire Department; the fire station is literally named after him. Suzi was one of the original members of the Friends of the Monument back in 2001 and for most of the time since she has been on our Board of Directors. Suzi also has been a strong community advocate and has been a large part of the leadership of the Friends of the Green Springs nonprofit group for many years.

Thank you Suzi and Bob for all you do!

We are thrilled by the success of our Friends Gala. To those of you who came out on November 11, 2022 to celebrate with us and support us, thank you! It was a festive evening of camaraderie, connection, delicious food and drinks, fundraising, and “Friends”raising in the Grand Ballroom at the beautiful Ashland Springs Hotel.

We’d like to give a special thank you to Bob Wick for an inspiring and informative presentation. According to Bob, former Wilderness Specialist and Outreach Coordinator for the Washington office Bureau of Land Management National Conservation Lands, “The national monument encompasses a really cool area south and east of Ashland and was designated specifically because of its biodiversity. In addition to being a national monument, the area includes a segment of the Pacific Crest Trail, CA-OR National Historic Trail, designated wilderness and a wild and scenic river — a grand slam of conservation designations. Species from the Cascades, Klamath Ranges and Great Basin all intermingle here. The Friends of Cascade-Siskiyou do a great job helping protect and interpret the area.”

We are also grateful for the businesses and individuals who donated items and services to our silent auction, the wineries who poured wine and donated wine for the Gala, and the volunteers who helped us pull off the event. We couldn’t have done this without you.

All in all, we feel very lucky to be a part of such a passionate community of like-minded folks who hold the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument near and dear to their hearts.

To read about our latest news and events, please check out our November newsletter.

September 16th/17th Hike and Learn

On Friday evening, Jeanine Moy, director of the Vesper Meadow Education Program, gave an inspiring talk sharing the details of how the organization came to be and all that they have accomplished in the Vesper Meadow Restoration Preserve since 2018 when it was established. The preserve is composed of two interconnected upland wet meadows surrounded by mixed conifer forest in the southern Cascades. The parcels total about 1,000 acres and are bordered by the Monument and other BLM lands.

Jeanine stewards the preserve and organizes opportunities for the community to get engaged in hands-on restoration projects outdoors. Additionally, there are tribal partnerships for native food cultivation, environmental education programs, community science and monitoring projects, and a growing list of artists-in-partnership that contribute to the network.

On Saturday morning, we started our hike at Buck Prairie II, a popular cross-country skiing destination in the Monument. We hiked along an old wagon road to the restoration site, admiring native grass species like Roemer’s fescue (Festuca roemeri), and savoring the delicious scents of the seeds of yampah (Perideridia spp.) and Lomatium. Elk enjoy roaming these meadows, evidenced by the tracks we noticed in the mud.

Once we arrived at Latgawa Creek, the work began: low-tech process-based restoration strategies. In other words, we behaved like beavers! Beavers impact natural stream flows and transform landscapes by gnawing down trees and building dams and lodges; they were a big part of this ecosystem before cattle arrived on the scene. We mimicked this natural process by cutting back shrubby willows (Salix spp.), planting the cuttings in the creek as if they were stakes, and weaving smaller branches to create a blockage in the creek. This will aid in sediment deposition; in many places the creek’s bottom is down to bedrock, which is not ideal for aquatic creatures or plants trying to regenerate along the waterway. It will also aid in water retention in the meadow by slowing down the water and allowing it to spread and sink on the land. There is much more work to be done on the preserve as well as throughout the Monument, so please look out for ways you can plug in to help.

The Friends would like to thank Jeanine and Vesper Meadow for offering a fascinating learning experience and collaborating with our community on this project.

To read about our latest news and events, please check out our October newsletter.

National Public Lands Day 2022

On Saturday, September 24, a group of hardy souls celebrated National Public Lands Day by removing about 1,000 feet of barbed wire fencing in the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument.  After donning gloves and grabbing tools at the Green Springs Mountain Loop trailhead, we headed up the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT) about a half mile to where the fencing spread out from the trail in both directions.

We quickly divided into two teams – Team Extreme who charged fearlessly up a steep slope to remove fencing that ran east of the trail and Team Daniel who boldly took on the fence to the west of the trail. Each team cut the strands of barbed wire at the metal t-posts, folded them up accordion-style and placed them in a pile. The t-posts were removed from the ground with a tool designed for just that purpose and were also staged for later hauling to the parking lot.  

Each team worked with good cheer and determination, uplifted by the calls of red-breasted nuthatches, pileated woodpeckers, and chickadees, moving further into the forest to ultimately remove thousands of feet of barbed wire and dozens of t-posts. On a team of his own, Brian Long, the Recreation Planner for the BLM, was tasked with removing the wooden posts that were immediately adjacent to either side of the trail that had been used to support a gate that crossed the PCT adjoining the two sides of fencing.

After a couple of hours, prompted by John Duwe, BLM’s new Interpretive Specialist, we began the long haul of materials from the woods to the parking lot where the BLM truck awaited. When the last of the materials were tightly secured for transport to a scrap metal recycler, we had lunch while celebrating that our efforts that day will make life easier for the wildlife who call the Monument home.

Inspired by the energy and motivation shown by our volunteers, we are already thinking about our next Monument stewardship day!

 Words and photos by Executive Director Collette Streight.

Sunday Hike #8 – Historic Buck Rock Tunnel, 8/28/2022

For the final Sunday Hike of the summer, we went back in time to the late 1800s, deep into the Monument to the site of the Buck Rock Tunnel, a railroad construction project that was never completed, left abandoned for decades, and, years later, rediscovered as an archaeological site with a fascinating story to tell.

Here’s the short version. By the mid-1800s, the Transcontinental Railroad had been completed for several years, but a north-south route in the western US was still in development. The final section of the route was the most challenging to construct, across the border of Oregon and California through what is now the Monument. Of course, the Monument is known for its biodiversity, a product of the complex “knot” of terrain where several mountain ranges and ecosystems converge. An engineer hired by one of the railroad companies, John Quincy Adams Hurlbut, surveyed several options before deciding that the Buck Rock Tunnel route was the best option, mostly due to the lower grade. Work started on the tunnel in 1883.

Most of the railroad workers were Chinese immigrants, earning more than what they would working for a farm, but less than their white counterparts on the job. Working for the railroad also came with much greater hazards: dynamite explosions, long hours of hard manual labor, and heat exhaustion, as well as treacherous terrain and an abundance of poison oak, which you can still witness on a hike to the site to this day. They worked day in and day out on both the east and west portals, tunneling on each side to eventually meet in the middle.

However, in 1884 the funds ran low. The tunnel was abandoned. The railroad company prioritized another shorter option over Siskiyou Pass, where I-5 currently runs. That route still exists today, but it’s not often used. Though less miles of track were laid, the grade was much higher; this was fine for the short-term, but over the years the trains found difficulty with the elevation change and snow piling on the tracks. The Natron Cutoff was constructed over the next several years and completed in 1926, which took trains east of the Cascades through Klamath Falls at a much lower grade – where the Amtrak and other routes still run today.

The Buck Rock Tunnel was left unfinished and abandoned for decades until a BLM forester rediscovered the site in the 1970s. Since the tunnel was left mid-construction, it presents a unique look into the building methods employed back in the day. An archaeological investigation found evidence of day-to-day life, like ceramic pieces (some with Chinese calligraphy detail), traces of temporary dwellings, and scraps of food that had been preserved for years. In 2014, the BLM acquired this piece of land and designated it as a historical and cultural site within the Monument. One hopeful future for the Buck Rock area is an interpretive trail to the tunnel entrances, which are currently what we’d call “off the beaten path.”

I really enjoyed sharing this story with a group of 20 hikers, including Friends board member Howard Hunter, who offered a lot of guidance and support in establishing the Sunday Hiking Series for the 2022 season. I would like to give credit to Chelsea Rose, SOU anthropologist and historical archaeologist, who has published numerous papers and articles about her research at the Buck Rock Tunnel site, as well as the Oregon Historical Society and the Chinese Diaspora Project, all of which informed my research on this interesting subject.

Thanks for a great summer, and happy trails!

Words by Interpretive Ranger Sarah Martinez. Photos by Sarah Martinez and Board Member Howard Hunter.