Yelm Shoreline Planting

Day 16: After roughly eight months of being on the injured list with a hip issue, I finally felt sufficiently recovered to join one of the Nisqually Land Trust's work parties. Oh, it felt good to be back on the end of a shovel again! We couldn't have asked for better soil in which to plant: friable, rockless, eminently easy to dig once you got through the sod of canary grass. Therein lies the problem. Canary grass is an invasive which takes hold in open areas and quickly proliferates. The best way to eliminate it is to shade it out. Admittedly, this solution takes years, but it is the most effective for the long term.

Forty-three volunteers (about half of them Cub Scouts) put 150 Douglas firs and shore pines in the ground in three hours. A few of us (the diehard core membership) stayed behind to install protective sleeves around each seedling. The white plastic tubes will prevent rodent damage, one of the major reasons for die-off among newly planted trees. They will be removed two or three years from now after the trees are fully established.

MORA Litter Pickers

Day 184: There has never been a lot of doubt in my mind, but whatever may have lingered was dispelled today: people are pigs. This intrepid crew of ten litter-pickers collected thirteen bags of garbage, one tire, two dog carcases bagged and dropped on the roadside by the animals' former owners and one live shotgun shell, all from one two-mile stretch of highway which, incidentally, we cleaned up late last September. Litter-picking is NOT a boring job! Five of the team are consistent returnees, joining forces with five new volunteers in a partnership Mount Rainier National Park has maintained with the Washington State Dept. of Transportation for the last four years. I am proud to say that this project was "my baby" from the get-go. I suggested it to my supervisor who told me to run with it. I just wish the careless, heedless people who travel this road would put me on the unemployment line.

How I Spent My Solstice Vacation

Day 70: While I was deciding how I wanted to celebrate Solstice this year, I received an invitation from the Nisqually Land Trust to join a work-party on that day. What better way to spend the occasion than in service to the Earth? My "annual leave" from Park duties parallels Kevin's since I ride up with him, so I had the day free. The project was touted as an "ivy-pull." English ivy is a major problem on many of our properties, but an earlier work party had cut it from the trees at this location (note the dead vines on the big cottonwood on the left), and our task involved removal of new shoots. Sounds fairly easy, right? It might have been, but for a heavy understory of five-foot high Snowberry concealing our quarry. You could never have guessed that six of us were hard at work within a 200-foot diameter circle. In fact, it was so dense that I couldn't see my work-mates even when they were only twenty feet away. The two hidden "Waldos" in this image were working near the river where I had the clearest vantage point to document volunteer attendance for the event.

Good And Evil

Day 270: In close-up, it's easy to see that these two plants are not the same species, but from a distance of six feet, you might simply think one was a colour variation of the other or a fading specimen. The similarity of the two allowed an invader to go unnoticed for a number of years until it had spread over an area encompassing approximately 600 square feet of Longmire Meadow. It was only through the curiosity of a Park colleague that its true nature came to light. Once we determined that it was not our native Self-heal (Prunella vulgaris ssp. lanceolata, left) and was in fact Carpet Bugle (Ajuga reptans, right), we began working on a plan to eradicate it.

Over the next ten days or so, I pulled together a team of volunteers who assaulted it in a manner not unlike the grid-by-grid excavation system used in archaeological digs, and on Wednesday when they left the site, about 75% of the weed was gone. Yesterday, Plant Ecologist Arnie Peterson took a break from his office duties to help me clear the remainder. A total of 50 man-hours went into the project, contributed by eleven "deveg" team members. Nine full-sized trash-can liner bags filled with Ajuga were taken away from the site.

Ajuga propagates both by seed and by stolon. The site will have to be monitored closely for the next several years to be sure that this invasive species doesn't regenerate and get a toe-hold again.

Only The Brightest And Best

Day 5: Mount Rainier's volunteers are the brightest and best...well, definitely the brightest! This scruffy lot turned out for today's litter patrol along SR706 despite showery weather, collecting a total of 16 bags of trash from a two-mile stretch of roadway, plus a large pile of sodden carpet padding and a few other bulky objects. It's not a glamorous job, but we like to think that visitors appreciate what they don't see on their way to the Mountain as well as what they do see when they get there. If you missed us this time, look for us again in April. Give a wave or honk as you drive by those folks in the bright orange ANSI-approved safety vests who are working hard to keep the road to Mount Rainier beautiful.

National Public Lands Day - Revegetation

Day 349: Yesterday, it was my privilege to be part of a revegetation crew working near Sunrise in Mount Rainier National Park. Nowhere on the Mountain is human impact more visible than in the subalpine zone, and particularly here where as late as 1970, a "drive-in" campground was available for visitor use. A gravel road cut through the meadow and hikers were allowed to wander freely through fields of wildflowers, thus creating countless "social trails" where vegetation was trampled and destroyed. The growing season is very short here, and plants did not have time to recover. Eventually, the area was closed to camping and the use of social trails was prohibited, but for the most part, the vegetation did not fill in. Enter revegetation crews, the heroes of the story!

For the last twenty years or more, the Park and several of its partners have been working together to replant these areas. Volunteers have been drawn in from the public sector to help out with this enormous project, and no single event in the Park points that up like National Public Lands Day. Approximately sixty people donned gloves and pushed wheelbarrows full of seedlings to a site above Sunrise Camp (now a walk-in camp), and there picked up trowels and knee-pads and set to work putting some 5000 plants in the ground. The weather was sunny but chilly, as one might expect when working at 6400' in late September, but most of the volunteers were veteran hikers or returnees from previous NPLD events, and knew what to expect.

"Reveg" is perhaps the Park's most popular volunteer project. All ages can participate, and a dozen or more young people were among our group. Some were Scouts. Some had come with their families to plant the seedlings cultivated in the Park's greenhouses over the summer. Other members of the group joked, "If I get down, you may have to help me back up," testing the creaky knees and stiff backs of their "golden years" in order to help with the planting.

Recurring questions include, "Isn't it kinda late to be planting?" and "What's the survival rate?" First of all, the growing season is very short at this elevation. Snow generally covers the ground from mid to late September until July. These plants have evolved to survive extreme conditions of alpine cold, but new seedlings have one major enemy: lack of water. Summer is a stressful time, even for established plants. Put in the ground in late season, these species stand a far better chance of taking hold. As for the survival rate, it's about 80%, and that's phenomenal.

Planting Crew

Day 19: If each of us planted as few as twenty trees today (and I know I planted at least two dozen), Ohop Valley is richer by no less than 600 young saplings representing 8-10 different species of wetland-loving plants destined to provide future habitat for critters of all sorts. This was one of several planting events which will be held on the former Burwash property, and is just a single facet of a multi-tiered restoration program which also includes reestablishment of the creek's natural meander. Portions of the creek have already been reditched, adding a mile or more of shoreline, improving drainage and controlling erosion with engineered log jams.

Thirty volunteers turned out for the Nisqually Land Trust's annual Hallowe'en event, some in costume and others not, but all willing to get down and dirty in the mud for the occasion. Many were returnees back for a second, third or fourth year on this long-term project. They came prepared for any weather, with smiles on their faces and shovels in their gloved hands. For three hours, they dug holes and filled them with plants, lovingly packing the soil around the roots and often giving a final word of encouragement to their charges as they moved on to the next in line: "Grow up tall, little snowberry!" and conversations flew all around as they laughed and shared their experiences.

As always, it was a delight to work with such a dedicated crew. Thank you all for your work today.

Recognizing Stewardship

Day 296: This weekend, it will be my great privilege to award seven young women with patches recognizing their stewardship of resources at Mount Rainier National Park. They will be volunteering over a two-day period, assisting Park staff with several projects, fulfilling Ranger Quests, and for the educational requirement of the badge, listening to your correspondent blather on about mycoheterotrophy and other botanical marvels.

Until today, I did not know that these badges were ours to distribute. I assumed that Scout honors came from Scout headquarters after some form of documentation was provided to prove that the badge had been rightfully earned. It will be a significant moment for me to have these awards accepted from my hands.

Wet Or Dry

Day 361: These two patches should be the same color, but after absorbing eight hours of steady rain, the one on the hat I was wearing today is looking a little waterlogged. Waterproof outerwear did a pretty good job of keeping me from getting totally soaked to the bone, but rain eventually penetrates anything which isn't absolutely water-tight. Still, I stayed warm as long as I was active.

So why was I out there during Washington's first major storm of the season? Today was National Public Lands Day, one of the biggest volunteer events at Mount Rainier National Park. We had an astonishingly good turnout in spite of the weather and accomplished all of our major goals with respect to the restoration of the historic Longmire Campground.

It's not the first time I've been this soggy, and it probably won't be the last. When you live in Washington, you just have to accept that you're going to get wet if you work in an outdoors profession.

Stick Pickers!

Day 256 (Part A): Storm debris has been accumulating in the Longmire campground for many years, and the customary means of disposal (dispersal) had proven to be less than effective. A ring of downed limbs and branches was building up behind the campsites faster than Nature could accommodate. Last year, two teams worked to bring the debris forward where it was hoped crews could be brought in to load it into drop boxes for removal, or alternately, that it could be chipped and distributed into the campground environment.

For the last two weekends, Mount Rainier volunteers have been hard at work clearing away the piles created by last year's work parties. On June 8, geocachers participated in their annual "CITO" event at the campground, and today (June 15), another team of nine individual volunteers gathered near the platform tents at 9:30 for a second assault. Four hours later, two 15-yard drop boxes had been filled to capacity, accounting for approximately 75% of the debris.

My personal gratitude as well as the Park's goes out to all the hard-working folks who have pitched in (literally!) on this project. Longmire Campground is now a much more pleasant environment, thanks to you!

Tents Up!

Day 249: A hard-working batch of geocachers and Mount Rainier Volunteers gathered together today in the Longmire Campground for the annual spring cleanup and installation of five platform tents which serve as temporary housing for volunteers throughout the summer months. The event was officially billed at Geocaching.com as a "CITO" (Cache In, Trash Out) and was the seventh annual gathering of this type at this location. The work went smoothly. Participants ranged in age from pre-school kids to senior citizens, each contributing their best efforts to the project. Go, Volunteers!

NPS Litter Team, Earth Day 2013

Day 200: In anticipation of Earth Day (Monday, April 22), Mount Rainier National Park sent out a team comprised of volunteers, paid employees and their family members to complete a litter patrol covering two miles of SR 706, the main access to the Park. In three hours, the group of twelve collected eleven bags of trash as part of their contract with the Washington State Department of Transportation's "Adopt-a-Highway" program. I had the honor of supervising this great crew, and couldn't have asked for a cheerier and efficient lot. Thank you so much, gang, for helping keep the Road to Paradise clean and tidy!