Licorice Fern… Forest Contrarian?

/ Tom Kloster / 4 Comments

Licorice fern in their two favorite habitats – growing on moss-covered talus (foreground) and on the moss-covered trunks of a sprawling Bigleaf Maple in the Columbia River Gorge

One of the great heroes of our Pacific Northwest forests is so ubiquitous that it’s almost always hiding in plain sight. Licorice Fern (Polypodium glycyrrhiza) is a creeping fern species whose rhizomes cling to moss-covered surfaces – typically tree trunks and rocks. The many ferns around the world that belong to the Polypodium genus share the growth habit of sprouting fronds from creeping roots called rhizomes, reflecting the genus name Polypodium, which translates to “many footed”. 

Licorice Fern on a grove of rainforest Bigleaf Maple and Red Alder along the Molalla River

While many of its cousins have especially furry “feet” to protect their rhizomes as they creep across bare surfaces, Licorice Fern has adapted to our rainforests by creeping under thick layers of moss. This not only protects their rhizomes, it also allows for more consistent access to moisture, given that these plants almost exclusively grow where there is no soil – just on rock surfaces or across tree bark. 

Like their cousins, Licorice Fern still retain enough of these fine hairs and roots on their rhizomes to anchor themselves as they grow to the underlying rock or tree bark under that protective blanket of moss.

The anatomy and reproductive phases of a Licorice Fern

Licorice Fern have colonized these massive boulders along Moffett Creek where a layer of moss is enough for the ferns to take hold

The second part of their Latin name – glycyrrhiza – translates to “sweet root” and describes the licorice flavor of their rhizomes that give these ferns their common name. If you grew up in the forests of the Pacific Northwest, you probably learned as a kid to identify both Licorice Fern and Wild Ginger (another, less common plant with a strongly flavored underground stem) for their distinct flavors. Both are important first foods for indigenous people and continue to draw interest in the broader foraging community today.  

Northwest indigenous peoples chewed Licorice Fern rhizomes for their flavor and as a medicine for colds and coughs, or cooked as a prepared food (which removes an enzyme in the rhizomes that can otherwise deplete Vitamin B). If you’re curious, you don’t have to destroy a Licorice Fern to sample its flavor (or better yet, to introduce kids to the plant). Carefully peel back the moss from the edge of patch of ferns to reveal the rhizomes and snap off a small piece to chew like gum.

A new colony of Licorice Fern is working its way up this very large Bigleaf Maple along the Molalla River

Their specialized adaptation to our moss-covered forests also explains their range. Licorice Fern are onlyfound in along the temperate Pacific Coast, from the Alaska Panhandle south to the Redwood forests of Northern California (an odd exception is a small population found in the Idaho panhandle). Within this narrow band, it is a remarkably adaptable species, in part because of its unusual growth cycle – more about that later in the article.

Their ability to grow without soil and cling to surfaces with their rhizomes makes Licorice Fern amazingly versatile and acrobatic in its native habitat. These ferns will happily grow upside down if there’s moss and moisture to be found on a cliff overhang, just as they can be found fifty feet (or more) from the forest floor, thriving on the trunk of an old-growth Bigleaf Maple or Red Alder, their most favored tree hosts. 

Licorice Fern thrive where limbs come together on large trees like this Bigleaf Maple, where the moss is abundant and rainwater concentrates between storms

Fern heaven in a mixed rainforest of Bigleaf Maple, Red Alder and Western Redcedar near the Clackamas. Sword Fern carpet the forest flloor beneath the giant Bigleaf Maple on the left, while Licorice Fern scale its mossy limbs

Licorice ferns spread by both creeping with their “feet” and – like all ferns – by their spores. There is plenty of evidence of both forms of spreading and reproducing if you look closely in our forests. 

When creeping by their feet, their progression up a tree trunk or across a moss-covered boulder is obvious. But when you see a smaller, isolated patch high up in a tree, or alone on a boulder, it is likely a new colony is forming from spores that took hold from a nearby parent colony.

Licorice Fern rhizome – tasty! (Wikipedia Commons)

Licorice Fern growing nearly 70 feet in the air on these Bigleaf Maples along Latourell Creek

This vertical rock face along Tanner Creek has only a thin layer of moss, but it faces north and is thus protected from summer heat, allowing several Licorice Fern to become established here

You’re not likely to notice Licorice Fern during its “gametophyte” phase – the transitional state in non-flowering plants that reproduce by spores by which a new fern is born. However, if you look closely where Licorice Fern grow, you might spot juvenile ferns that have recently emerged from the gametophyte phase with tiny, developing fronds.

Airborne spores allowed Licorice Fern to colonize this giant boulder in the middle of Silver Creek

The importance of their ability to reproduce by spores is on full display right now where our rainforests have recently experienced major wildfires – most notably, the Columbia River Gorge. Unlike many understory plants whose roots were protected from scorching heat by a layer of soil, Licorice Fern were decimated by the fires – along with the moss layers they anchor themselves in. 

As the burned areas gradually recover in places like the Gorge, mosses are quickly beginning to take hold on talus slopes and burned trees. Licorice Ferns will soon follow as their spores find their way to moss layers that have grown sufficiently thick.

These cliff-dwelling Licorice Fern grow under a moist ledge on a north-facing cliff in the Gorge. This allowed them to escape the recent fire, and they will now send spores to the surrounding, burned area as it recovers from the burn

Licorice Fern spores are tiny and can travel long distances in the air, so one patch of surviving ferns in a burned area can quickly spread to form new fern colonies once the moss has returned and gametophytes can survive. 

The scene below shows a talus slope in the Gorge that was covered with a thick blanket of moss and Licorice Fern before the 2017 Eagle Creek Fire, and now must rely on spores from survivors like this small colony to restore the fern population.

The small colony in the foreground somehow escaped the heat during the Gorge fire and now will help restore the much larger colony across this slope the moss recovery continues

One of the remarkable stories in the unfolding forest recovery after the fire is how pioneer species like Licorice Fern begin to move back to areas they once dominated. Before the fire, it would have been easy to simply see these plants are pretty additions to the mossy landscape. 

Yet, in areas where the fire completely burned away the moss and fern layer on the talus slopes that define the Gorge, we now know the important role they play in helping hold these over-steepened slopes together. In places where moss and fern-covered talus had not moved for decades, the loss of this thin, living blanket has triggered countless rock slides that continue to plague trail restoration in the Gorge. In time, the moss and Licorice Fern partnership will once again return to these slopes and – barring another fire in the near term – help stabilize them, once again.

The unusual life cycle of a Licorice Fern

Licorice Fern in peak foliage… in mid-winter?

Licorice Fern are so familiar in our forests that most consider them to be perennial – like Sword Fern or Deer Fern – keeping their foliage year-round. And sometimes they are, but just as these plants can scale their foliage to local conditions, Licorice Fern are uniquely adapted to buck the conventional annual growth seasons that most plants follow, whereby new growth appears in spring and summer, followed by a dormant cycle in fall and winter.

I used to see Licorice Fern in late summer or fall looking yellowed and wilted, and assumed these plants were doing what a lot of broadleaf species do, and simply sacrificing some foliage in the face of our annual summer drought. This was based on seeing other Licorice Fern soldier through the dry spells where they were growing in more protected spots. 

Licorice Fern fronds browning out in mid-summer in the Columbia River Gorge

Then I noticed something surprising on a late October visit to the Gorge several years ago: thousands tiny Licorice Fern fronds were unrolling from the moss layer on trees and rocks that had been rejuvenated by the first big rains and cooler temperatures of the fall season. 

Researching this, I discovered that Licorice Fern often grow their annual burst of new foliage in the fall, not spring – and keep this foliage at least until the next summer drought, or until new fronds appear in the fall in places where they are more protected or have summer moisture.

Tiny new Licorice Fern fronds just beginning to emerge from drought-dormant rhizomes at Starvation Creek in mid-October

Young Licorice Fern fronds rising above the fall leaf litter near Starvation Creek in early November

Just one month into their re-emergence in late fall, this colony of Licorice Fern near Starvation Creek has produced a dense new flush of fronds that will mature to dark green and remain over winter and into the next summer drought

This upended growth cycle makes sense for a hardy fern that grows on the soil-less surfaces of trees and rocks, and thus more reliant on regular rainfall. Their thick rhizomes contain enough stored moisture to help them ride through short dry spells, but when long summer droughts hit our forests, these ferns have adapted to simply drop their foliage and go dormant until the rains reappear.

Their inverted growth calendar also explains why Licorice Fern favor deciduous host trees like Bigleaf Maple and Red Alder. Not only do these trees typically provide the thick moss layers that the ferns require, they lose their leaves in late fall and winter, when the ferns are growing and need access to light the most. While you will often see Licorice Fern in evergreen forests, their preferred environment is on deciduous trees or mossy rocks and logs in an open forest settings for this reason.

New Licorice Fern fronds emerging in fall from a moss-covered rock buried in new leaf debris – a common scene where these plants grow on rocks or logs in open forest

Licorice Fern also have the ability to scale their foliage to their microclimate, further expanding their adaptability. Plants in consistently cool, moist and shaded locations become quite lush, with fronds up to a foot long that persist year-round, even during summer droughts. This is why Licorice Fern appear as evergreens in rainforests on the wet west side of the Cascades.

This lush Licorice Fern colony in the Gorge grows at the protected base of a Bigleaf Maple and on adjacent moss-covered rocks – the best of both worlds for these ferns

In exposed locations where the moss layer is less thick, or they face extended summer droughts and very cold winters, Licorice Fern adapt by downsizing their foliage to minimize moisture loss and maximize the period in which they are leafed out each year. These locations include talus slopes and exposed cliffs throughout their range, or where they grow in shaded areas at the edge their range, east of the Cascades.  

In these harsh environments they typically have short, rounded fronds, sometimes just an inch or two long, and often survive by shedding their downsized foliage in early summer and going dormant for the next 4-5 months.

The tiny new fronds on these licorice ferns are as large as they will get on this protected boulder in an Oregon White Oak grove in the otherwise arid east Columbia River Gorge

Their inverse growth cycle requires Licorice Fern to be especially hardy in winter, when tender new foliage is leafing out just as freezing temperatures arrive across most of their range. These plants are especially well-adapted to snow and ice, as can be seen every winter in the Columbia River Gorge, where winter weather conditions are especially severe. While a heavy snowfall or ice storm can level other ferns, Licorice Fern quickly bounce back and continue their upside-down growth cycle throughout winter.

Cliff-dwelling Licorice Fern typically downsize their foliage, both to preserve moisture in these exposed locations and to withstand tough winter weather conditions

Short, flexible fronds allow Licorice Fern to be completely buried in snow and ice, then emerge and spring back, ready to continue their winter growth cycle

Tiny-leafed Licorice Fern (center) with downsized leaves that reflect the harsh conditions of this talus slope rock garden near Gorton Creek in the Columbia River Gorge

While you’re not likely to spot a gametophyte, juvenile Licorice Fern are common and easy to spot, if you look closely. Their emerging fronds are the size of thumbnail and they lack rhizomes at this stage in their growth. They are often pioneers, as well – tiny patches growing far away from established colonies. 

Juvenile Licorice ferns just beginning to emerge from moss on a talus slope boulder along Tanner Creek. The two arrows point to new fronds emerging from gametophytes. The brown Douglas Fir needles provide scale in this tiny scene

Well-developed juvenile fronds in this new colony of Licorice Fern along Tanner Creek will remain small for the first few years until these plants develop mature rhizomes under the moss layer

This young Licorice Fern has begun producing mature fronds – the wrinkles on the lower frond are from sori on its underside, where mature ferns produce their spores

Where do Licorice Fern get their nutrients when they typically do not grow in soil? The answer is that these plants are mycorrhizal, meaning they have a symbiotic relationship with fungus through their rhizomes and roots. In this relationship, the ferns use their green fronds to produce food through photosynthesis for the fungi, and in turn, the fungi provides minerals supplied from the substrate the plants are growing from. This is why it’s not unusual to find tiny Licorice Ferns growing from what sometimes seems to be solid rock.

Tiny fronds no more than two inches long help these cliff-dwelling Licorice Fern survive where they have sprouted from small cracks in the rock

While not much is known about other organisms that depend on the Licorice Fern, they are considered to be an important niche habitat for other species simply because they grow where most other plants are unable to, thus providing shelter and food for insects and other wildlife living within fern colonies.  

While researching this article, I was especially curious to know if the unique, lowland Pika population in the Columbia River Gorge relies on Licorice Fern for food or nesting material, since these intrepid animals have uniquely adapted to live in talus slopes in the Gorge, and feed on the moss that covers these rocky slopes. Hopefully, as this unlikely Pika population continues to be studied, we’ll learn if it has also developed a special reliance on Licorice Fern, as well.

Urban Licorice Ferns..?

A bit weather-battered after the January ice storm, but bouncing back quickly

Thirty-two years ago, I constructed a stone retaining wall in my backyard and — wanting that “Gorge” look that I’ve always admired – I laid a patch of moss with a few Licorice Fern rhizomes embedded in it across some landscape rocks, just above the wall. For a couple years the ferns struggled to establish, but over the years they’ve formed a tough, lush colony that has now spread to cover much of the retaining wall. 

When I took the above photo in late January, they had been battered by an ice storm, but were quickly bouncing back to winter form, and providing welcome patch of green in our extended gray, rainy season!

The author in 1981 (at age 19!) beginning my infatuation with licorice-ferns — and stone walls — at Wahkeena Falls

Because I lightly water these plants in summer, they remain green year-round, even in the middle of our typically hot, dry Portland summers. These urban ferns have thus adopted a growth cycle of June through April, dropping most of their previous year’s foliage (with occasional human assist) as warm weather arrives in mid-May, then vigorously rolling out new fronds by early June – apparently “aware” that I’ll be providing light watering over the summer months.

The real surprise came a few years ago when the now, well-established colony on the rock wall spread to their preferred habitat on a nearby Hollywood Juniper, of all places. There was just enough moss on the shaggy bark of this 30-year-old tree to host the ferns, and they also benefit from being shaded by the juniper’s evergreen foliage during our hot summers in Portland. 

Pioneering Licorice Fern in my backyard… on a Hollywood Juniper!

Last year, the new colony on the juniper expanded to include two tiny new colonies, just above it, in this unlikely location. Their life here is exceptionally dry during the summer season – no supplemental water and at least three months of drought each year. The original colony even survived our unprecedented “heat dome” temperature of 116 F in June 2021! These new colonies have thus adopted to the conventional growth cycle of Licorice Fern, and go dormant in late summer, then re-emerge in the fall.

New colonies are now forming near the original Hollywood Juniper colony

The above photo shows the spreading Licorice Fern colonies on my backyard juniper tree – including a gametophyte just emerging from the moss layer. While I think the parent colony for these ferns was the most likely from the nearby rock wall, it turns out that if you look up when you pass under large, moss-bearing street trees throughout Portland, you’re likely to see Licorice Fern taking root throughout the urban area. 

This century-old Norway Maple (below) on my block has several large colonies among its sprawling limbs, as does the 60-year-old Norway Maple growing in front of my house. These colonies are thriving in the middle of the city, even as TriMet buses and other urban traffic on this busy street passes directly below them.

Licorice Fern colonies leafing out in early November on a Norway Maple street tree near my home in North Portland

As our climate continues to warm, we can only watch and learn how native plants will (hopefully) adapt. A few years ago, I wouldn’t have included any ferns on a list of resilient adapters to climate change, but the ability of Licorice Ferns to maintain an inverted growth cycle, scale their foliage to harsh local conditions and go dormant when droughts arrive should help them manage the changes ahead. 

Bringing the Forest Home…

In our time of climate change, native species that have already adapted to seasonal droughts are great options to consider for home gardens. They’re low-maintenance, bug and disease resistant and require little or no summer irrigation once they are established. But perhaps most importantly, they bring a slice of our amazing forests right into our yards for people and wildlife to enjoy year-round. If you can’t be in the forest, bring the forest to you!

Oregon Grape collected along a forest road near Mount Hood three years ago, and now bursting from its gallon pot (including through the drain holes!), ready to be planted in the garden

I’m a longtime forest transplanter, and licorice fern are just one of the dozens of native plants I’ve collected for my home garden over the years. Like many, I’ve also gradually transitioned away from ornamentals that require heavy watering, yet still fare poorly in our increasingly hot summers.

Among my favorite transplants are the many Sword Ferns planted throughout my garden. They provide year-round green and show a similar toughness to Licorice Fern. While they don’t share the ability to flip their growing seasons, Sword Ferns are able to scale the size of their fronds to local conditions and are remarkably drought tolerant, even in direct sun. I’ve also planted Oregon Grape (pictured above), Deer Fern, Salal and many Vine Maple (below) throughout the garden.

Vine maple leafing out just a few weeks after I collected it in the Clackamas River area three years ago. After two years in a planter, it developed a healthy root ball, and was able to go into the ground last spring

But is it legal to collect transplants on federal land? It is, though you are limited to what the Forest Service defines as the “road prism”. Generally translated, is the area along forest roads that was disturbed by construction, either for drainage or slope cuts. That includes embankments and ditches. The schematic is provided by the Forest Service:

No permit is required for non-commercial collecting. Having done this many times, I recommend digging in February or early March, just before plants emerge from winter dormancy. And don’t try to get a root ball in the normal gardening sense – forest plants have long, meandering roots that wrap around rocks and under logs, so you’re likely to end up with a “bare root” plant, even if you try to dig soil along with your transplant. 

Instead, my system is to not fight this “bare root” reality, and instead, embrace it. A shovel, pair of loppers and some hand pruners are the essential tools needed. Also, pack a few large, plastic trash bags with balls of dampened newspaper inside to keep the roots on your mostly bare-root transplants moist for the drive home. Then, plant them in the ground or in pots as soon as you’re able to. 

I like to grow my starts in containers with potting mix for a couple years to give them a chance to recover and develop a true root ball, then plant them in the yard in fall. That seems to speed up their adaptation to urban life significantly. Soon enough, they’ll asking for overpriced coffee and gluten-free mulch… 😊

You can learn more about collecting plants on Mount Hood ‘s forest roadsides here:

Harvesting Transplants on National Forest Land

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Tom Kloster | February 2024

Collawash River Cliff Collapse!

/ Tom Kloster / 10 Comments

The recently collapsed cliff wall along the Collawash River

We’re experiencing a bit of a geologic moment in WyEast Country, of late. A series of major cliff collapses in recent years along well-known streams has given us a unique opportunity to see the raw forces of nature at work, shaping the landscape in real time, and also to witness nature rebounding after these violent events. Most of these recent collapses have been along streams in the Columbia River Gorge, but sometime over the past two years, the Collawash River joined the trend. 

The Collawash River is special. Even in a region known for pristine, spectacular rivers, the Collawash stands apart. That’s in large part due to its unique geology. The Collawash River originates in the remote, rugged Bull of the Woods Wilderness and tumbles through a deep, forested canyon, made perpetually unstable by ancient landslides that are literally pulling the steep mountain slopes on both sides toward the stream.

Massive landslides create a continually changing landscape along the rugged Collawash River

The result is very active landscape along the Collawash, with hundreds of massive boulders marking past landslide events scattered along its course. The ongoing landslides, combined with recent forest fires in the Bull of the Woods Wilderness have also created epic logjams where thousands of trees dropped into the river have accumulated behind these boulders in huge piles.

The erosive action of the Collawash River against the force of these landslides has the effect of a conveyor belt. During high water, the river periodically removes debris from the actively eroding toe of the slides, which in turn, triggers more sliding. This cycle has been playing out for millennia on the Collawash, gradually carrying material from the slides downstream into the Clackamas River, then beyond, leaving only large boulders behind. In time, even the largest of these boulders eventually give way to the elements, and are carried away by the river in pieces.

The dramatic, evolving scenery along the Collawash River is shaped by massive, collding landslides pushing into the river canyon from two sides

One of the many landslides feeding into the Collawash River

[click here for a large version]

Along the way, these landslides also push the Collawash River against solid rock walls along its steep course, allowing the river to gradually cut away at these, as well. Like the erosive process described in this recent article, a solid rock wall that has been persistently undercut by the river eventually collapses, adding still more boulders and loose debris to the river. 

I unexpectedly came across just such an event this year along the Collawash River. The first clue was an eerie slackwater (shown below), with streamside Red Alder inundated under several feet of perfectly still, turquoise water. Just downstream was the answer to this strange anomaly. A massive rock slab had split from a tall cliff along the east bank of the river, crashing into the stream and creating a debris dam that formed a temporary lake on the Collawash.

The eerie, still pool in the Collawash impounded by the recent debris pile

The new debris pile in the foreground and the impounded, temporary lake on the Collawash

The river has since breached the debris pile and is now beginning to carry away fine debris. Note the inundated Red Alder trees in the background

Based on available air photos, the collapse occurred sometime between July 2021 and August 2023 — the 2021 image shows the free-flowing river and the 2023 version clearly shows debris the cliff collapse. While these events can occur at any time of year, those we have seen in recent years have mostly happened during the wet winter months, when the forces of erosion are at their peak. 

Based at the state of the debris pile, I would guess that this cliff came down sometime in the winter 2021-22, roughly two years ago. Why this guess? Because with events like this, the debris pile is usually loose enough for the stream to initially flow under it – like a sieve – until the pile settles and when fine material carried in the stream begins to plug small gaps in the settling pile. The other clue is the lack of fine material on top of the pile – the Collawash has clearly had some time to scour the pile of small debris during at least one season of high water.

(Update: per Ian’s comment, below, the Forest Service estimates the collapse to have occurred in February 2023 — a full year later than my guess! They also reported that at that time, the entire river was flowing through the debris and had not yet overtopped it, where today a significant amount of the flow is overtopping the debris. The Collowash is making quick work of this blockage!)

Though a portion of the river’s flow is now cresting the debris pile, much of the flow is still flowing through the loose debris

As with other cliff collapses, several very large pieces of intact cliff survived the fall, but these are already beginning to buckle from their own weight. As the stream continues to churn away at the smaller debris in the pile, the huge boulders sitting on top face enormous stress when the underlying debris beneath them shifts. An especially impressive, house-sized slab that is the largest among the boulders to survive the collapse (below) is already showing large stress cracks. It, too, will eventually break apart as the debris pile continues to shift and erode.

The largest of the intact cliff sections is this behemoth, roughly the size of a small house. Stress cracks are already forming as gravity and the shifting, eroding debris flow beneath the boulder continues to move

Downstream from the debris pile the Collawash River roars through a new Class 5 rapid created by the debris (below). The erosive energy of this steep, newly-formed rapid is immense. Over time it will erode the debris pile from below, continually pulling material from the collapse downstream and allowing the river to cut more deeply into the remaining pile.

New Class V rapids formed below the debris pile where the Collawash is now much steeper than before

Looking downstream from the collapse section, giant boulders in the distance (now moss-covered) from previous collapses reveal the most recent event as just another in a perpetual process of river erosion here

The erosive energy now concentrated in the new rapids just below the debris pile is hydro-physics in action. The panoramic view of the collapse (below) tells the story: the temporary lake on the right hides a series of pools and rapids that existed upstream before the slide, and this energy has now been displaced to the new rapids in the downstream section, just below the slide. 

Panoramic view of the cliff collapse showing the impounded lake (right) upstream and the new rapids (left) downstream created by the debris pile at center

[click here for a large version]

This amount concentrated energy of focused on the lower end of the new, unconsolidated debris pile means the river will quickly win the battle of rock versus water that is on full display here. Eventually, this will become what kayakers call a “boulder garden”, eventually draining the temporary lake and leaving only a few of the largest boulders in place to mark the site of cliff collapse. This is only the latest of many such events at this narrow bend in the Collawash River, and it won’t be the last.

The following schematics show the newly exposed cliff scar and the debris left by the cliff collapse in more detail:

The collapse created a 120-foot vertical scar in the cliff

The debris pile from the collapse is dominated by this massive 25-foot wide boulder

In researching this article, I stumbled across an image captured by outdoor writer Zach Urness in the summer of 2019 at the popular swimming hole just below these cliffs. To my amazement, you can plainly see that a prominent crack had formed in the cliff face, and matches the outline of the eventual collapse! I’ve marked it with a series of arrows in the photo below. 

View of the Collawash River cliff before the collapse with arrows marking the obvious crack that was forming (photo: Zach Urness)

Closer view of the Collawash River cliff before the collapse with arrows marking the crack that would eventually lead to the collapse (photo: Zach Urness)

Zach’s photo also shows how this spot in the stream was already littered with large boulders from prior collapses before the collapse. There’s no way of knowing when these earlier events occurred, but we do know from witnessing the latest collapses here and elsewhere in WyEast Country that they are more common – and constant – than we once thought.

The lack of photos or reporting on the collapse has a silver lining: Zach’s photo was taken from just above the Little Fan Creek picnic area, located at the confluence of the main Collawash and Hot Springs Fork. This area is especially popular with families in the summer months, with crowds of people floating and swimming the many pools in the river, and where a summer event might have had deadly consequences.

How to see it for yourself…

The graceful Collawash River Bridge was constructed in 1957 as part of logging heyday in the upper Clackamas River watershed

The recent cliff collapse on the Collawash River is easy to visit if you’re looking for a weekend drive. The winter off-season is the best time, too, as the Clackamas River corridor is popular and often busy during the spring and summer months. To reach the site, head up the Clackamas River Highway (OR 224) for 26 miles east of the town of Estacada to the Ripplebrook ranger station and campground, Here OR 224 becomes Forest Road 46. Continue for another 3.5 miles on FR 46 to an obvious (but usually unsigned) junction with the paved Collawash River Road (Forest Road 63).

Turn right onto FR 63, and be sure to take your time along this stretch. Here, the road hugs the Collawash River through an exceptionally scenic and geologically interesting areas. You will immediately cross a beautiful arched bridge over the Collawash as you enter the river’s narrow lower canyon on FR 63. Views of dramatic cliffs, river rapids and impressive old growth trees are at every turn, with frequent pullouts for stopping.

Autumn scene along the Collawash River Road

At about the 4-mile mark you will reach another junction, where paved Forest Road 70 heads right to well-known Bagby Hot Springs, located on the Hot Springs Fork of the Collawash River. Stay straight on FR 63 from this junction and immediately cross the Hot Springs Fork on second bridge. The recent cliff collapse is just upstream from here, so watch for an obvious boulder perched on a pile of moss-covered rock on the east side of the road (shown below). This is where the collapse occurred.

There’s room for shoulder parking next to the perched rock, and the best view is from the upstream side of the big boulder, on top of the rock pile. Use care scrambling up the rock pile – there’s a steep drop on the opposite side! 

While it looks poised to roll onto my car, this boulder is from an earlier cliff collapse that occurred well before the Collawash River Road was built in the 1950s. The best viewpoint of the latest collapse is from the top of this rock pile, next to the big boulder

Though the Collawash River was mostly spared by the Riverside Fire that swept across 138,000 acres in the Clackamas River watershed in 2020, the Clackamas River Highway route to the Collawash River travels through much of the burn. While this might sound a bit bleak for a scenic drive, it’s a great opportunity to fully appreciate the scope of the burn and watch the beginnings of the post-fire forest recovery here. 

The Riverside Fire was the third and largest of three human-caused fires to sweep through the Clackamas River canyon over the past two decades. While fires are a natural and necessary element to forest health in the Pacific Northwest, it’s also true that human-caused fires are burning the Clackamas River basin (and many other forests in the Pacific Northwest) at an unsustainable. 

The human-caused Riverside Fire roared across the Clackamas River area in September 2020 burning 138,000 homes and dozens of structures in its path

Human-caused fires are also killing old-growth riparian trees that have survived centuries of wildfires. Why? In part because of the intensity of these recent burns as a result of decades of fire suppression, but also because riparian areas were often be spared in the past by natural, lightning-sparked fires that typically began on exposed, drought-stressed ridgetop forests – not in moist rainforest canyons, where all three of the human-caused fires on the Clackamas started.

The Forest Service is still gradually reopening the many campgrounds and picnic areas along the Clackamas River that were affected by the burn, so you are likely to encounter logging operations where trees deemed “hazardous” are being removed by contract crews. These projects are well-signed and easy to avoid if you’re following the main route.

The Forest Service is still logging fire-killed or weakened trees like these along major forest roads in the Clackamas area as “hazard trees”

For a longer tour, you can continue further upstream along the Clackamas River Highway from the Coillawash River Road junction. The highway hugs the Clackamas River for another eight scenic miles, with pullouts along the way to appreciate the views. This section of the highway passes Austin Hot Springs, an interesting area, but also a private inholding within the national forest, and not open to the public.

Above the Collawash River confluence, the main Clackamas River is unburned and a reminder of what the lower canyon looked like before the 2020 Riverside Fire

As you explore the area, you may begin see each vertical cliff and outcrop with new eyes as – perhaps – the next real-time geologic event! Chances are slim that any of us will witness such an event, but seeing the aftermath of the Collawash River collapse gives a new appreciation for the constant natural processes that continue to shape the scenery around us.

Enjoy!

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Tom Kloster | January 2024

The Campaign Calendar at 20 Years!

/ Tom Kloster / 2 Comments

The 2024 Campaign Calendar is the twentieth edition!

With the December holiday season comes my annual Mount Hood National Park Campaign calendar, but this year is a bit of a milestone: the 2024 calendar is the 20th edition since I began putting these together back in 2003! Much has changed over those years, so this article includes both a retrospective from the early calendars and highlights from the 2024 edition, so I hope you’ll indulge me!

The new calendars for 2024 are print-on-demand and available now from Zazzle. You can find them here:

See the 2024 Mount Hood National Park Campaign Calendar on Zazzle

Zazzle does excellent work and these can be shipped direct to anywhere. As always, all proceeds go to Trailkeepers of Oregon (TKO) for their crucial work in volunteer trail stewardship and advocacy.

Looking back to the very beginning…

It was back in 2003 when I kicked off the “idea campaign” for a Mount Hood National Park that encompasses Mount Hood and the Gorge. It’s an idea that has made it as far as legislation in Congress on several occasions as early as the 1890s, but never made it as far as the president’s desk to become law – usually due to moneyed interests in exploiting the mountain. Thus, the purpose of the “idea campaign” is to simply keep the national park idea alive.

Shooting the Salmon River with my first digital camera in 2003 (Greg Lief)

I’ve been asked many times “do you really think Mount Hood will become a national park?” I do, of course. Eventually. Most of our national parks had a long and bumpy road to finally being established, often starting as a national monument or recreation area – but always because they had exceptional natural and cultural features unmatched elsewhere. That’s why I believe that Mount Hood will eventually join the ranks of Crater Lake, Mount Rainier and the Olympics and receive the level of commitment to both conservation and recreation that only the National Park Service can offer. In the meantime, this blog serves as place to celebrate those natural and cultural features that make Mount Hood and the Gorge unparalleled places worth protecting, while spotlighting threats to the mountain.

With this goal, the first calendar (below) was an outgrowth of the idea campaign as a visual way to celebrate the many places and landscapes that combine to make WyEast Country so exceptional. Back in 2004, there were also new technologies that helped make a custom calendar possible: I had recently purchased my first digital camera and CafePress had emerged as a quality on-demand printing service as part of the dotcom revolution. 

The first cover… back in 2004

The first calendar was modest – printed at 8.5×11 inches with color reproduction that was decidedly “approximate”, though still a big leap forward from color photocopies of the 1990s. The first edition featured a recurring, favorite spot of mine on the cover – Elk Cove on Mount Hood’s north side. 

From this start, the calendar evolved over the next 20 years in technology, print quality and the landscapes I featured. This collage (below) of the 20 annual covers shows some of that evolution.

[click here for a large version]

Looking back, the two constants among cover subjects were waterfalls and the mountain, though the places and vantage points varied greatly. One of the best rewards in putting the calendars together has been the opportunity to explore different corners of the mountain and gorge, as I set a goal early on to feature new images taken during the previous year in each calendar. While there are a few spots I go back to nearly every year, I’ve also been able to feature new places and perspectives not seen elsewhere.

Looking across those old cover images, I’m also able to see how the cover design evolved. The first two calendars used a script font that looks ridiculous to me now, and by 2006 I had moved on to the “national park” fonts I use today – notably, Copperplate — along with the color scheme I had used on the (then) brand new Mount Hood National Park Campaign website. The graphic below the main image was from bumper stickers I also had printed at CafePress at the time.

Getting there… improved fonts in 2006

The cover of the 2006 calendar is the first in a series of reminder among the covers that there are no constants in WyEast Country. Everything changes, and lately, change seems to be accelerating, as the cover image of Mount Hood from the Elk Cove trail underscores. Just two years after I took this photo, the Gnarl Fire had roared across the east flank of the mountain, nearly engulfing Cloud Cap Inn. Then, three years after the Gnarl Fire, the Dollar Lake Fire had burned much of the forest on the north slope of the mountain shown in this image.

The 2011 Dollar Lake Fire started just below the rocky viewpoint where this cover photo was taken. Today, the sea of green Noble Fir and Mountain Hemlock that once covered the slopes has been replaced by a ghost forest of silver tree skeletons, with a new forest just getting underway in their. The following photo comparison from this viewpoint (below) shows the dramatic changes to the north side in stark contrast. 

The Dollar Lake Fire burned thousands of acres of subalpine forest on Mount Hood’s north slope in 2011

The Dollar Lake Fire brought an unexpected opportunity to witness and document the forest recovery, and without the assistance of man, as most of the fire was within the Mount Hood Wilderness. As such, the Forest Service has adopted a hands-off policy and is deferring to the natural forest recovery process. I’ve since posted several articles tracking the recovery:

“After the Dollar Lake Fire” (June 2012)

“Dollar Lake Fire: Five Years After” (October 2016)

“10 Years After the Dollar Lake Fire” (November 2022)

The 2007 calendar marked a technology change when CafePress began offering a much larger format, measuring 11×17”. This required a different photo aspect, but also gave sweeping vistas the space they need to be truly appreciated. Such was the case with the first calendar cover in this larger format in 2007, when the sprawling view of Mount Hood’s east face (below) from Gnarl Ridge was the cover image. This edition also featured what has become the basic design for the cover, along with a blue color scheme that I’ve alternated with the original green theme over the years.

Going ultra-wide with a new format in 2007

In 2008, I started this blog as an alternative to making constant updates to the campaign website. This  opened still more opportunities to explore and capture WyEast country in words and imagery, with deeper dives and more details in the long form that I prefer. As the blog shifted my focus toward emerging risks to Mount Hood and the Gorge, so my photography shifted, and the calendar began to include more remote and obscure places on the mountain.

There’s a story behind the nearly identical cover scenes of Upper McCord Falls (below) that appeared on both the 2011 and 2013 calendars. In 2012 I lost all of my original digital files from the 2011 calendar in a computer upgrade, and by 2013 I’d clearly forgotten what the earlier cover images was. Apparently, I liked that view of Upper McCord Falls enough to put it back on the cover — though I had also upgraded my camera between these covers, so at least the 2013 version was an improvement on the earlier take – to my eye, at least! (for this article, I recreated the 2011 cover from a printed copy of the calendar I saved).

Seeing double-double!

As with so many places in the Gorge that I had taken for granted in my life, it never occurred to me that the forests surrounding Elowah Falls and Upper McCord Falls would soon be completely burned, leaving a landscape will take generations to return to the lush, mature forests that I grew up with. As it turned out, Upper McCord Falls was the first trail I visited within the “restricted area” following the September 2017 Eagle Creek Fire. It was just five months after the fire when I headed up there in February 2018 with a Trailkeepers of Oregon (TKO) crew to survey the trail damage.

The devastation was much more extensive than I expected on what would be the first of many trips into the restricted area after the fire. I had hiked through the recent burns on Mount Hood in previous years, and was braced for seeing ancient trees reduced to burned snags, but what makes the aftermath of fire in the Gorge so unique is the terrain. The forest was playing  a greater role in holding the steep slopes of the Gorge together than I think anyone realized, and just five months after the fire the scale of erosion and ground movement was alarming.

Locating surviving trail tread after the fire at McCord Creek in early 2018

The scene at Upper McCord Falls was startling, as well. The burn was severe around the falls, killing the entire forest. The layers of green moss that survived the burn on the cliffs and boulders nearest the falls seemed like they had been hand-tinted onto the brown landscape, like an old postcard.

Upper McCord Falls in February 2018 (Randi Mendoza, Oregon Parks & Recreation) 

The trail seemed a total loss in several areas on that trip where sliding mud and rock had completely covered the tight series of switchbacks originally carved into the slope by the Civilian Conservation Corps back in the 1930s. In the years that followed the fire, TKO volunteers have removed tons of debris from the trail and reconstructed damaged stone walls built by the CCC, restoring the tread to nearly its original design today.

Upper McCord Falls a few months after the fire

On the way out from that first visit after the fire, the clouds broke at the west end of the Gorge just as darkness was falling, creating the weird illusion that the charred forest silhouetted against dark the clouds and flaming sunset was still burning. As with all who love the Gorge, it was the beginning of a journey for me in accepting the reality of the fire – including the senseless act that started the blaze, as well as the inevitability of this fire being long overdue – and finally, a deeper appreciation for the resilience of our forests in which fire an essential destructive force.

Burned forests at McCord Creek on my first trip after the fire appeared to be on fire, once again, as a brilliant sunset lit up at the west end of he Gorge

Revisiting the slopes leading to Upper McCord Falls last spring, the resurgence of the understory and beginnings of a new forest was inspiring after five summers of forest recovery. While I won’t live long enough to see big trees replace those that were killed in the fire, the surviving trees are bouncing back strongly, and watching the renewal of the Gorge forests is as inspiring in its own way as the big trees we lost. 

A stand of Douglas fir that survived the fire is surrounded by a thriving understory along the McCord Creek trail in Spring 2023

Meanwhile, Upper McCord Falls looks quite different five years later, as well (below). The understory has made a vigorous comeback, but more surprising is the east (left) segment of this twin falls, which appears to be plugged with debris released into McCord Creek from the fire – at least for now. Prior to the burn, the twin tier would have been flowing when I took this photo last spring, just as it was in the calendar covers in 2011 and 2013. 

Upper McCord Falls six years after the fire in Spring 2023

Upper McCord Falls has historically had as many as three segments cascading from the basalt ledge that forms the cascade (a third tier once flowed to the left of east tier as recently as the 1970s, as shown below), so in time, there’s no reason to assume the second (or even third) tiers will re-emerge. The defining factor is simply the amount of rock and log debris piled up on top of the basalt ledge. 

Since the 1970s, the debris had been further stabilized by a colony of Red Alder that was the main force holding the pile of boulders and debris together, eventually blocking the third tier of the falls completely. Today, those trees have been killed, and with the volatile flooding on Gorge streams since the fire, there’s good reason to expect McCord Creek to re-arrange the shape of Upper McCord Falls by removing some or all of the debris plugging parts of the waterfall.

Upper McCord was a triple falls in the 1970s! (Don Lowe)

Where the tree canopy along the McCord Creek trail system were completely burned (below), the forest recovery is now in full swing, choking the route in many spots with Thimbleberry, Vine Maple, Douglas Maple and many other understory plants whose roots survived the burn, allowing them to bounce back quickly.

Forest understory surging back after six years at McCord Creek

Bigleaf Maple are bouncing back in this way, too, pointing to a future deciduous forest canopy as the first phase of recovery in many of the burned areas. Along the lower sections of the McCord Creek trail, ten-foot shoots have exploded from the roots of Bigleaf maple trees whose killed tops still stand as bleached snags (below). Many of these recovering maples will become multi-stemmed trees, a familiar sight in Oregon’s forest and one answer as to why mature Bigleaf Maple so often have multiple trunks.

Bigleaf Maples regrowing from the base of burned trees whose roots survived the fire

The drama at McCord Creek continued a few short years after the fire when the west cliff wall of the Elowah Falls amphitheater collapsed in the winter of 2021. There’s no science (yet) to make the connection, but the Gorge has seen a series of cliff failures since the 2017 Eagle Creek Fire. Could these events be linked to the loss of vegetation or corresponding runoff on Gorge slopes? Perhaps, but as I described in the previous article on the 1973 Tanner Creek landslide, there are unique forces at work in the Gorge that date back to the last ice age, so events like these are the norm, not the exception.

Elowah Falls cliff collapse in the spring of 2021 (Drew Stock, Trailkeepers of Oregon)

TKO volunteers discovered the Elowah Falls cliff collapse in 2021 and captured the dramatic photos shown here. In the immediate aftermath of the collapse, McCord Creek disappeared into the loose basalt cobbles that had filled the creek channel and buried the Trail 400 footbridge to its railings. That condition was temporary, however, as by last spring McCord Creek had already carried away much of the small debris and excavated the footbridge. The images below show the erosive power of the stream over a period of just two years.

Debris burying McCord Creek and its footbridge immediately after the collapse (Drew Stock, Trailkeepers of Oregon)

Elowah Falls footbridge excavated (and railings removed!) by McCord Creek after just two years

Like most cliff collapses in the Gorge, the jumbled debris fan at Elowah Falls is a mix of truck-sized boulders that managed to hold together amid a sea of smaller boulders and fractured basalt cobbles where parts of the once-solid rock face had simply crumbled during the event.

Large blocks of basalt mixed with smaller cobbles in the debris pile at the base of the collapsed cliff

Today, a massive scar is still obvious on the cliff wall where the basalt gave way (below). In time, however, the evidence from event will be hidden under a fresh carpet of moss and Licorice Fern, once again giving that deceptive illusion of stability that has never really existed in the Gorge.

Looking up the debris fan at the massive scar left behind by the cliff collapse at Elowah Falls in Spring 2023

While the cliff collapse at Elowah Falls was massive in scale, it spared the spectacular trail to Upper McCord Falls where it is carved into the basalt walls 400 feet above the creek. In fact, hikers passing along this vertigo-inducing stretch of trail might not even notice that a large section of the wall directly below them had collapsed into the creek, as the impact is mostly hidden from this airy view (below).

Elowah Falls seems unchanged from above along the Upper McCord Trail

If the cliff collapse Elowah Falls was impressive to see, the earlier collapse at Punch Bowl Falls on Eagle Creek was downright shocking. After Multnomah Falls, and Crown Point, the view into the mossy cavern that holds Punch Bowl Falls might be the most iconic in the Gorge. The idyllic scene drew photographers from around the world before the fire, and even gave its name to the category of “punchbowl” waterfalls.

Punch Bowl Falls as it once appeared in 2012

I posted an extensive piece on this event when it showed up unexpectedly on a series of aerial surveys the State of Oregon had conducted to track landslides after the Eagle Creek Fire. The Punch Bowl collapse occurred just months after the fire, sometime in early 2018. The “restricted area” was still in effect at the time, so the first few people to see the aftermath in person were trail volunteers working to put the Eagle Creek trail back together. Today, you can see the re-arranged landscape by taking the Lower Punch Bowl spur trail down to the falls.

Aftermath of the 2018 cliff collapse at Punch Bowl Falls

Getting that classic shot of Punch Bowl Falls during spring runoff usually entailed wading knee-deep into Eagle Creek to get a look into the hidden cavern that holds the falls. The cliff collapse has since changed things a bit. For now, there are a pair of good-sized boulders that landed in the entrance to the cavern, blocking the traditional view. 

In time, Eagle Creek will dismantle much of the debris from the collapse, and even these boulders will eventually break apart or be pushed downstream by the enormous force of the stream during winter floods. This will be aided by the many fallen logs that have dropped into the stream since the fire, and now act as erosive battering rams and levers as they move downstream.

The ”modern” calendar design emerges in 2016

The final design and format emerged in 2016 with a switch in vendors

Year twelve in the calendar series brought a major shift and format and improved quality when I moved printing from CafePress to Zazzle. The image reproduction at Zazzle is excellent and the overall printing process much better, resolving some quality concerns that drove me to make the move. Zazzle also brought the added opportunity to have a printed back cover on the calendar, kicking off the grid of nine botanical photos that I continue to include each year. Like the scenic views in each calendar, the botanical images are captured over the course of the prior year on my forays into WyEast Country.

New with the 2016 calendar? A printed back cover!

One last profile of note from past calendars is the 2019 edition, where lovely Whale Creek in the Clackamas River watershed is featured. This idyllic scene is – or was – typical of the beautiful rainforests there. Despite a long and frustrating history of aggressive logging over more than a past century, some of the finest ancient forests in the region survived here. Sadly, the Riverside Fire – yet another human-caused event – started just upstream from this spot along the Clackamas, and eventually burned 120,000 acres of forest, as well as numerous structures.

This scene from Whale Creek taken before the 2020 Riverside Fire was featured on the 2019 calendar

I’ve posted many articles on the necessity and benefits of wildfire in our forests, but the Riverside Fire underscores a few caveats to the science. As I described in this 2021 article, we are burning our forests faster than is sustainable. This stems from multiple factors adding up to a perfect storm: a century of fire suppression coupled with heavy logging has left us with thousands of old clearcuts packed with thickets of overplanted, fire-prone young trees and decades of fuel buildup. Add climate change, with our summers getting drier and hotter, and our forests have become a tinder box in most years, not just the occasional hot summer.

The same section of Whale Creek after the fire in 2020 (USFS)

Given this confluence of stresses on our forests, we’re doing an especially poor job preventing human-caused fires – they account for 70 percent of wildfires in Oregon! As I point out in the linked article, we’ll need to set some unwelcome limits on human behavior if we hope to slow down the burning to sustainable levels. So far, the Forest Service is moving very slowly in limited access during extreme fire danger, though successful liability lawsuits against power companies whose live lines triggered some of the 2020 fires may change that thinking.

TKO crews clearing big logs on the Clackamas River Trail after the Riverside Fire

Some good news from the Clackamas? TKO crews have already been working on reopening trails damaged in the fire. Like the Gorge, the Clackamas River canyon is steep country, so keeping trails open as the forest recovers will be a long-term endeavor.

That’s a look back at 20 years of campaign calendars, and now…

…looking ahead to 2024!

The view from Inspiration Point is the cover image for 2024

For the 2024 calendar cover, I selected an image of Mount Hood’s fearsome north face (above), as viewed from a tiny, unofficial trail that I maintain at Inspiration Point (located at the 3-mile mark on bumpy  Cloud Cap Road). How long have I been stopping here? I looked back at my photo archive, and the earliest I could find was a slide from the summer of 1984 – which means I’ll celebrate my 40th summer visiting this lovely spot when I stop at Inspiration Point next year!

Clouds capping the mountain on the road to Cloud Cap in this 1980s view from Inspiration Point

On the back cover of the new calendar, yet another collection of nine wildflowers that I photographed over the past year is featured – including a couple that were new to me. 

Back cover of the 2024 calendar

Putting it all together, here’s a jumbo collage of the 12 monthly images in the 2024 calendar, plus the covers and a snapshot of the page layout:

[click here for a large version]

For the January image in the new calendar (below), I selected a view of Mount Hood’s northwest side, with Cathedral Ridge and the Sandy Glacier Headwall covered in an early dusting of autumn snow. On this day last October, the mountain was emerging from the clouds after being socked in most of the day.

Northwest face of Mount Hood with early autumn snow

For the February image I thought I’d mix things up a bit with this view of the lower Deschutes River canyon at Oak Springs (below), a corner of WyEast Country that not many find their way to. On this day last winter, a dusting of snow had fallen on Tygh Ridge, the long fault scarp that rises in the distance – another lesser visited spot on this lonely, dry side of the mountain.

Lower Deschutes River and Tygh Ridge from above Oak Springs

For March, a more familiar scene (below) along a quiet section of the lower Salmon River features a group of Lady Ferns. The Old Salmon River Trail follows this stretch of river through some of the best rainforest and oldest trees within easy reach of Portland.

Lower Salmon River in Spring

I chose another stream scene for April, though this one is less familiar to most. This is Viento Creek (below), in the east Gorge, just a few miles west of Hood River at Viento State Park.

Viento Creek in the East Gorge

There’s a backstory associated with this photo, as I’ve been working with TKO for the past few years to create a new family-friendly trail from the Viento Campground to a magnificent viewpoint on the Viento Bluffs. The new trail will someday pass the stream scene shown above, enroute to expansive views of the Columbia River – but with a short route that it will be welcoming to casual hikers and young kids. Watch this space for more news on this project!

TKO and State Parks crew surveying a new trail at Viento Bluff earlier this year

The picturesque view from Viento Bluff will someday become a family trail destination

The May calendar image features another stretch of the Salmon River (below). This pretty cascade has become a popular spot for photographers in recent years. I included it in this year’s calendar partly for symbolic purposes, as this scene appeared in the very first calendar in 2004. This is also where Greg Lief’s image at the top of this article of me shooting photos was captured in 2003 – hard to believe that was 20 years ago!

Springtime on the Salmon River

June brings another symbolic favorite, as Elk Cove appeared on the cover of the first calendar, and in several subsequent editions over the years – and almost always from this very spot (below) along the Timberline Trail. As much as the mountain has changed in recent years, this view remains a bit of a constant – always lovely, but especially the Western Pasqueflower are putting on their “Muppets of the Mountains” show.

Summer wildflowers putting on their annual show at Elk Cove

For July I selected another repeat spot, one of my favorite viewpoints of Mount Hood and the Eliot Glacier from the shoulder of Cooper Spur (below). I posted a look-back article on this area earlier this year to kick off a series of then-and-now photo retrospectives. 

Mount Hood and the Eliot Glacier from the Cooper Spur Trail

For the August image, I selected another scene from a blog article, in this case a view of the recovering Muddy Fork valley where a landslide swept through two decades ago. This event and several now-and-then photo comparisons are over here.

Muddy Fork of the Sandy River

For September, I chose something a bit different, with a cliff-top view into the lower White River Canyon (below) at White River Falls State Park. So many things make Mount Hood unique (and worthy of national park protection!), but the compact collection of wildly different climate zones might be at the top of the list. There aren’t many places in the world where a 2-hour drive from the middle of a major metropolitan area takes you from rainforest to desert, with glacier-covered volcano rising above you the entire time!

Lower White River Canyon in desert country

The October image stays with the desert theme, and features Lower White River Falls. In spring, this canyon lights up with desert wildflowers that I’ve included in previous calendar editions, but the tawny yellows, gold and reds of autumn create their own beauty in this rugged landscape.

Lower White River Falls in Autumn

White River Falls State Park remains a diamond in the rough, with much potential for both improved recreation and conservation of the natural and cultural features in the park. The area is becoming more popular, and that has translated into some visible impacts – and therefore several proposals to respond to this increased demand are featured in this article from earlier this year.

Loop Trail concept for White River Falls State Park

For November, fall colors along Vista Ridge and fresh snow on the mountain are featured (below). This scene is surprisingly easy to get to – it’s along the access road to the Vista Ridge Trailhead, another increasingly popular spot on the mountain. This article from last summer includes some proposals for managing the pressures the newfound popularity is bringing to Vista Ridge.

Brilliant fall colors on Vista Ridge

Finally, a view of the mountain after the first big snowfall of the season (below) from the lightly traveled Gumjuwac Trail, gateway to the Badger Creek Wilderness. My favorite viewpoint hikes are to “pocket views” – those spots where a steep talus slope or rocky outcrop provides an unexpected view – and this rocky crest just below Gumjuwac Saddle is among the best, and was featured on the front of the 2016 calendar, as well.

Pocket viewpoint along the Gumjuwac Trail in winter

On the way up to the Gumjuwac viewpoint, I followed the chunky footprints of a Black bear for much of the route. Hiking in snow is a useful reminder that wildlife are always out there, even if we don’t have snow on the ground to record their travels. This is their home, after all, we are the visitors.

Bear tracks along the Gumjuwac Trail

Bear tracks in fresh snow on the Gumjuwac Trail

So, that’s it for my annual calendar review! If you made it this far and would like order one, they are available here – and all proceeds go to Trailkeepers of Oregon (TKO):

2024 Mount Hood National Park Calendar

As always, thanks for visiting the blog. Looking ahead to next year, I already have several articles underway, with the usual collection of deep dives, new proposals and reflections on the past. I hope you’ll continue to stop by!

The author at Owl Point in 2008 (Andy Prahl)

Best to you in the coming year – see you on the trail in 2024!

_______________ 

Tom Kloster | December 2023

Tanner Creek Landslide at 50 years

/ Tom Kloster / 4 Comments

Beautiful Wahclella Falls in the massive rock cathedral that Tanner Creek has sculpted

Fifty years once seemed like a very long time to me – half a century! Fifty years before I showed up on this planet (in 1962) human flight had barely been mastered and automobiles had just begun to replace the horse and buggy. Looking back today upon the past fifty years, things seems less changed from the perspective of a 61-year-old (though it’s true that without the arrival of personal computers and the internet, I wouldn’t be posting this article!) Our sense of passing time is warped by our own very short lives.

That’s the gift of witnessing the natural world around us moving forward at its own pace, as it has for millennia. Fifty years is a fleeting moment in time to our mountains and forests, where the only constant is change and the seemingly endless repetitions in the of cycle life that plays out on the landscape. Seeing these larger systems at work is a reassuring escape from our daily lives driven by deadlines and chores, and a reminder of the larger natural order that we belong to.

Tanner Creek weaving through the mossy boulder gardens below Wahclella Falls

This article is a 50-year snapshot of a catastrophic landslide in the Columbia River Gorge that perfectly illustrates these forces at work, right before our eyes. The landslide took place in the lower gorge of the Tanner Creek canyon in 1973, triggering a cascade of events that are still playing out today. It might have gone unnoticed at the time by all but a few avid hikers had there not been an earlier human presence at Tanner Creek dating back to very start of the 20thcentury. 

The story begins at the Bonneville Fish Hatchery, located at the mouth of Tanner Creek. Built in 1909, it remains as one of the oldest hatcheries in the State of Oregon’s system, and was established as a place to breed salmon fry to be shipped to other hatcheries around the state.  The map below shows the proximity of Tanner Creek to the Columbia River, Bonneville Dam and today’s Interstate 84.

The Tanner Creek gorge is located on the south side of the Columbia River at Bonneville, in the heart of the Gorge

The Bonneville Hatchery opened five years before the Historic Columbia River Highway arrived at Bonneville, when Gorge travel was still by train or boat. It was completed nearly 30 years before Bonneville Dam was constructed, though expanded as part of the dam construction project. Over its nearly 125 years of operation, The Bonneville Hatchery has been expanded and upgraded several times in an attempt to keep pace with continued dam building upstream on the Columbia River. The hatchery continues to be a popular tourist attraction, with stocked ponds and interpretive displays.

Construction of the hatchery diversion dame on Tanner Creek in about 1907 – note two men standing on the pipeline intake structure (OSU Archives)

The hatchery diversion dam today

The Bonneville Fish Hatchery originally depended on the cold, clear mountain water of Tanner Creek for its existence. When the hatchery was constructed in 1908, a small diversion dam was built one-half mile upstream from the main hatchery and a supply pipeline was built along the west bank of Tanner Creek to carry stream water to the hatchery ponds. The original diversion dam still exists today, though most of the hatchery water now comes from wells. The old pipeline has since been replaced, and is now buried under the short access road that hikers follow to the old dam and the start of the Wahclella Falls trail.

The original pipeline that carried Tanner Creek water to the Bonneville Fish Hatchery nearing completion in about 1908

Today’s access road to the diversion dam replaces the old water supply pipeline, and doubles as the first half mile of the Wahclella Falls Trail. This view is in roughly the same spot as the previous historic photo

When the Tanner Creek landslide occurred in 1973, it was first noticed by hatchery workers after the water supply suddenly stopped flowing. An investigation upstream revealed a massive cliff collapse along the west all of the canyon, just below Wahclella Falls. The resulting landslide had completed blocked Tanner Creek, temporarily blocking the streamflow below the landslide.

There was a rough user trail to Wahclella Falls in the days of the landslide, but it was a sketchy affair, crossing several treacherous, small landslide chutes on the east side of the canyon. Hikers parked at a gravel turnaround by the access road gate (located at today’s Wahclella Falls parking area) to reach the trail. By the late 1980s, the modern trail we know today was conceived, with much of it built by volunteers. When the new loop trail was completed in the early 1990s, the landslide was deemed stable enough to be traversed by the new trail. This has allowed countless hikers over the past 30 years to see the spectacle close-up.

Hikers are dwarfed by the Tanner Creek landslide debris – especially the house-sized boulder in the middle of the debris field

Loose material from a landslide typically forms a steep, cone-shaped pile at its terminus, known as a debris fan. Today, the landslide debris fan from the 1973 landslide appears as a green, moss and fern-covered talus slope with a few young trees gradually becoming established in the rubble. A few truck and house-sized boulders poke through the surface of the smaller talus. Below the talus slope, Tanner Creek has stripped away much of the small debris, exposing several of these giant basalt boulders in a dramatic rock garden that the stream continues to shape and shift.

What caused the landslide?

Three epic geologic events continue dominate how the Gorge is shaped today, including the 1973 landslide at Tanner Creek and the many smaller cliff collapses and landslides that occur every year. The first event created the underlying geology of the Gorge, and dates back about 17 million years. On the Oregon side of the river, ancient layers of volcanic ash and debris (similar to what Mount St. Helens produced in the 1980 eruption) accumulated to form the loosely consolidated geologic foundation, and is visible at river level. This unstable base is known as the Eagle Creek Formation.

The second event occurred between 12 and 16 million years ago, when hundreds of epic lava flows originating near today’s Steens Mountain flooded much of Oregon, leaving behind thousands of feet of “flood basalts” in stacked layers. These are collectively known as the Grande Ronde Formation and make up the layers we can plainly see in the towering cliffs that make dominate the Gorge landscape today. For this article, they will simply be referred to as Columbia River Basalt. 

Thick layers of ancient Columbia River Basalt make up the steep walls of Tanner Creek canyon and much of the surrounding Gorge landscape. Individual basalt layers can range from a few feet to 50 feet or more in depth

The underlying ash and debris layers of the Eagle Creek Formation are less obvious than the overlying basalt, but this formation is familiar to hikers. Named for Eagle Creek in the Gorge, hikers slip and slide during the wet months on the muddy trail surface where the first mile or so of the famous Eagle Creek Trail is built across this material. 

Compared to the hard, black layers of basalt that form the bulk of the overlying geology, the Eagle Creek formation is very unstable, especially when exposed to weathering or stream erosion. And though the overlying layers of basalt are comparatively hard and durable, their weakness comes from the extensive fractures that form when basalt lava flows cool, creating the familiar columns that are common throughout the Gorge (more about that weakness in a moment).

Loosely consolidated volcanic avalanche debris known as the Eagle Creek Formation underlies thousands of feet of basalt layers in the Gorge, making for an unstable, easily eroded foundation

Eagle Creek Formation makes up this wall along the lower section of the Tanner Creek Trail

The third epic event came long after the volcanic ash and lava had cooled and at the end of last ice age. During a period from about 13,000 to 15,000 years ago, a series of catastrophic floods from collapsing glacial lakes in today’s western Montana and northern Idaho and Washington rushed across the landscape of the Columbia Basin, then pushed through the Columbia River Gorge toward the Pacific Ocean. Compared to the volcanic episodes that created the Eagle Creek Formation and Columbia River Basalts, the glacial floods occurred yesterday, by geologic standards, and their impact is still playing out today.

The floodwaters were an astonishing 800 to 1000 feet deep as they rushed through the Gorge, carving the steep, dramatic gorge we know today. These are now known as the Bretz Floods, and scientist now believe there were over 40 separate flood events over the course of this period. The floods named for Harlen Bretz, a brilliant, visionary geologist who bravely persevered against intense criticism of his theory behind these events before they were finally accepted by the scientific community in the 1960s and 70s.

The trademark waterfalls of the Gorge are a product of the Bretz Floods where the stacked layers of ancient flood basalts were stripped of loose slopes and debris, revealing the soaring, vertical cliffs and dramatic waterfalls we see today. Where these waterfalls occurred on larger, more powerful streams like Tanner Creek, time and constant erosion has gradually migrated them upstream and away from the Columbia River over the millennia.

The succession of massive ice age floods known as the Bretz Floods easily topped Crown Point, stripping away all but the basalt cliffs, just as the floods shaped the sheer cliffs we see throughout the Gorge today

Since the great floods, Tanner Creek has persistently swept away debris from each successive landslide and cliff collapse, continually eroding the heavy basalt layers from below and setting the stage for the next landslide event. The underlying Eagle Creek formation speeds up this process because it lies at river level in the Gorge, allowing both the Columbia River and its tributary streams to actively undercut the towering basalt walls that rest upon this unstable, underlying layer.

Today, Wahclella Falls marks the current spot where Tanner Creek continues to carve its own, ever-longer gorge, now more than a mile long from where it began after the floods. Seen in this timeframe, the 1973 landslide at Tanner Creek was just one event in hundreds of similar cliff collapses and landslides over time that continue to shape the Gorge we know today. 

Weathered basalt often spalls according to the cooling cracks that formed when the lava flows cooled, creating the familiar stone columns common in the Gorge.

The cooling cracks in the basalt layers help, too, as they allow slabs of basalt to continually calve off where the cliffs have been undercut by erosion (see the photo, above). The cracks that form the columns in basalt also allow water to seep in when exposed to weather, and when the water freezes it expands, eventually splitting the rock. While most basalt columns are 5-sided, they may have anywhere from 3-7 sides or be less organized in their cooling patterns. As the example above shows, the columns typically break into pieces on impact when they fall, turning them into the smaller blocks of sharp-cornered basalt. When these blocks make it into a large stream like Tanner Creek, they are further tumbled and broken down into smaller pieces and moved downstream.

Whole chunks of basalt also split off when fractures in the rock are expanded by repeated freezing and thawing of water that seeps into the cracks. The raw, dark area at the center in this view just downstream from Wahclella Falls mark the spot where the boulders at the base of the cliff split off a few years ago. Moss will soon cover the evidence of this collapse.

The spalling process is underway on every sheer basalt face in the Gorge, and most of the steep talus slopes in the Gorge were created this way, gradually growing over time as new basalt chunks drop onto the rock slope from spalling cliffs above. This phenomenon occurs at scales both small and large throughout the Gorge, from individual columns spalling off to entire rock slabs and cliff faces that also break up into smaller pieces on impact. It was basalt wall collapse like this that triggered the 1973 Tanner Creek landslide.

The monumental crash nobody heard…

The sole known account of the 1973 landslide at Tanner Creek comes from Don and Roberta Lowe, legendary hiking guide pioneers in Oregon. Their first guide to trails in the Columbia River Gorge was published in 1980, and included this description of the event:

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“In 1973, attendants at the Bonneville Dam Fish Hatchery were surprised, puzzled and alarmed when the water supply to the facility by Tanner Creek abruptly stopped. When the flow did not resume after a short time, the men became worried, as hatcheries require constant supply of fresh water, so they hiked up Tanner Creek to learn what had happened. 

“The canyon was filled with an eerie calm and almost unearthly ambience. A short distance before Wahclella Falls, they found the answer: several hundred cubic yards of the west wall had fallen away and blocked the stream, forming a small lake behind the dam. Fortunately, water began flowing through the debris before any damage was done in the hatchery. The lake (although not as large as it was soon after the landslide) and the slide area still can be seen from the trail – an intimidating view.”

-From “35 Hiking Trails: Columbia River Gorge” by Don and Roberta Lowe (1980)

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The Lowe guide goes on to describe the very rustic trail to Wahclella Falls as it existed in the 1970s, a slippery boot path the Lowes describe as “tricky” during the wet season, including a rock-hop along Tanner Creek near the trailhead – a far cry from today’s well-graded, family friendly trail.

It’s hard to imagine what the scene must have been like when the basalt cliffs gave way along Tanner Creek in 1973, but it must have been extraordinarily loud! Dozens of massive, house-sized boulders managed to roll all the way to Tanner Creek, several hundred feet below, part of a huge debris fan that measures more than a quarter mile across. What we can’t know is whether it happened as a single event, or series of collapses over hours, or even days, though the complete damming of Tanner Creek – a sizable stream with a powerful flow — suggests a single, catastrophic event.

The temporary lake behind the landslide debris lasted long enough to make it onto U.S. Geological Survey maps that were being updated in the 1970s. The bare slopes of the debris fan were also shown on the new maps. Part of the lake persisted well into the 1980s, when I made my first trip into the canyon. Photos from the trip that I have included in this article show just how raw the landslide area continued to be more than a decade after the collapse.

The tiny, temporary lake resulting from the landslide was timed perfectly to be included on USGS maps. Tanner Creek has since carved through the landslide debris and the lake is no longer

The tiny lake on Tanner Creek persisted into the 1980s – this view is from 1986

In preparing this article, I searched for official accounts of the landslide event and historic photos of the west wall of the canyon from before the landslide, but found neither.  Therefore, the following schematics are based upon visual evidence on the surviving cliff face above the landslide and the sheer amount of debris that came down. It must have been involved a very large section of the canyon wall. Another guide for these schematics was the recent pair of cliff collapses at nearby Eagle Creek (described in this article), where the “before” conditions were well-documented could be easily compared with the amount to debris produced in these similar, though somewhat smaller events.

Visualizing the landslide aftermath

The first schematic view of the landslide is from high on the east slope of Tanner Creek Canyon, where the modern trail approaches a footbridge over a tributary stream (below). Wahclella Falls is just out of view to the left, and Tanner Creek can be seen in the lower left of this view. The dark cliffs on the left side of the photo were not involved in the collapse, so they provide a reasonable sense of what the west wall must have looked like before the 1973 collapse and landslide. 

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The dashed line shows the extent of the collapse, where the canyon wall gave way. Large, intact slabs of basalt that were once part of the wall poke through the loose debris of the fan, below. This is common when basalt cliffs collapse, as the amount of fracturing within the layers of rock determines whether the individual layers hold together in large chunks as they fall, or complete disintegrate into the loose talus rock that makes up most of the Tanner Creek debris fan. The arrows show the direction in which rock from the collapse tumbled, creating the debris fan we see today. The circled hiker on the lower leg of the loop trail provides a sense of scale against the massive slide area.

This schematic view (below) is from farther upstream on the main trail, just below Wahclella Falls and directly opposite the landslide. It provides a better sense of what the west wall might have looked like before the collapse, based on the intact wall to the left. The collapsed area is now a hollowed amphitheater in the wall of the canyon, and it still sends rocks and debris down to the fan each year as the new cliff face continues to weather and spall from exposure to the elements. The stand of mature Douglas fir to the right survived the event, marking the edge of the new debris, though these trees also grow on a talus slope created by some earlier event in Tanner Creek’s continued evolution. Two groups of hikers are circled to provide scale.

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Tanner creek can also be seen at the bottom of the schematic, where it tumbles through house-sized chunks of collapsed cliff that rolled into the stream during the event. At the time of the collapse, smaller, loose debris filled the voids between these giant boulders in the same way the large boulders remain buried in smaller material in the debris fan today. Tanner Creek quickly carved into the smaller material, clearing it away over the past 50 years and stranding the giant boulders in the creek bed. 

The next schematic of the landslide (below) is from the lower part of the loop trail, where it crosses the debris fan and where the hikers appear in the previous schematic. This view gives a better sense of the smaller debris, from small, loose basalt fragments to boulders ranging from a foot across to as much as 25 feet across. The amphitheater formed in the cliff wall is more evident from this perspective, as well.
Over the half-century since the collapse, this part of the debris field has settled into a talus slope and is now fairly stable where it is out of reach of Tanner Creek.

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Along with the moss and Licorice Fern that now carpet much of the talus in the debris fan, a few Douglas Fir have become established over the half-century since the collapse, along with scattered understory plants like Ocean Spray and Snowberry. Despite fifty years passing, however, the landslide remains a raw, rocky place that tells us the full recovery will take many more decades for the forest to fully reclaim this slope.

The following photo sequence shows the progressive forest recovery on the landslide from just 13 years after the event, when moss was just beginning to take hold, to 2011, when the east wall of the canyon had stabilized enough to become dense with young deciduous trees like Bigleaf Maple and Red Alder. The most recent view shows a thinned forest recovering from the Eagle Creek Fire that swept through in 2017, moderately burning several sections of the Tanner Creek canyon, including this slope. 

Forest recovery over the years on the Tanner Creek landslide

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The arrows in this photo comparison show common reference points, each marking one of four very large boulders that haven’t moved since the 1973 event. Surprisingly, the tall Douglas fir along the left edge of these photos is the same tree, and one that has survived the many changes to the area over the past half century – though leaning toward Tanner Creek a bit in recent years.

Why was the east wall of the canyon affected by a landslide on the west side? That traces to the dammed-up stream and subsequent erosion as Tanner Creek worked its way around the pile of debris the landslide had pushed against the east slope. As constant stream erosion has gradually uncovered the massive boulders that line the creek, the boulders have forced the creek against the edges of the stream channel, undercutting slopes on both sides of the canyon as the channel continues to deepen. 

The lower bridge on the Tanner Creek loop trail crosses the stream where soft Eagle Creek Formation is overlain by solid basalt flows and loose basalt debris

Though they seem immovable by their sheer size, Tanner Creek continues to gradually shift the giant boulders over time, as they lie directly on unstable Eagle Creek Formation that forms the creek bed. This soft, underlying formation can be easily seen from the lower footbridge (above) along the Wahcella Falls trail, with the collection of basalt landslide boulders resting on top of the formation where it has been exposed by the creek. As the creek erodes soft Eagle Creek Formation material under these boulders, they shift, which in turn shifts Tanner Creek, as well. This continually shifting action continues to actively undercut slopes on both sides of the canyon, triggering smaller active landslides in several spots. 

This effect can be seen in the following view of the east slope showing one of several small landslides that has been triggered over the years as the Tanner Creek banks against the foot of the east slope to move around the boulder in the lower right.

Active landslide on the east side of the canyon where Tanner Creek has been pushed against the slope, undercutting it

Over time, even house-sized basalt boulder fall apart, and this is on display at Tanner Creek, too. The giant boulder shown in this image (below) split sometime in the early 2010s. By 2016 a large piece had split off and partially crumbled, falling off into the stream in several pieces. While weathering like this typically results from cracks in the basalt that are expanded over time by freezing and thawing, the uneven erosion of the underlying Eagle Creek Formation likely destabilized this boulder further, with the sheer weight of the rock eventually pulling it apart at the seams.

This giant boulder was split apart in the early 2010s when Tanner Creek eroded the Eagle Creek Formation material underneath

This comparison view (below) of the boulder in 2011 and 2016 shows the extent of the weathering that occurred, as well as how the collapse of the east portion of this boulder allowed Tanner Creek to more aggressively undercut the east slope of the canyon, behind the boulder, expanding an active landslide. The letters in this graphic mark reference points for comparing the views. 

Split boulder comparison from 2011 and 2016

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This animation (below) of the same before and after views of the boulder give a better sense of how the adjacent slope on the east wall was destabilized when the boulder split, leaving the slope unsupported and exposing it to undercutting by Tanner Creek. This weather and erosion sequence might seem unusual to us, but it is a constant in the geologic shaping of the Gorge, playing out countless times along Tanner Creek and along other streams that continue to carve their way through layers of basalt.

Animated split boulder comparison from 2011-16

The 2017 Eagle Creek Fire introduced yet another erosional force to the Gorge streams by producing thousands of fallen trees that quickly became driftwood as they fell or were carried downhill by landslides. During high water season, Tanner Creek and other large streams in the Gorge are fully capable of moving mature logs down their course, often piling them in huge log jams along the way. In a powerful stream, these join with the current when the streams are raging to become battering rams and pry bars against the boulders they encounter along their path.

Tanner Creek is especially wild and wooly in the winter, easily capable of moving whole logs down its channel

Such is the case at Wahclella Falls, where an enormous jam of several hundred logs has piled up since the fire in the side channel just below the falls (next to the “Wahclella Cave”). These comparison photos (below) shows how dramatically the log jam has grown over subsequent years, from a 25-foot wide pile two years after the fire in 2019 to a 120-foot long pile just five years in 2022. A smaller logjam has since formed inside the splash pool, as well (indicated by the arrow near the falls in the second photo). 

Despite the size of these log piles, they are temporary and will eventually be on the move. Their next stop will be the boulder garden created by the landslide, just out of view to the left, where they could significantly alter the changing stream channel there, once again.

Growth of the post-Eagle Creek Fire logjam at Wahcella Falls

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This view (below) of the main logjam at Wahclella Falls is looking downstream from the upper footbridge and shows the obstacle course of huge landslide boulders in the distance that these (and other) logs will eventually work their way through. When logs form a jam, the combination of their sheer weight and the water pressure building behind them can move very large boulders or simply divert Tanner Creek in a way that accelerates erosion under boulders resting in the streambed.

Post-fire logjam below Wahclella Falls

This view (blow) of the smaller logjam inside the Wahclella Falls splash pool shows these forces at work, with Tanner Creek continuing to add new logs and woody debris to the gap between these large boulders, where the stream once freely flowed. The hydraulic pressure behind these jams is immense during high water, allowing the logs to incrementally pry even large boulders like these loose, and thus rearrange the stream channel.

Smaller logjam within the Wahclella Falls splash pool

Logjams like these will continue to appear and grow for decades to come in the post-fire period in the Gorge. The very good news is that woody debris like this is an essential ingredient to healthy fish habitat for salmon and steelhead, a fairly recent discovery by stream biologists. The lack of fire in the Gorge over the past century has had the effect of starving streams of woody debris, so the new conditions that we are witnessing are, in fact, very old. This is what these streams had always looked like for millennia, before fire suppression began in the early 1900s.

What about the boulders at Wahclella Falls?

In writing this article, I’ve attempted to map the areas impacted by the 1973 landslide, including the many large boulders left behind in Tanner Creek. Without photos from before the slide, I’m not able to fully answer whether the iconic boulders immediately below the falls (as seen in the logjam comparisons, above) were part of the event, as some believe. However, I’m fairly certain they were not, and instead that they came from earlier, similar cliff collapse events long ago.

I do have a single historic photo of Tanner Creek (below), titled “Tanner Creek Falls in 1910”. If this is an image from a century ago, then it shows most of the boulders located immediately below Wahclella Falls to have been in place long before the 1973 landslide. The timing of the photo corresponds to construction of the Bonneville Fish Hatchery and accompanying diversion dam on Tanner Creek, so there’s a good chance it was captured during that period of intense activity in the area.

Wahclella Falls in 1910

While the 1910 photo doesn’t show much of the surrounding landscape, it does show the edge of a very large boulder that guards the west approach to the falls, immediately adjacent to the modern trail. The following comparison shows the edge of the same boulder on the right, as well as a pair of boulders in front of the falls that also appear to date back to the 1910 photo. 

Wahclella Falls over the course of a century – 1910-2015

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The angle of the 1910 photo also suggests that the flat-topped “island” boulder bounded by the side channel (and now by the logjam) is where the photographer was standing, since the rock in the lower right foreground of the 1910 photo is where the west end of the footbridge is located today. This is shown in the following image of the boulders surrounding Wahclella Falls, with at least four of these present at the time of the historic photo. 

Are these boulders from the 17973 cliff collapse? Unlikely

Based on the shape of the debris fan (just out of view to the left in the above photo), I believe all of the large boulders in this view pre-date the 1973 cliff collapse and landslide, though I will continue to look for historic photos that can document what really happened!

After the fire… and the future of Tanner Creek?

Since the fire in 2017, landslides have been active throughout the Eagle Creek Fire burn area. With no forest cover to moderate runoff, tributary streams flood more frequently, and as the killed trees begin to decay, their roots will no longer hold the steep Gorge slopes in place. Fortunately, the forest is already bouncing back, and these erosion effects will eventually fade, but in the meantime slides and erosion will continue to have a real impact – especially on hiking trails.

Small post-fire landslides like this one on the Wahclella Falls trail are keeping trail volunteers busy throughout the Gorge

What is less known is whether the loss of forest cover will trigger much larger events – like the massive cliff collapse that occurred at Punch Bowl Falls on Eagle Creek shortly after the fire. Given the amount of earth movement already happening on a smaller scale throughout the burn, it does seem likely that something larger might also be triggered. Perhaps this will happen at Tanner Creek? So far, there’s no way to know or predict future events of this scale.

Larger landslides like this one on the Wahclella Falls trail are moving whole trees burned in the fire into the stream

Meanwhile, Gorge visitation has never been greater, especially in the years after the pandemic, when interest in hiking soared across the country. At Tanner Creek, the combined effect of post-fire erosion and record crowds year-around has taken a visible toll on the landscape. Though the area was added to the Mark O. Hatfield Wilderness in 2009 to better protect it, Tanner Creek feels more like the popular state parks in “waterfall alley” on busy days than a “wilderness”. Large groups that greatly exceed the wilderness party limit of 12 are commonplace, and the small parking area at the trailhead overflows year-round, with cars parked along the freeway off-ramp on especially busy weekends.

Weekend crowds at the upper footbridge on the Wahclella Falls trail

For its part, the Forest Service has expanded amenities somewhat at the trailhead, including a growing collection of portable toilets and even periodic law enforcement visits in response to frequent car break-ins. So far, the hiking experience remains exceptional, despite the crowds and their visible impacts. The trail to Wahclella Falls is considered family-friendly, so many of the visitors here are children who (hopefully) will come back to this as their own cherished spot for decades to come. That is perhaps the best way to ensure places like this are well-cared for in the future.

Contractors servicing the array of portable toilets at the Wahclella Falls trailhead

In addition to the parking area basics like toilets, I would like to see more interpretive information on the 1973 landslide provided at Wahclella Falls. The wilderness designation means that any signage along the trail must be minimal and rustic in design, but there is plenty of space at the parking area or the formal trailhead near the hatchery dam to provide more information on both the unique natural history of the area and a simple map of the trail – many hikers I encounter here don’t realize it’s a loop, and I finding them standing puzzled at the unsigned loop junction, unsure of which way to go (“take the lower trail, it’s a loop” I tell them).

Lines form for selfie photos in front of Wahclella Falls on busy days

Looking to the broader future, my hope is that new trails and destinations will be opened in the Gorge to take some pressure off places like Tanner Creek. I’ve posted some ideas here over the years, and I will continue to make the case for more trails (including expanding the trails at Tanner Creek to new destinations upstream… watch for a future article on that topic!)

I’ve been hiking in the Gorge since I was in kindergarten, so I have the benefit of seeing the many changes to the area over time – whether they be natural events like the Tanner Creek landslide, or human-caused. That’s why this quote in the 1980 Lowe field guide caught my eye:

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“The serene glade of cedar at the base of the Wahclella Falls is ample reward for the precarious stretches. You’ll probably want to spend extra time enjoying the sylvan setting.”

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This description then came to mind when I was preparing this article, and ran across an image (below) from a hike to Wahclella Falls some 21 years ago, taken with my first digital camera in the fall of 2002. It was truly “serene glade” back then, and it still is – despite some signs of overuse that have since appeared.

Wahclella Falls in 2002 when the impact of hikers was still minimal

We don’t know what the forces of nature have in store for Tanner Creek in coming years, but the landscape continues to be in a state of dynamic change fifty years after the great landslide in 1973, and it will continue to change. But as the landscape continues to recover from the landslide – and now, the 2017 fire – we can do our part to ensure that this remarkable spot continues to be a place where we can watch the recovery unfold while also managing our own impacts, and allow some of the scars humans have caused to heal, as well.

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Tom Kloster | November 2023

Muddy Fork Debris Flow at 20 Years

/ Tom Kloster / 4 Comments

20 years later, it’s hard to imagine the massive debris flow that roared down the verdant Muddy Fork valley in 2002…

Earlier this year I posted a “then-and-now” look at the changes to the Cooper Spur area on Mount Hood’s east flank over the past 20 years, including dramatic changes to the Eliot Glacier. This article provides a similar look at forces of nature that have once again reshaped the Muddy Fork canyon, on Mount Hood’s steep western flank. 

The story begins in the winter of 2002-03 with a massive debris flow triggered by a landslide in the upper Muddy Fork canyon. The event occurred sometime during the winter season, when deep snow-covered hiking trails, and thus went unnoticed until the snowpack cleared that spring. The event immensely powerful, mowing down whole forests and raising the valley floor of the upper Muddy Fork by as much as 20 feet. Whole trees were snapped off and carried downstream with the debris, forming huge piles that still give mute testimony to the power of the event.

Stacks of downed trees still give mute testimony to the violence of the 2002 event

Though the exact origins of the initial landslide remain unknown, the event was probably not triggered by a collapse within the Sandy Glacier that looms above the Muddy Fork, as there were few signs of the debris flow near the glacier, above the section of the upper canyon where the landslide scars were obvious. Instead, the debris flow likely began as a major slope collapse within the steep confines of upper canyon, where the Muddy Fork tumbles between sheer rock cliffs and steep talus slopes. 

The scars from the 2002 collapse are still plainly visible today (below), but the debris fields it created downstream are rapidly being reclaimed by new forests. The landslide created new cliffs and steep walls within the upper canyon, including new waterfalls along the Muddy Fork where the stream suddenly plunged over the newly exposed bedrock. 

The massive 2002 cliff collapse in the upper reaches of the Muddy Fork canyon gave birth to a debris flow that spread for miles downstream

Below the cliff-lined section of the upper canyon, the debris flow fanned out, spreading the landslide debris across the broad floor of the Muddy Fork valley. Nobody witnessed the event, so it’s unknown exactly how it played out. However, the wide debris fields of rock and sand clearly resulted from a major event, as did the complete removal of a standing forest. 

Trees swept up in the flow were stacked in piles that suggested a lot of water content in the debris flow – as much mud as it was rock – due to saturated winter soils and possibly a sudden snowmelt, perhaps from an unusually mild winter storm.  Whole trees were rafted on their sides until they were beached in giant log jams against forest stands along the valley margins that somehow survived. Evidence of the flow only became apparent when hikers returned that spring to find the Timberline Trail completely erased where it had crossed the Muddy Fork.

The raw cliffs and talus slopes surrounding McNeil Falls are still recovering from the event after 20 years

Over the course of the two decades that have since passed, the Muddy Fork quickly cut through the new debris to reach the old valley floor, revealing splintered stumps from trees that were snapped off during the event, then buried in the debris (below). This has confined the stream to a deep channel in the upper valley that limits its once-meandering ways across the valley floor, at least for now. However, the event only affected the north branch of the Muddy Fork, leaving the south branch almost untouched. 

Large trees by the thousands were snapped off and upended by the debris flow, then buried on the floor of the Muddy Fork valley

The Muddy Fork quickly excavated a new channel in the debris flow, unearthing trees like these that had been buried on their sides under the debris

While the north branch is currently confined to its newly cut channel, this is a temporary condition. Debris flows along Mount Hood’s glacial streams are a nearly constant reality, and even major events like the one that occurred on the Muddy Fork in 2002 are not uncommon. As jarring as these events are to witness, they also give us a privileged glimpse into the very processes that have shaped the mountain we know today. In time, smaller debris flows will gradually choke the current channel with debris, and the Muddy Fork will once again meander across the valley floor – just 20 feet higher than it was in 2002.

The Muddy Fork debris flow then… and now

Though it wasn’t apparent to casual visitors from a distance, hikers who knew the mountain immediately spotted the debris flow from the open slopes of Bald Mountain, where the Timberline Trail provides a sweeping view of Mount Hood’s west face. Before the debris flow, the two main branches of the Muddy Fork had similar floodways at the head of the valley, below the Sandy Glacier. As the 2003 image (below, left) shows, the north branch was suddenly much wider. Today, forest recovery has nearly erased signs of the debris field (below, right) from this vantage point.

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A closer look at this photo comparison reveals the scale of the debris flow in the summer of 2003, shortly after the event (below, left). The debris field was up to 1/4 mile wide and left up to 20 feet of debris in the channel of the north branch of the Muddy Fork. After 20 years (below, right), a carpet of green, recovering forest has already reclaimed much of the new debris field.

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Down at ground zero, the scene at the head of the Muddy Fork valley in 2003 (below, left) was of astonishing destruction. Whole forests were toppled and piled like matchsticks along the margins of the debris flow, pushing into standing forests just high enough on the valley walls to have escaped the waves of debris. 

Twenty years later (below, right), most of the forest debris remains, though new logs were added to the jumble in the September 2020 wind event (described in this WyEast Blog article) that swept over Mount Hood. The new, mostly decidious forest rapidly emerging on the debris flow can also be seen in the 2023 image as the bright green band in the mid-background.

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The debris flow was still raw and unstable in the summer of 2003 (below, left), but after 20 years, a dense young forest (below, right) of Red Alder, Cottonwood and scattered Douglas Fir is quickly stabilizing the debris field. The health and vigor of this young forest growing on a 20-foot layer of boulders, gravel and sand is testament to the remarkable fertility of volcanic soils. While this new deposit contains almost new organic matter or true soil, the mineral content is rich in iron, potassium, phosphorus and other mineral nutrients essential to plant growth.  

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Red Alder and Cottonwood are no surprise, here. Both are pioneer species known for their ability to colonize disturbed areas – but the presence of Douglas Fir is a surprise (two can be seen in the foreground of the 2023 image). If the young firs growing within this largely deciduous new growth can keep pace with their broadleaf neighbors, the new forest could begin to be dominated with evergreen conifers within a few decades, speeding up the succession process that typically unfolds in a recovering forest.

Looking downstream (west) from the center of the debris field in 2003 (below, left) provided a true perspective on the scale of the event, with large debris deposits mounded against heaps of stacked, toppled trees. After 20 years, the recovery (below, right) is rapidly obscuring the view, though Bald Mountain can still be seen over the young tree tops. The tallest of the young trees in the 2023 view are Cottonwood and most of the smaller tree are Red Alder. The conifer in the foreground is a young Douglas Fir – roughly 15 tears old and about eight feet tall.

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Turning back (east) toward the mountain from roughly the same spot, the view in 2003 (below, left) revealed a new channel through the debris that the Muddy Fork had almost immediately begun excavating. By 2023 (below, right) the channel has been widened over the years, though its depth has since stabilized at the old valley floor level. The second photo also shows the new forest quickly hemming the channel in from both sides.

[click here for a large version of this photo pair]

Still, the Muddy Fork is a glacial stream, and therefore volatile. It continues to expand, then refill its new channel with debris from smaller flood events that occur almost every year.

On one of my first visits to the debris field, I spotted a row of tree stumps (below) that marked the original valley floor – or perhaps an ancient valley floor? In this spot, the Muddy Fork had cut down through the loose flow material, exposing these sure markers of a former level of the valley floor. 

One surprise is how quickly the Muddy Fork settled in to its new landscape after the debris flow. As these photos show, the stream quickly cut its way to the former valley floor then mostly stopped cutting any deeper in the many years that followed, despite its famously volatile flow. These stumps – and even the two large boulders to the left – remain today much as they were 20 years ago, despite being directly adjacent to the stream and exposed to the many flood events that occur here.

[click here for a large version of this photo pair]

Looking downstream (below) from just above the spot where the stumps were revealed, you can see how little change to the new channel has occurred since it was initially carved in the year after the event. The large boulder on the lip of the channel (left side of these images) is still perched there – and the three Noble fir growing it that survived the original event are still thriving today, nearly twice as tall. 

[click here for a large version of this photo pair]

The most notable difference in the above photo pair is how debris has begun to refill the channel, as evidenced in the 2023 photo on the right. This process will continue over time until the channel has filled and the Muddy Fork is once again meandering across the main valley floor.

I don’t have good photo records of the narrow, upper canyon of the north branch Muddy Fork from prior to the 2002 debris flow. However, I have seen both photos (and even paintings) of this idyllic scene from the 1980s and 90s that show a waterfall here. Based on those earlier images, I do think that a single waterfall existed before the debris flow, roughly where the new falls is located today. Waterfall hunters have dubbed this “McNeil Falls”, referencing nearby McNeil Point – just off to the right in the photo pair, below.

[click here for a large version of this photo pair]

While the landslide and debris flow that it triggered in 2002 did seem to move McNeil Falls somewhat, the most notable change was to produce a twin waterfall – something waterfall hunters (the author included!) prize. However, as the reshaped falls has continued to evolve over the two decades since the event, the two segments have gradually begun to merge into one – or so I thought until I took a closer look for this article. 

In the following photo pair, you can see that the Muddy Fork has actually been carving away debris from the sloped bedrock, and simply moved the falls northward and down the cliff scarp. You can see the shift by matching the rocks marked “A” on the right, the dark notch to the left of the letter “B” and the protruding rock marked “C” that – surprisingly – used to divide the two tiers of the falls! Today, the south (right) tier of the semi-twin drop is really the original north tier, and a completely new tier has formed to the left of this original tier where landslide debris was cleared from the rock ledge. 

[click here for a large version of this photo pair]

Look closely at the above photo pair and you can also see some very large boulders perched to the left of the falls as they existed in 2003. These have since been eroded away, and contributed to the pile of rock debris that has accumulated at the base of the falls in the 2023 photo –shortening the falls a bit.

What will the future bring for McNeil Falls? My guess is that it will continue to shift north a bit more, likely becoming a single tier – twin waterfalls are rare! But even as it find its way to a lower brink along that cliff scarp, the stream will also gradually move loose rock away from the base of the falls as the canyon walls stabilize, so it might become taller over time. There are other examples of exactly this phenomenon on other big waterfalls around Mount Hood – most notably, Stranahan Falls, on the Eliot Branch, which has gained at least 30 feet in height from an eroding canyon floor at its base. Of course, McNeil Falls will also continue to suffer the brunt of the Muddy Fork’s volatile nature and keep changing and reinventing for centuries (and millennia) to come.

Downstream from the falls, the bed of the Muddy Fork continues to gradually collect new debris as the channel carved in the years immediately after the debris flow continues to fill. This can be seen in the photo pair (below), where large boulders now fill the floor of the new channel – and even support young alder and willow pioneers on small midstream islands.

[click here for a large version of this photo pair]

The downstream effects of the 2002 debris flow on the Muddy Fork were less dramatic, yet still reshaped the way the river flows through its valley. This view of the valley (below) from Bald Mountain is roughly two miles below the source of the debris flow. The large rock and gravel deposits along the stream are still plainly visible twenty years later, though the bright green alder and willow colonies have begun to reforest the flooded area. In this view, you can also see the bleached ghost trees along both sides of the stream that were killed by the debris flow. 

Though riparian trees like Sitka alder and willows are making inroads, the Muddy Fork continues to meander across the debris flow where the valley is less steep and the stream less channeled

These disturbed areas now serve as important habitat for raptors and cavity-nesting birds alike, along with many other species that require standing skeleton trees to survive. The dense new riparian growth (below) is equally important to many species that require streamside habitat. While major events like the 2002 debris flow might be shocking for us, it’s also a reminder that violent processes like this are built into the cycle of the ecosystem – they are required for the species who have adapted over millennia to forests that continually cycle through disruption and recovery. 

Large areas of the debris flow have recovered further downstream from the event, marked by the bright green stands of alder, willow and cottonwood along the Muddy Fork in this view from Bald Mountain

Debris flow pioneers

Whether from fire, debris flow or even human-caused events like logging, watching our forests recover and rebuild provides invaluable insight into the role individual species play in the health of forests. Where we used to value our forests mostly for the lumber that could be harvested (and therefore, mostly for big conifers) we now know that non-commercial species like alder, willow and cottonwood are as essential to forest health as the conifers.

Twenty years into the recovery, I expected to find Sitka alder (below) dominating the young forests returning to the debris flow, as these tough, adaptable trees among the first to reclaim disturbed ground wherever it might occur. They are often called “slide alder” for their ability to survive in avalanche chutes, as they freely bend and give under the heaviest of winter snow loads, often popping new leads from horizontal, snowpack-flattened limbs. But alders have a super-power that is especially important in forest recovery: they are nitrogen fixers that enrich the soil as they grow, making them uniquely suited as pioneers in disturbed areas.

Sitka alder growing on the Muddy Fork debris flow

What I didn’t expect to find in the recovering forest atop the debris flow were Black cottonwood (below). Yet, many are thriving throughout the alder thickets, outpacing the alders since they can easily grow to 50-60 feet in mountain environments compared to just 30-40 feet for alders. Cottonwood are fast growers, too, especially where they can tap into a steady supply of groundwater – something the shallow water table in the Muddy Fork valley provides in abundance. They are important wildlife trees, too, including the browse they provide as young trees and the nesting cavities that form in the trunks of older trees as they mature.

Cottonwood growing on the Muddy Fork debris flow

An even more startling pioneer in the recovering forest on the debris flow are Douglas fir (below). These trees don’t require much of an introduction — as our state tree and a species found all over Oregon. I didn’t expect to find so many here, in part because we’ve been conditioned by the timber industry to believe these native conifers must be hand-planted after logging, and then only after all other vegetation that might compete has been killed with herbicides.  

Douglas fir growing on the Muddy Fork debris flow

Douglas fir are fast growers, and with their early arrival as pioneers in the new forests along the Muddy Fork, there’s a good chance they will keep pace with both the alders and cottonwood and quickly begin to restore a conifer overstory – though “quick” is measured in decades and centuries when describing forest recovery! 

Douglas maple growing on the Muddy Fork debris flow

Another surprise in the new forest growing on the debris flow is Douglas maple (above), a close cousin to our Vine maple, and sometimes called Rocky Mountain maple. These attractive trees are sprinkled throughout the young trees returning to the Muddy Fork and they are positioned to become part of the future understory of a mature conifer stand. Where alder and cottonwood are eventually shaded out by taller conifers, Douglas maple are more tolerant of shade, and can coexist with the big trees. They are also more drought-tolerant than their Vine maple cousins, and thus well-suited to the sandy upper layers of the debris flow that can become quite dry during summer droughts.

The cycle continues… except faster, now

Just as the recent series of wildfires in WyEast country have given us the gift of insight into how a forest regenerates after a burn, the debris flow on the Muddy Fork is providing a glimpse into the resilience of Mount Hood’s forests in the face of growing disturbances from climate-driven floods, landslides and debris flows. There is no way to know if the 2002 landslide in the Muddy Fork canyon was triggered by climate change, yet scientists do know that extreme rain events and unusually saturated soils are increasingly triggering such events. And while these events have always occurred, the extreme and often erratic nature of our storms in recent years has accelerated the pace and scale of flooding and debris-flow events on the mountain. The good news from the Muddy Fork is that our forests are – so far – coping well with these changes, especially in riparian areas where the restored habitat is most critical. 

Early 1900s scene along the upper Sandy River

Historic images and geologic evidence show these events to be part of a timeless cycle of destruction and rebirth. This image (above) show the upper Sandy River valley in the early 1900s, with mix of debris and young streamside vegetation (the willows and alders toward the background) that look much like today’s conditions. Clearly, periodic floods and debris flow events had always played a role, here.

This image (below) is a wider, hand-tinted view from about 1900 that shows the Muddy Fork branch of the Sandy River hugging the left side of the valley, with obvious signs of flooding and debris flows. There’s a story in the young forests covering the balance of the flat Sandy River valley floor, too (known as Old Maid Flat) in this view: at the time the photo was taken, just over a century had elapsed since the Old Maid eruptions on Mount Hood covered this entire valley with a debris flow that extended 50 miles downstream to the Columbia River, creating today’s Sandy River Delta. This very early view also shows burn scars (colorized as white snow) around the western foot of the mountain that have long-since recovered, and are now covered with dense forests of Noble fir.

The Muddy Fork is the open channel on the left in this colorized view of the Sandy River Valley from about 1900

While these events may seem random and jarring in from the perspective of a human lifetime, when you connect the dots between events over geologic time, the continuum is that of a mountain in a perpetual state of both eroding and occasionally rebuilding itself, one catastrophic event after another.

It is this long view that helps us understand and appreciate how our forests have evolved not to a specific end-state (the view from a logging perspective), but instead, have evolved to continually adapt to their conditions in a perpetual state of renewal and rebirth. The fact that our forests are rebounding so readily in places like the Muddy Fork or the scorched slopes of the Gorge fire — even now, in the midst of climate change – is both inspiring and reassuring in a time of unprecedented change in the world around us.

Rx for the Vista Ridge Trailhead!

/ Tom Kloster / 6 Comments

Mount Hood’s scenic wonders beckon on the final approach to the Vista Ridge trailhead on Forest Road 1650

Public lands across the nation experienced a big spike in visitors during the recent pandemic, continuing a growth trend that has been in motion for decades. In WyEast Country, this has placed an unprecedented burden on some of Mount Hood’s under-developed trailheads, like the one at Vista Ridge, on the mountain’s north side. 

The scenic gems within a few miles of this trailhead are among the mountain’s most iconic: Cairn Basin, Eden Park, Elk Cove, WyEast Basin and Owl Point draw hikers here, despite the washboards along the dusty final gravel road stretch – and the completely inadequate trailhead. 

The Vista Ridge is located on Mount Hood’s rugged north side and reached from Lolo Pass Road

The pandemic isn’t the only driver in the growing popularity of Vista Ridge. The 2011 Dollar Lake Fire torched Vista Ridge, leaving a vast ghost forest behind. In the years since, the forest recovery has featured a carpet of Avalanche Lilies in early summer that draws still more visitors to this trailhead. And since 2007, volunteers have restored the Old Vista Ridge trail to Owl Point, adding yet another popular hiking destination here.

It is abundantly apparent to anyone using the existing Vista Ridge trailhead that it was never designed or developed to be one. Instead, it was the result of a plan during the logging heyday of the 1960s to extend Forest Road 1650 over the crest of Vista Ridge and connect to the growing maze of logging roads to the east, in the Clear Branch valley. 

For reasons unknown, that never happened, and by the late 1960s the road stub defaulted into an unimproved trailhead for the Vista Ridge Trail when a short trail connection from the road stub to the saddle was built, instead. This new trail connection short-circuited the northern two miles of the Vista Ridge trail, but has since been restored reopened as the Old Vista Ridge trail. This is how today’s Vista Ridge trailhead came to be on a steep hillside at the abrupt end of a defunct logging spur.

The existing Vista Ridge trailhead is simply a logging spur that was abandoned mid-construction in the 1960s, and thus lacks even a simple turnaround

While it was still lightly used as recently as the early 2000s, the popularity of the Vista Ridge trailhead has grown dramatically over the past 15 years. Today, dozens of cars are shoehorned into this dead-end spur during the busy summer hiking season.

Parking at the trailhead is a haphazard affair, at best. There is room for about 6 cars along the south edge of the stub, though it was never graded for this purpose, and thus even these “spaces” are a minefield of sneaky, axel-cracking pits and oil-pan ripping boulders. These semi-organized spaces fill immediately on summer days, so most who come here end up parking at the stubbed-out end of the spur or spill out along the narrow final approach of Road 1650. 

Overflow from the cramped existing trailhead routinely spills over to the narrow Road 1650 approach during the summer hiking season

Spillover parking on this section of Road 1650 is only unsafe for passing vehicles, it also impacts a resident Pika population living in these talus slopes

Because the existing trailhead was never designed or graded as a parking area, visitors must navigate large boulders and deep pits to find parking

The scars on this boulder are testimony to the real damage caused by the lack of an improved parking surface at the existing Vista Ridge trailhead

The constrained, chaotic parking at the Vista Ridge Trailhead and resulting overflow on busy weekends is frustrating enough for visitors, but it also creates a safety problem for emergency response. This trailhead provides the best access to the northern part of the Mount Hood Wilderness, yet there is often no way to turn a vehicle around in summer, much less park a fire truck or ambulance here.

The overflow parking on the narrow access road is not only stressful an potentially dangerous for visitors to navigate, it also creates an access problem for larger emergency vehicles attempting to reach the trailhead

This visitor was forced to back nearly 1/4 mile down the access road after reaching the full parking lot and overflow shoulder parking that left no room to turn around

The origins of the short trail connector from today’s trailhead to the historic Vista Ridge Trail has unclear origins, it appears to have been built between 1963 and 1967, and it was clearly intended to replace the northern portion of the Vista Ridge Trail – the section that has since been restored as the Old Vista Ridge Trail.  

While most of the short connector trail is a well-constructed and graded route through dense forest, the first 200 yards are a miserable, rocky mess where the “trail” is really just a rough track that was bulldozed for a planned extension of the logging spur, but never fully graded. This sad introduction to the wonders that lie ahead is a frustrating chore to hike – and an ankle-twisting nightmare to re-negotiate at the end of your hike. 

This signpost is the sole “improvement” at the Vista Ridge trailhead, leaving much room for improvement at what has become one of Mount Hood’s most popular trailheads

The first 1/3 mile of the Vista Ridge trail follows an abandoned, partially constructed section of logging spur that has significant surface and drainage problems that also leave much room for improvement as the gateway to this popular area

Add to these trailhead and trail condition woes an ongoing lack of proper signage to help people actually find Vista Ridge, and you have a discouraging start to what should be stellar wilderness experience for visitors – many from around the country and even the world. Thus, the following: a proposal to finally fix these issues at Vista Ridge and give this sub-par portal into the Mount Hood Wilderness the attention it has long deserved.

The Proposal…

The problems that plague the existing Vista Ridge Trailhead all stem from its accidental location on the steep mountainside. As a result, there is no way to safely accommodate needed parking, a turnaround or other trailhead amenities in the current location. The good news is that flat ground lies about 1/2 mile away, where Road 1650 passes an already disturbed site that was part of a recent logging operation.

This map shows the proposed new trailhead site – roughly 1/2 mile northwest of the existing trailhead – and the section of existing road (highlighted in yellow) that would be converted to trail

To make this new location work, the section of Road 1650 from the proposed new trailhead to the old (highlighted above in yellow) would be converted to trail. Normally, adding a half-mile of converted road to a hike would be a minus, but this segment of Road 1650 is stunning (see below), with spectacular views of Mount Hood. The talus slopes that provide these views are also home to colonies of Pika that provide their distinctive “meep!” as you pass through – something that can’t be appreciated from a car.

Converted roads don’t always make for great trails, but the approach to the existing Vista Ridge trailhead is exceptionally scenic and would make for a fine gateway trail to the Mount Hood Wilderness

The first step in creating the new trailhead (and even without the new trailhead) would be restored signage to help visitors find their way from Lolo Pass Road to Vista Ridge, especially at the confusing fork (below) located just short of the proposed trailhead.

Finding the Vista Ridge trailhead is a challenge. The signpost at this crucial fork just below the trailhead had lost its sign in this view from two years ago, but the entire post has since disappeared. A new trailhead would include restoring directional signage to help visitors navigate the route

Next up, the obvious spot for the new trailhead (below) is a yarding area from a logging operation that was impacted more recently with a nearby thinning project. Dirt logging spurs radiate in all directions from this cleared area, allowing for new trailhead parking to incorporate these already impacted areas to minimize environmental impacts.

The proposed new trailhead site was previously disturbed with a logging operations

Until recently, the proposed new parking area faced a wall of trees to the south, but a tree thinning project on the opposite side of Road 1650 has suddenly provided a Mount Hood view (below). The purpose of the thinning was to enhance forest health by removing smaller, crowded plantation trees to promote huckleberries in the understory – an important first food harvested by area tribes. 

Should the huckleberries thrive as planned and bring berry harvesters to the area, this could be another benefit of providing trailhead parking here. For now, the thinning just provide a sneak-peak at the mountain that lie ahead for hikers or a backdrop for people using picnic tables at the trailhead (more about that in a moment).

The proposed new trailhead is directly across Road 1650 from a recently thinned area

It looks pretty grim now, but the tree thinning project across from the proposed is intended to spur the huckleberry understory to allow for berry harvesting… eventually

The concept for the new trailhead parking is to use an old dirt logging spur that splits off the Vista Ridge Road as the entrance to the parking loop. The existing Road 1650 would be closed and converted to trail from this point forward. The logging spur is shown on the left in the photo below, along with the portion of Road 1650 where the trail conversion would begin. The existing trailhead lies about 1/2 mile from this point.

The existing road conversion to trail would begin here, with the new parking access following the logging spur on the left

Roughly 200 yards beyond the proposed trailhead, the views open up along existing Road 1650 where it crosses the first of two talus slopes (below). This is one of those “wow!” spots that comes as a surprise to hikers as they drive to the existing trailhead. The right half (downhill) in this converted section of the existing road would be retained as trail, the left (uphill) side would be decommissioned.

The final 1/2 mile of Road 1950 is scenic in all seasons, with Beargrass blooms in early summer and brilliant fall colors emerging by late summer

How does this work? The decommissioning of the uphill half of the existing road could be accomplished by upturning the surface with a backhoe – a process used to decommission miles of logging roads in recent years around Mount Hood country. The scene below is a typical example from a decommissioned road near Black Lake, located a few miles north of Mount Hood, on Waucoma Ridge. In this example, the goal was to completely retire the road, though the same method can be used to convert a road to single-track trail.

This road near Black Lake was decommissioned in the early 2000s and is gradually revegetating

Just beyond the first “wow!” talus viewpoint, the mountain comes into view once again along the existing Road 1650 as it crosses the second talus slope, just before reaching the existing trailhead. This slope here is unique in that it consists of red lava (below), a somewhat uncommon sight around Mount Hood that adds to the scenic beauty. Like the first talus section, this slope is also home to Pika colonies, adding to the trail experience. The right half of the converted road would be retained as trail here, and the left (uphill) side decommissioned.

Without overflow parking blocking the view, the final stretch of the access road passes this scenic and somewhat unusual talus slope composed of red lava rocks

Beyond the practical benefits of moving the Vista Ridge trailhead to make it safer and more functional, there are also compelling conservation arguments for the move. First, it would allow the Forest Service to retire another segment of old logging road – and though only 1/2 mile in length, in its current state it nonetheless contributes to the massive backlog of failing roads built during the logging heyday that the agency can no longer afford to maintain.

There are also noisy (meep!) wildlife benefits, as the Pika colonies living in both talus slopes are likely impacted by the noise, vibration and pollution that the steady stream of hikers bring as they drive – and increasingly park – along this scenic section of road.

Because most road-to-trail conversions around Mount Hood have been driven by wilderness boundary expansions, washouts or other abrupt events, there aren’t many examples of intentional conversions to point to. Instead, most conversions are simply abandoned roadbeds that nature is gradually reclaiming, like the section of the Elk Cove trail shown below.

The lower section of the Elk Cove Trail follows an old logging road that was simply closed, but not formally converted to trail

Beyond often being a hot, dusty trudge for hikers looking for a true trail experience, old roads that aren’t intentionally converted also lack proper trail design features for stormwater runoff and drainage, as seen on the opening section of the existing Vista Ridge trail. Abandoned roads also lead to thickets of brush and young trees as the forest moves in, making maintenance of trails that follow these routes a constant chore. It simply makes more sense to undertake true conversions from road to trail on these routes in the long run.

Recently converted road-to-trail at Salmon Butte (Oregon Hikers)

There are very good examples of intentional conversions, and among the best is the Salmon Butte Trail, where the Forest Service decommissioned a section of road in 2010 and intestinally created meandering trail through mounds of earth along the old roadbed to further conceal evidence of the road from hikers. Just a few years after the conversion (above) the signs of the old road were already fading fast, creating a more authentic trail experience. Self-sustaining drainage features were also incorporated into the design. The same approach could be applied to decommission both the final road section and the current trailhead parking area at Vista Ridge.

Finally, improvements to the opening stretch of the existing Vista Ridge trail that also follows old roadbed is in order. This short section (below) is typical of a road that wasn’t property converted to trail, and as a result suffers from serious runoff erosion during the winter and spring. The result is a cobbled mess that is hard on ankles and morale as hikers set off for their hike. 

If this looks like a dry streambed, that’s because it is! It’s also the opening 1/3 mile section of the Vista Ridge Trail where it follows an abandoned, partly constructed road bed that becomes a running stream in the winter months

There are some basic trail drainage features that could keep this section from becoming a river during the wet months. Next, some of the most miserably rocky sections could be covered with gravel – but from where? It turns out the Forest Service left a couple of large piles (below) where today’s trailhead is located when work on extending this road was abandoned more than 50 years ago. 

A Northwest Youth Corps crew did just this about a decade ago, but because the drainage problem wasn’t addressed, most of that first layer of gravel has been washed away and their efforts long since erased.There are some basic trail drainage features that could keep this section from becoming a river during the wet months. Next, some of the most miserably rocky sections could be covered with gravel – but from where? It turns out the Forest Service left a couple of large piles (below) where today’s trailhead is located when work on extending this road was abandoned more than 50 years ago. 

Let’s put this leftover pile of gravel from the logging days to work!

How a parking loop would work…

Putting it all together, this proposal (below) shows how the new trailhead parking could be accomplished as a parking loop, as opposed to a parking lot. The inset images include an aerial image of the current, dead-end trailhead parking at the same scale as the proposed loop map for direct comparison. The topographic inset map shows the proposed trailhead and parking loop, along with the proposed road conversion in relation to the existing trailhead (be sure to click on “large version” link below for a closer look!) 

[click here for a large version]

Why a loop? First, it’s the least impactful on the environment. Instead of clearing a wide area to provide room for cars to back in and out, the parking is simply provided along the right shoulder of the loop – like parallel parking in the city – but with nature left intact inside the “donut hole” of the loop.  

In this case, the loop would follow a series of old logging skid roads, further minimizing the impact on the forest. But perhaps most importantly from an environmental impact perspective, adding a couple hundred yards of new loop road here would allow a half-mile section of existing road to be retired and converted to trail, a clear net gain, overall.

Busy trailheads call for amenities like improved signage and toilets – and space for emergency vehicles to have access. These vehicles were called to the trailhead where a hiker was injured in the Clackamas River area – fortunately, the trailhead was located along a paved forest road with ready access and space to turn around

Another important benefit of a loop is to provide a much-needed turnaround at the end of a dead-end road for forest rangers and emergency responders. This might be the most compelling reason to fix the Vista Ridge trailhead sooner than later, as today’s overflowing dead-end parking area is a disaster waiting to happen should fire trucks or other emergency vehicles need to access the Vista Ridge trail on a busy weekend.  

Designing the parking loop…

From a user perspective, a parking loop is efficient and easy to navigate. The one-way design ensures that people arriving here would always reach the closest available parking spot to the trailhead first. This is the opposite of the current dead-end trailhead, where hikers arriving later in the day often park in less-than-safe spots along the access road when they see overflow shoulder parking occurring, for fear of not being able to turn around in the cramped trailhead lot – often after spaces have opened up in the main parking area.

As shown in the parking schematic (above), the relocated trailhead would accommodate up to 30 vehicles along a 1,100-foot-long loop – or about three times what the current dead-end parking area allows. The loop would be gravel-surfaced, 16-feet wide and designed to flow one-way in a counter-clock-wise direction, with shoulder parking allowed on the right side.

The new trailhead could also be a Northwest Forest Pass site with the required toilets, picnic tables and welcoming signage for visitors, something that the space constraints at the current lot would not allow. These could be located in the “donut hole” center of the loop. Making this a forest pass site would also address one of the more dire needs at Vista Ridge – a toilet! The heavy use at the trailhead and steep terrain has turned a couple of more accessible trees adjacent to the parking area into de-facto toilets, with unpleasant results. 

Industrial toilets at a busy trailhead in the Columbia Gorge – functional, but not exactly a complement to the outdoor experience!

The Forest Service has upped its game with pit toilets in recent year at some Northwest Forest Pass sites, replacing industrial porta-potties (above) that are the last thing you want to see as you set off for a wilderness experience with more aesthetic toilets, like the one at the High Prairie trailhead (below), just east of Mount Hood. This would be a great choice for a new trailhead at Vista Ridge.

Rustic toilet design at the High Prairie trailhead, gateway to the Badger Creek Wilderness

The are also more substantial examples around Mount Hood that are wheelchair accessible, like this one at the Billy Bob snow park near Lookout Mountain (below).

Accessible, rustic toilet design at the Billy Bob snow park near Lookout Mountain

Why an accessible toilet? Because there’s also an opportunity for the converted road section in this proposal to incorporate an accessible trail surface to at least one of the talus viewpoints along the way – like this well-photographed spot along the existing road (below), located just a few hundred yards from the proposed trailhead. 

This view is from the shoulder of the current access road, just a few hundred yards from the proposed new Vista Ridge trailhead. Converting the road to an accessible trail design and providing some simple amenities (e.g., a picnic table) would make this a welcome new destination for people with limited mobility or who use mobility devices

Accessible trail opportunities are in woefully short supply around Mount Hood, an unacceptable reality. There’s room at this viewpoint for an accessible picnic table, benches and perhaps interpretive signage — allowing for the extended Vista Ridge trail to serve a wider spectrum of visitors and abilities, not just able-bodied hikers heading into the wilderness.

What would it take?

There are two main parts to this proposal: (1) building the new parking loop and (2) converting the final half-mile section of Road 1650 to become a trail. The first part – the parking loop, pit toilets, picnic tables, signage and other trailhead amenities — would have to be built by the Forest Service. However, this work could likely be fast-tracked as an exemption under the environmental review process, since it involves relocating an existing parking area and would result in much less roadway than the current trailhead. That environmental analysis would also have to be completed by the Forest Service.

The second part of this proposal — the road-to-trail conversion — could be completed as a partnership between the Forest Service and volunteers, like Trailkeepers of Oregon (TKO), who already maintain the Old Vista Ridge and Vista Ridge trails. The Forest Service could complete the rough backhoe work to reduce the converted road to single track, and volunteer crews could finalize the tread and drainage on the converted trail. 

Volunteers could also install viewpoint benches and picnic tables for an accessible trail and trailhead signage at the new parking area. Some of the heavier work could be contracted to organizations like the Northwest Youth Corps, which has a long history of trail work around Mount Hood.

Northwest Youth Corp crew working on the Vista Ridge Trail

How could this concept move forward? Funding is always a concern for the Forest Service, but there’s also unprecedented funding coming online right now for the federal agencies from the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. This project could compete for these funds, many of which are competitive, especially if it includes an accessible trail. Creating a new Northwest Forest Pass site would also generate revenue (in theory) to help maintain the new trailhead. 

Volunteer crews from TKO are already working from this trailhead every summer to maintain the Vista Ridge and Old Vista Ridge trails. The over-crowding at the existing trailhead has already made their work more difficult, so contributing to the trail conversion effort would be a natural fit for TKO volunteers to be part of.

The author on the Old Vista Ridge trail

In the meantime, if you want to experience the wonders of Vista Ridge and Old Vista Ridge, the best plan is to avoid this trailhead on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays from July through mid-September. If you must go on those days, then it’s not a bad idea to simply park on the shoulder of Road 1650 where this new trailhead is proposed, and simply walk the scenic final half mile to the current trailhead. You’ll get mountain views, hear the local pikas calling out, avoid the stressful chaos of the existing trailhead – and with any luck, you’ll be getting a preview of things to come!

__________________

Tom Kloster | August 2023

Blowdown!

/ Tom Kloster / 3 Comments

Blowdown from the 2020 wind storm on Mount Hood’s McGee Ridge

The spectacle and impact of the massive forest fires that exploded in the northern Oregon Cascades in September 2020 overshadowed widespread blowdown events that might otherwise have made headlines at the time. The two were linked, with a strong east-west atmospheric pressure gradient producing gale-force winds along the Cascade Crest during the driest month of our annual summer drought. 

Like the recent forest fires in the Gorge, on Mount Hood and the Riverside Fire that swept much of the Clackamas River watershed, many of the recent blowdowns on Mount Hood are in plain sight and have since added to the public anxiety over the future of Mount Hood’s forests.

On Mount Hood’s slopes there were large areas of blowdown from this event along Cathedral Ridge, McGee Ridge and Yocum Ridge, with smaller blowdown patches scattered along other ridges around the mountain and on smaller peaks along the Cascade Crest. One of the more prominent blowdown areas on the shoulder of McGee Ridge is prominently visible from Lolo Pass (shown in the opening photo and below).

Closer view of blowdown on McGee Ridge

Detailed view of blowdown on McGee Ridge

The visual impact of whole forest stands being toppled like matchsticks is jarring enough, but in the case of the Yocum Ridge blowdown, an entire section of the Timberline Trail was also impacted. 

While these events seem new and troubling, blowdowns — like wildfires – are endemic to our forest ecosystem. As such, blowdowns have emerged in recent years as a topic of increased interest to forest scientists. This article draws from the changing understanding of extreme wind events as a normal, mostly beneficial contributor to forest health in WyEast Country, complementing natural forest fires in surprising ways.

Recent Events on Mount Hood

The recent blowdown events on Mount Hood are hard to miss for those who spend time on the many trails that encircle the mountain. Most occurred during the September 2020 event, but there were earlier events on a smaller scale that point to blowdowns as a regular, ongoing force shaping our forests.

The 2020 event brought down whole forests on Mount Hood’s northwest slopes (below), leaving a tangle of fallen trees in their wake. Most trees were snapped off or tipped, with with their root ball on end and their tops pointing in the direction of the prevailing wind force. While a few trees within the blowdown areas managed to remain standing, they were stripped bare of limbs and foliage, and few eventually survived the destructive impact of the event.

The September 2020 windstorm created large areas of blowdown on the forested ridges that radiate from Mount Hood

[click here for a large version of this graphic]

Less obvious from a distance are the thousands of trees that fell within the still-standing forests that border the blowdown areas. Outside the major blowdown areas, there were many scenes like those shown below on ridges and steep slopes around the mountain.

Though this forest on Bald Mountain was largely spared, many small trees within the canopy were still toppled in the September 2020 wind storm

The September 2020 wind event had the effect of thinning this young forest near Lolo Pass by toppling small, struggling trees within the canopy

Meanwhile, the 2020 storm also toppled hundreds of timberline trees on the south side of the mountain. Most of these were thick-trunked, ancient Mountain Hemlock, and they were simply tipped, roots and all, by the high winds. The south side blowdown was less extensive, however, with scattered trees tipped in a seemingly random fashion (below).

Ancient Mountain Hemlocks near Timberline Lodge were toppled during the 2020 wind storm

Upturned roots of toppled Mountain Hemlock above Zigzg Canyon on Mount Hood

Localized blowdown from the 2020 wind storm in a Mount Hemlock forest above Zigzag Canyon

The blowdown on Yocum Ridge was the most widespread and complete, leveling several hundred acres of Noble fir and other mountain conifers (below). The effects here were immediate for hikers, as scores of ancient Noble Fir fell across the Timberline Trail between Ramona Falls and the Muddy Fork crossing. These piles of old-growth logs took volunteer crews hundreds of hours to chip away with handsaws, as this area is within the Mount Hood Wilderness, where motorized equipment is prohibited.

This large blowdown area from the 2020 wind storm is on the north slope of Yocum Ridge

Closer view of the Yocum Ridge blowdown area showing alignment of downed trees that reveals the wind direction during the storm

Detailed view of the Yocum Ridge blowdown area showing the dense understory of young Noble Fir that have already begun replacing this downed forest

The blowdown on Yocum Ridge in 2020 covered the Timberline Trail with large, old-growth logs for nearly two miles (photo: Trailkeepers of Oregon)

Trail volunteers beginning the work of clearing blowdown below Yocum Ridge (photo: Trailkeepers of Oregon)

At the north end of the Mount Hood Wilderness, the 2020 wind event toppled hundreds of trees along the Old Vista Ridge trail, especially in the low, wind-exposed saddle that divides the West Fork and Clear Fork drainages (below). Like the south and west side blowdown areas, some trees were simply snapped off, but most were tipped, pulling their roots from the thin mountain soils that are typical along Mount Hood’s ridges and subalpine slopes. 

This pair of 150-year-old trees were tipped during the 2020 wind storm, and somehow left the Old Vista Ridge trailhead sign intact

Blowdown from the 2020 wind storm along Mount Hood’s Old Vista Ridge Trail

Blowdown from the 2020 wind storm along the Old Vista Ridge Trail

Volunteers from Trailkeepers of Oregon (TKO) eventually cleared the Old Vista Ridge trail in 2021, though some sections had to be re-routed where the entire tread was pulled up or covered by upturned root balls. Among the other poplar trails on Mount Hood affected by the 2020 blowdown were Elk Cove, Vista Ridge, Cathedral Ridge, Bald Mountain, Yocum Ridge, Hidden Lake and Paradise Park.

Natural Forest Blowdown vs. Logging Blowdown

For many years during the logging heyday that extended from the 1950s into the 1990s on our public lands, blowdown was a growing concern that highlighted the many ecological problems with clear-cutting our forests. This was especially true in high-elevation forests, where you can still find piles of fallen trees in the intact forests that border clearcut areas, such as the scenes below on the shoulder of Lookout Mountain, just east of Mount Hood. This clearcut at Horkelia Meadow dates to the 1990s, yet the resulting blowdown impact on the adjacent forest continues today.

Blowdown near Horkelia Meadow resulting from a 1990s clearcut that exposed the remaining forest to new wind loads

Blowdown near Horkelia Meadow bordering a 1990s clearcut. The fallen trees point away from the clearcut

Similar impacts of clearcutting on blowdown were on display adjacent to the 1980s Boundary Clearcut, on Mount Hood’s north side, and along the north wall of the Clear Branch valley, at above Laurance Lake (below). These blowdown impacts from logging are more the rule than the exception where logging is allowed at high elevations and along subalpine ridges.

Clearcut-driven blowdown along the Boundary cut, on Mount Hood’s Vista Ridge

Wind-damaged forests above Laurance Lake (upper left) resulting from exposure created by the adjacent, large 1950s clearcut (forested area on the right)

Blowdown damage along clearcuts differs from that produced in natural forests by extreme wind events. In these logged areas, shallow-rooted conifers along the intact forest margins are suddenly left exposed to wind loads that the once-standing, clearcut forest had protected them from, and thus are easily toppled by normal winter storms. 

The vulnerability of trees growing in these clearcut margins can continue for decades after logging occurs, as it takes years for the newly exposed trees to adapt their roots and canopy to the new wind pressures they face. These trees are especially vulnerable to more substantial wind events that they might have otherwise survived. Such was the case in the 2010 blowdown shown on Vista Ridge (above), where centuries-old trees adjacent to the Boundary clearcut were brought down by a typical strong winter storm some 30 years after the adjacent forest had been logged off.

Age + Terrain + Season = Destiny

New research on large blowdown events in established forests draws some fairly intuitive conclusions about the relationship of terrain and season to these events. Not surprisingly, places that are already predisposed to extreme wind by their geography are most vulnerable to blowdown in major wind events. Likewise, saturated soils during the wet winter months can make forest more vulnerable to high wind events. 

Despite their towering size, the big conifer species in our forests are surprisingly shallow-rooted compared to many deciduous trees that have a deep taproot. This makes our conifers especially susceptible to tipping under high wind stress. As a result, recent studies of blowdown events in the Cascades show that uprooting accounts for the vast majority (about 85%) of trees toppled in our evergreen forests, with only a small number of trees (about 15%) snapped off.  

Their shallow root system and vulnerability to tipping is also why conifer forests are susceptible to widespread blowdown events, with falling trees often knocking down or jarring other trees in their path, creating a domino effect that can quickly level entire stands.

Blowdown near Government Camp photographed in the early 1900s – along with a ghost forest produced by fire on the distant hilltop. Fire and wind are not new to our forests, and we’re learning they are an essential part of forest health

Elevation and terrain also make a big difference, especially in winter. Evergreen forests growing above the snow line often have a combination of saturated soils with heavy snow accumulation in their canopy during the early winter months, adding to their vulnerability in a high wind event.

Studies of recent blowdown events in the Cascades also show that even-aged stands are more likely to suffer widespread impacts than forests with mix-aged stands. This is particularly concerning, given that the continued practice of clearcutting and planting logged areas with single-age stands of Douglas fir has produced millions of acres of same-aged plantation forests across the Pacific Northwest. Surprisngly, blowdown research also shows that in mixed-age stands, larger trees are disproportionately impacted by high wind events, despite less widespread impact on the overall stand. This is somewhat intuitive, since these are the trees with the greatest mass and height, and thus take the brunt of the wind load. But it also points to a virtuous cycle of forest succession (discussed below).

Blowdown in the Clackamas River drainage from the 1962 Columbus Day Storm

Because major wind events tend to affect larger trees, windstorms often have an inverse effect on subsequent forest recovery from wildfire. Low-intensity fires typically burn the understory while leaving large, fire-resistant species (like Ponderosa Pine, Western Larch and Douglas Fir) intact. In contrast, wind events often bring down the largest, oldest trees, leaving the understory intact.

This effect of wind on the largest trees is an important part of forest health and succession, though one that has been recently appreciated and studied by scientists. If you’ve explored the forests around Mount Hood, you’ve probably noticed that uprooted conifers create large mounds of soil around their exposed root mass, and a shallow pit where the tree once stood. This freshly exposed soil combined with newly created access to sunlight to makes these disturbed spots a thriving seedbed for new understory plants and conifer seedlings. Over time, the fallen tree, itself, will also provide shelter and habit for wildlife, and as it decays, becoming a nursery for young trees.

While less common, snapped trees from extreme wind events also play an important role in forest health by providing habitat for cavity-nesting birds and mammals, while their decaying standing trunk becomes a food source for wildlife feeding on the insects and fungi that immediately begin digesting the wood.

Foresters rushed loggers into affected areas after the 1962 Columbus Day Storm to remove fallen trees for milling before they were “wasted” to decay in the forest

Blowdown events can affect areas ranging from a few dozen to a few hundred acres, typically in a patchy, highly variable pattern. Compared to blowdown along the uniform boundaries of a clearcut, scientists have also found that the complex shapes of large, natural blowdown areas helps speed forest regeneration from adjacent standing trees by leaving much of the affected area in close proximity to surviving trees that will reseed the impacted forest.

While snow and saturated soils can make our forests more vulnerable to high winds, elevation and exposure remain the drivers of major blowdown events. The September 2020 windstorm showed that even during our driest time of year, an unusually potent windstorm can have widespread impacts. The  combination of wind speed, elevation and exposure correlated closely with the ridge tops and adjacent slopes where the heaviest blowdown occurred on Mount Hood. This event was especially unusual for late summer, as there was a strong, easterly wind blowing along the entire crest of the Cascades, as opposed to the normally westerly flow that dominates our region. 

The two National Weather Service-based maps (below) for the September 2020 wind event are otherwise identical, except the second map excludes vegetation for ease of reading. The arrows point in the predominant direction of the wind during the event, and combine to show the rivers of fast-moving air that were flowing over the Cascades and toward the Willamette Valley. The arrow colors indicate wind speeds: green shows protected valleys where wind speeds were less, while orange shows steady winds of over 30 mph and red shows where steady winds exceeded 40 mph – though there were much higher wind gusts during the event, as well.

Wind map from the September 2020 wind storm showing the directional flow from east (right) to west (left)

[click here for a large version of this graphic]

This is the same map shown without vegetation to reveal the complex flow patterns as the wall of wind pressed across the Cascades from the east, roaring across high ridges around Mount Hood

[click here for a large version of this graphic]

The patterns revealed by the directional arrows show the air mass speeding up as pours over the Cascade Crest, from east to west, then rushes down the western valleys of the Cascades toward the Willamette Valley. Mount Hood forms a noticeable “wind shadow”, especially along the Sandy River valley, due west of the mountain, where sustained wind speeds dropped to 10 mph. The wind shadow of the mountain wasn’t enough to protect the forests along the upper slopes high ridges that radiate from the mountain, however, and this is where the main blowdown occurred.

While these wind maps were created with a combination of monitored weather data and window flow models, the downed trees on Mount Hood north, west and south sides follow the pattern exactly. This satellite image (below) shows the blowdown areas along Yocum Ridge, where sustained winds of 40+ mph were sweeping down the west slopes of Mount Hood. 

Google Earth images of Yocum Ridge from 2021 showing the extent of the blowdown

The closeup satellite image of the same area on Yocum Ridge (below) shows how consistent the sustained winds in this event were with the directional patterns that were modelled, with their toppled trunks pointing in the same direction as the arrows on the wind maps. The light-colored dots are tipped root balls from toppled trees.

This Google Earth view of the Yocum Ridge blowdown area shows the hundreds of upturned root balls dotting the September 2020 blowdown area

As distressing as it is to walk through a badly damaged forest after one of these events, we also know that extreme wind is a constant over time in our forests. Like fire, we have a history of treating these events as an anomaly, something out of the ordinary. Yet, research shows just the opposite – that extreme wind events and the blowdown that results are as much a part of our forest ecology as rain, snow and fire. Like the other natural forces, our forests have evolved with extreme wind as a relative constant, and the forest ecosystem is renewed by these events just as it renews and rebounds after a fire.

Rethinking Blowdown

Scientists categorize recurring wind events as “chronic” and “acute”. Chronic wind events include the typical storms that are part of every Pacific Northwest winter. These are the routine winds that annually shape the canopy of forests on lower slopes and sculpt our alpine “krummholz” trees at timberline. Except where forests are disturbed by clearcuts (as described above), these events typically don’t create significant blowdown, though they do invigorate tree growth by trimming limbs and selectively downing disease or drought-weakened trees.

“Acute” events are what our Cascade forests experienced in September 2020. These events may seem exceptional and catastrophic because of their impact, but they are as predictable as chronic wind – just on a longer scale. These are the events that produce significant blowdown, which, in turn, creates a cascade of beneficial effects for our forests. 

The rainforests on Mount Hood’s western slopes quickly hide blowdown with a thick layer of moss and ferns. There are at least a dozen fallen trees of varying size in these old-growth scene along Three Lynx Creek

While there are the immediate forest benefits of new forest openings, upturned soil and wildlife habitat created where downed trees fall, one of the most important benefits comes from the blowdown that makes its way to our streams. This can be from trees simply falling into streams (as shown above), or sliding down steep mountain slopes to reach nearby streams.

This satellite image of the Muddy Fork of the Sandy River (below) shows the immediate introduction of fallen logs just downstream from the September 2020 blowdown on Yocum Ridge. While only a fraction of the trees toppled by the storm made it into the Muddy Fork, they have already had an immediate and visible benefit by adding what biologist call “woody debris” to the stream. These logs will improve stream health by slowing the flow of runoff, creating pools for fish habitat and providing new wildlife habitat in and along the stream.

Google Earth image showing large log jams along the upper Sandy River just one year after the 2020 wind storm

Since the 1990s, scientists have become increasingly aware of the importance of woody debris to stream health. This awareness resulted from the lack of wood in our streams, following a century of fire suppression and heavy logging that deprived our streams of forest debris, leading to stream channel erosion and few pools for fish to spawn and their hatch to grow.

Logjam along Multnomah Creek resulting from upstream blowdown in the Eagle Creek Fire burn zone

This giant log was blown down across a stream in the Clackamas River drainage during the 1962 Columbus Day Storm. Old-growth logs can last for decades in a stream. This log likely survives today, more than sixty years later

Today fish biologists have begun restoring streams affected by logging and fire suppression by artificially placing logs and root balls in streams to restore the complex mix of wood and gravel that was once typical in all of our Cascade streams and rivers. The man-made pile of logs in the example shown below is on Still Creek, which flows from Mount Hood’s south side. The hope is that these log piles will not only slow the stream and create spawning habitat for endangered salmon and steelhead, but also provide organic nutrients for aquatic insects and flora that fish fry need to survive.

Man-made log jam along Still Creek placed here to enhance fish habitat

The value of these logs to the stream habitat also underscores why “salvaging” fallen trees from blowdown events or wildfire burn areas for lumber – especially where they border streams – has long-term impacts on forest and stream health that we’re only beginning to understand.

Learning to “see” the benefits of blowdown

Where we do find healthy amounts of woody debris in our Cascade streams, it’s usually the result of a fire or wind event sometime in the distant past. Downed logs can last for decades (or even a century) lying in a stream or on the forest floor, so they help tell the story of how a forest has evolved. Just as we have begun to learn the benefits of fire in our forests in recent years, the 2020 windstorm gives us an opportunity to appreciate this force of nature with new insight, as well – as an awesome, destructive force that is equally one of rebirth and forest succession. 

The following scenes from around Mount Hood country are places where the effects of blowdown in our forests are hiding in plain sight. Learning to “see” these events from the traces they leave behind, and learning to appreciate how they continue to shape our forests is the best way to rethink how we view blowdown events.

Log jams (including the man-made versions shown above) are easy enough to spot. But in time, logs gradually fade into the forest floor and sink into streambeds, often covered with moss and understory plants as they continue their decay. A healthy stream is full of these, with new downfall continuing to provide a steady supply of new debris. The following scenes (below) are examples of streams with a healthy supply of woody debris, both new and old.

Decades-old blowdown along the Little Zigzag River still providing habitat by forming pools and collecting woody debris in the stream, with newer blowdown visible just upstream

The small falls in this scene in the Clackamas River drainage is formed by an ancient Western Red Cedar that has likely been lying in this stream for as long as a century. This old log also catches smaller debris, further enhancing the stream habit

Tipped trees are a common sight in our forests, and they help tell the story of how wind is shaping the ecosystem. This old-growth tree (below) was among the largest in a mix-aged stand of mostly younger trees, and it demonstrates what scientists have observed: big trees are often the primary victims of wind events in healthy, mix-age forests. 

This old tree’s demise is already giving rebirth to the forest. It’s upturned root ball and the cavity it created in the forest floor have already begun to be colonized by ferns and other understory plants after just one year, thriving in the bright spot of sunlight created by the fallen giant. The tree, itself, will continue to provide habitat for decades to come as it decays on the forest floor.

The root ball on this tipped Douglas Fir is beginning to decompose, leaving nutrient-rich soil newly exposed for new understory plants to take root

Small forest openings are one of the most important contributions of blowdown events. These scenes (below) are from a small blowdown area on Mount Hood that resulted from the 2020 wind storm. While seeing big trees toppled and broken is unsettling, the response of the understory after just two growing seasons to the sunlight provided by the new forest opening is equally inspiring. New life flourishes in these openings, where deer have abundant, new browse and other wildlife species thrive in the lush, rejuvenated understory. Soon, young conifers will take hold here, beginning the forest cycle, once again.

Small blowdown areas like this one along McGee Ridge area  boon to forest health, allowing the understory to flourish in the new sunlight and young conifers to become established

Beneficial forest opening created by the 2020 blowdown event along McGee Ridge

It’s easy to forget that most small forest openings like the one shown above don’t just happen, they are usually created by wind events and blowdown. That’s because the evidence of the blowdown is so fleeting. Soon, the fallen trees in this blowdown area will disappear into the understory. Their limbs will fall away as they begin to decay, and their trunks will be pushed to the ground by gravity and winter snowpack, eventually becoming invisible to hikers passing by. Yet the effects of this blowdown event has created a forest opening that will endure for decades to come.

Fallen trees can last for a century or more in our forests, especially large trees. Eventually, however, they decay into a long, deep pile of mulch that becomes a nursery for understory plants and conifer seedlings. This is common on the western, rainforest side of the Cascades, where these are known as “nurse logs”. The first example (first two images, below) jumps out because a hiking trail happens to run parallel to the nurse log. The second example (third image) shows a nurse log still spanning a stream, even as it hosts a new forest of young conifers.

In Oregon’s west-side rainforests, downed trees eventually become “nurse logs”, with young trees growing along their length as the log decays and blends into the soil. This log happens to form the border of a hiking trail

This is the same log in the previous photo as viewed in the opposite direction to show the trees growing atop this decaying “nurse log”

Nurse logs often span streams, as in this case on Tag Creek in the Clackamas River area (lower part of this image). Eventually, this log with buckle and fall into the creek, though some of the Western Hemlock seedlings growing on it will likely survive to continue growing along this stream

It’s easy enough to spot fallen logs in our forests and to appreciate the role of wind in creating forest openings or stream habitat. But one of the less obvious benefits of blowdown might be the most important – the role that wind plays in creating multi-aged, biologically diverse forests. When you find yourself in a multi-aged stand of trees ranging from ancient old growth to seedlings, you’re seeing centuries worth of alternating wind and fire events at work, gradually culling both the forest understory and overstory over time. The result in the Pacific Northwest are forests with a sheer biomass and ecological diversity that is unrivaled in North America.

The following scenes show mixed-age, mature forests shaped by wind and fire. In each case, the conifer overstory ranges from old-growth giants to mid-sized and younger trees. Bleached snags, downed trees and young conifers emerging from the understory mark a new opening created by blowdown.

Healthy conifer forests have multi-aged stands of ancient, mature and young trees with standing snags, like this forest on the slopes of Bald Mountain, near Lolo Pass

Healthy, multi-aged conifer forest on the slopes of Bald Mountain

The previous images (and the one below) were captured along the Top Spur trail, on Mount Hood’s west side. While most hikers pushing up this popular trail have their attention focused on popular destinations like McNeil Point, the forest along this short trail is among the best examples of a multi-aged, subalpine stand on the mountain. It was very nearly logged, too – the name “Top Spur” refers to the logging spur that now forms a crowded summer trailhead instead of the log landing that once operated here. Today, it is protected as wilderness.

Multi-aged Noble Fir forest in winter on Bald Mountain

Noble fir giants dominate the forest along the Top Spur trail, but you will also find Western Redcedar along the tiny stream that runs through the area. Where fallen logs have been sawed out to keep the trail open, count the rings – you’ll find that even the trees that are 12” in diameter are more than a century old in this challenging, subalpine environment. The largest trees have been growing here for several centuries, and are living witness to the succession of storms and fires that have shaped this thriving forest. And while hikers may curse the tangle of roots exposed on this well-traveled trail, they tell a story of a mountain slope that is quite literally held together by the lush conifer forest that is thriving here.

Want to see this forest? It’s a short hike from Top Spur to the site of an old forest lookout on Bald Mountain that begins in this beautiful old growth forest, then climbs through a very young forest where “Bald Mountain” is a bit less bald (ironically, thanks to fire suppression aided by the former lookout). 

Moonrise over Mount Hood from the top of Bald Mountain

The view of Mount Hood from the top is stunning and worth the short, often steep hike. Oh, and you’ll probably have to step over some blowdown, too… but hopefully with new appreciation! You can find a hike description here:

Top Spur Trail to Bald Mountain Hike

..and yes, you might recognize the author of that particular field guide entry…

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(Author’s note: as always, thanks for reading this far, and apologies are in order for my absence in recent weeks! I’ve got plenty of articles in progress, just lacking time needed to get them posted. I hope to get back up to speed shortly!)

Tom Kloster | July 2023

White River Falls 3.0

/ Tom Kloster / 4 Comments

White River Falls during spring runoff

Every year, a growing number of summer visitors flock to White River Falls State Park to witness the spectacle pictured above, only to find a naked basalt cliff where the falls should be! The spring runoff has long since subsided by mid-summer, and field irrigation in Tygh Valley also draws heavily from the tributary streams that feed the river during the dry season. Worse, part of what’s left when this federally protected Wild and Scenic River finally reaches the park is diverted by a century-old waterworks into a side channel that bypasses the main falls. It’s a sad sight compared to the powerful show in winter and spring, but it doesn’t have to be this way.

Many of these same visitors hike down to see the historic, century-old powerhouse at the base of the falls that once used the diverted river water to spin some of Oregon’s earliest hydroelectric turbines. Though mostly in ruins, the site is fascinating – yet the trail to it is a slick, sketchy goat path coming apart at the seams that hikers struggle with. This short hike doesn’t have to be this way.

The hidden lower tier and punchbowl is called Celestial Falls

Lower White River Canyon

Some hikers push beyond the historic powerhouse to the lesser-known lower falls, and then still further, to a dramatic view into the lower White River canyon. Here, the river finally has carved a rugged path to its confluence with the mighty Deschutes, just a few miles downstream. It’s a striking and beautiful riverside hike, but the “trail” consists of a maze of user paths that are gradually destroying the drifts of wildflowers along the canyon floor. This trail doesn’t have to be this way, either.

Lesser-known Lower White River Falls

In recent years, White River Falls State Park has also become a popular stop for cyclists touring the route from Maupin to Tygh Valley, then looping back through the Deschutes River canyon. While the park has an excellent restroom and day-use picnic area that would make for a terrific stopover, overnight camping is not allowed, even for cyclists camping in tents. This, too, does not have to be this way.

The increased popularity has begun to noticeably wear on the park. The good news is that in the past couple years Oregon Parks and Recreation (OPRD) rangers and the park’s  dedicated volunteer park hosts have stepped up their efforts to care for the park infrastructure and get a handle on vandalism (mostly tagging) that had plagued the historic powerhouse. Still, much more is needed to unlock the amazing potential this park holds as a premier destination. It’s time to reimagine White River Falls. 

Historic White River Powerhouse just downstream from the falls

[click here for a larger view]

Turbines inside the powerhouse a few years ago, before vandalism began to take a heavy toll. Oregon State Parks has since closed off entry with heavy barriers

[click here for a larger view]

As it stands, the park lacks a comprehensive vision for how its natural and historic wonders can best be protected, while still keeping pace with ever-growing numbers of visitors. It’s a surprisingly big and mostly undiscovered place, and an updated blueprint could achieve both outcomes: protecting and restoring the natural and historic landscape for future generations, while also making it accessible for all to explore and enjoy. While the park includes a surprising amount of backcountry now, White River Falls also holds the potential to become a much larger park that restores and showcases the unique desert landscape and ecosystem found here.

This article includes several proposals for new trails and campsites to better manage the growing demand and provide a better experience for visitors, expanding the park to better protect the existing resources, and even a re-plumbing of the waterworks to allow White River Falls to flow in summer as it once did before it was diverted more than a century ago. 

An Unexpected Past

Grist mill at White River Falls in the late 1800s. This rare view reveals a northern cascading segment of the falls to have been part of the natural scene, and not created by the power plant diversion channel that was constructed in the early 1900s.

White River Falls was never envisioned as a park by the white migrants who settled in Tygh Valley and Wasco County in the mid-1800s. In their day, waterfalls were viewed mostly as obstacles to river navigation or power sources to run mills. The falls surely had a more spiritual and harmonious value to native peoples who had lived, fished and gathered along its banks for millennia before white settlers arrived. The Oregon Trail passed through Tygh Valley, and soon the new migrants had cleared the valley and began to build irrigation ditches to bring water to the cleared farmland. By the late 1800s, a grist mill was built at White River Falls, powered by the falling water.

By the early 1900s, the grist mill was replaced with a much more ambitious project, and the abandoned hydroelectric plant we see today was constructed at the base of the falls in 1910. A concrete diversion channel was built where the grist mill stood, and a low diversion dam brought a steady flow from the White River into a series of pipes and penstocks that powered the turbines below. Power from the new plant was carried north to The Dalles, one of the earliest long-distance hydroelectric transmission projects in the country.

Aerial view of the White River Powerhouse and network of penstocks taken in the early 1900s. The group of structures at the top of the photo were located where today’s picnic area and restrooms are now. This photo also shows the concrete dam holding the settling pond, in the upper right. This structure still exists today. The diversion dam is partly visible at the left edge of the photo, with its diversion pipe leading first to the settling pond, then to the lower penstock pipe leading down to the powerhouse at the bottom of this photo.

The White River is a glacial stream that flows from a glacier by the same name on Mount Hood’s south slope, just above Timberline Lodge. Because of its glacial origin, the hydro plant included a large settling pond to separate the fine, grey glacial till that gives the White River its name. The settling pond still survives today (albeit dry), along with the diversion dam and much of the pipe and penstock system. These features are all visible in the aerial photo (above) and described in the interpretive schematic (below) provided by Oregon State Parks.

[click here for a larger view]

After fifty years of operation, the powerhouse had become obsolete and fallen into disrepair, and by the early 1960s it was abandoned. Giant new dams on the Columbia and Deschutes rivers had long since eclipsed it, and the constant chore of separating glacial sediments from the river water made it costly to operate. 

How white is the White River? This recent aerial view shows the White River flowing from the upper left corner toward its confluence with the Deschutes River, the wide, dark stream flowing from the lower left. When the crystal clear waters of the Deschutes mix with the silty glacial water of the White River during peak glacier melt in late summer, the result is a pale blue-green Deschutes River downstream from the confluence (flowing toward the middle right)

The site was an unlikely candidate for a new park, given the dilapidated buildings and pipelines scattered across the area. But thankfully, the raw power and beauty of White River Falls made the case for a second act as a public park and nature preserve borne from an industrial site. For many years, the reimagined White River Falls was simply the quiet “Tygh Valley Wayside”, and was way off the radar of most Oregonians. It only drew a few visitors and only the gravel parking area and main falls overlook were improved to a park standard.

Panoramic view of Lower White River Falls during spring high water. The basalt bench to the left marks where flood events on the river have repeatedly overtopped this ledge, scouring the bedrock

The park had one (hopefully) final scare in its natural recovery just over a decade ago, when Wasco County pitched a new hydroelectric plant at the site, promising “minimal impact” on the natural setting. Thankfully, Oregon State Parks expressed major concerns and the proposal died a quiet death. You can read an earlier blog article on this ill-conceived proposal here.

Over the past two decades, growth in the Wasco County and increased interest from Oregon’s west side population in the unique desert country east of Mount Hood has finally put White River Falls on the recreation map. Today, the parking area overflows with visitors on spring and summer weekends, and the park has become a deservedly well-known destination. The rugged beauty of the area, combined with the fascinating ruins from another era make it one of Oregon’s most unique spots. These are the elements that define the park, and must also be at the center of a future vision for this special place.

A new vision for the next century: White River Falls 3.0

  1. New & Sustainable Trails

Weekend visitors skittering down the steep, slick path to the old powerhouse

The trail into the canyon as it exists today is deceptive, to say the least. It beings as a wide, paved path that crosses an equally wide plank bridge below the old sediment pond dam. Once across, however, it quickly devolves. Visitors are presented with a couple of reasonable-looking dead-ends that go nowhere (I will revisit one of those stubs in a moment), while a much more perilous option is the “official” trail, plunging down a slippery-in-all-seasons (loose scrabble in summer, mud in winter) goat path. Still, the attraction of the river below — and especially the fascinating powerhouse ruins – beckon, so most soldier on.

Soon, this sketchy trail reaches a somehow steeper set of deteriorating steps, built long ago with railroad ties and concrete pads. And still, the river continues to beckon, so most folks continue the dubious descent. The “official” trail then ends abruptly at the old powerhouse, where a popular beach along the river is a favorite wading spot in summer. This is the turnaround spot for most visitors. The return up the steps and scrabble of the goat path is challenging in any season, but it’s particularly daunting in summer, when desert heat reflecting off this south-facing wall of the canyon is blazing hot.

Hikers navigating the steep, deteriorating stairway section of the “official” goat path into White River canyon

Looking back at the loose cobbles and scrabble that make up the upper section of the “official” trail into the canyon. Two hikers at the top of the trail consider their fate before continuing the descent

The stairway section has deteriorated enough that hikers are simply bypassing it, which is damaging the slope and causing the stairs to come apart still faster

The railroad tie steps were filled with poured concrete pads at some point, making this a very difficult repair job. In the long term, this section of the “official” trail simply needs to be bypassed with a properly graded route and the old goat path turned back to sagebrush

Beyond the “official” trail, a user path skirts a fenced river gauge, then slips through a patch of waist-deep sagebrush before dropping down to a beautiful streamside flat. Here, Ponderosa pine survive in the deep sand along the riverbank and rugged basalt cliffs soar above the trail. This path soon passes Lower White River Falls before ending at an impressive viewpoint looking downstream, where the White River tumbles another two miles through a deep canyon to its confluence with the Deschutes River.

The “unofficial” trail below the powerhouse was little known just ten years ago, but today it is quickly devolving into a tangle of user paths as an increasing number of visitors push further into the canyon. The flat canyon floor is quickly becoming a maze of these social paths, greatly impacting the desert wildflowers that grow here.

In contrast to the “official” trail, the lower “unofficial” trail rambles at a pleasant grade along various user paths through a beautiful canyon floor framed by towering basalt cliffs

After flying under the radar, the lower canyon has been “discovered”, with a maze of new social paths forming in the past few years that are gradually expanding and destroying the wildflowers that grow here

So, how to fix this? The first step is to improve both the “official” and “unofficial” trail sections to something resembling proper trails. The official route is a tall order, and in the long term, it really needs to be retired and replaced with a correctly graded trail that can be safely navigated and doesn’t trigger heart attacks for visitors making their way back out of the canyon. In the near term, however, simply repairing the damaged stairs and adding a few more in a couple of especially steep sections would buy some time until a better trail can be built.

The unofficial, lower trail is a much easier fix. It simply needs a single route with improved tread and modest stone steps in a couple spots, while also retiring the many braided user paths that have formed. The new interest in the lower trail underscores a more significant need, however, and that’s the main focus of this trail proposal: this hike is simply too short to be satisfying for many visitors.

The solution? Build a return loop from the current terminus of the lower, unofficial trail that traverses the canyon rim back to the trailhead. This simple concept is shown in the map, below.

[click here for a larger view]

The proposed return trail (shown in red) would be approximately one-half mile long, making the new loop about one mile in length – short enough for families and casual hikers, yet long enough to make for a more immersive experience. The loop would also allow hikers to avoid climbing back up the goat path section of the existing trail, buying some time until that segment can be rebuilt. The upper end of the proposed loop would actually follow the well-defined game path that many hikers assume to be the main trail where it now connects at the top of the “official” goat path.

Another surprise feature of the loop? The new route would not only provide spectacular views into the canyon and its waterfalls from above, but Mount Hood also appears on the horizon, rising directly above White River Falls. While most hikers would likely continue to first follow the existing trail to the old powerplant, then complete the new loop from there, the rim trail could also work in reverse for hikers looking for big views without the challenging up-and-back climb and steep steps on the existing trail. The upper end of the new rim trail would traverse at a nearly level grade to a spectacular viewpoint (shown on the map, above) that would be a fine turnaround destination just one-quarter mile from the trailhead.

One important detail of this trail concept that should be completed in the near-term is a formalized spur trail to the Celestial Falls overlook. This is an irresistible, yet extremely dangerous overlook just off the main goat path section of the “official trail”, with abrupt, vertical drop-offs and another maze of sketchy social trails. 

The stunning overlook at Celestial Falls is a scary mix of ever-expanding social trails and abrupt vertical cliffs that needs near-term attention to be stabilized and made safer for hikers

[click here for a larger view]

Much of the new return trail would follow game paths (like this one at the upper end of the proposed trail) that already traverse above the rim of the canyon.

The new rim trail would bring hikers to this spectacular birds-eye view of White River Falls and Mount Hood on the horizon (Oregon State Parks)

The crux to completing the new loop is a short section of new trail that would climb from the current terminus of the “unofficial” trail to the rim of the canyon, where the new route would then traverse at a nearly even grade back to the trailhead. The crux section follows a sloped ridge through a gap in the canyon rimrock, as is shown in the close-up map (below). 

[click here for a larger view]

The end of the user path in the lower canyon marks the start of the proposed new trail, where a set of switchbacks would ascend the slope to the left to the canyon rim and return to the trailhead

The crux section would require some switchbacks and thoughtful trail planning, but it is no steeper than the terrain covered by the “official” trail at the start of the hike. What would it take to make this trail vision happen? More on that toward the end of this article.

2. Accessible Trails

Did you know that rural Oregon has a higher percentage of elderly and mobility limited folks in its population than the state’s major urban areas? Yet, even in our most urban areas, Oregon is woefully short on accessible trails, and the gap is even greater away from major population centers. At White River Falls, there are building blocks for a new accessible trail system that could be phased in over time to become among the finest in the state.

The existing parking area is gravel and would need at least a couple paved spots to be considered accessible

This paved path starts (inexplicably) about 50 feet from the edge of the gravel parking area and leads to the fenced, main viewpoint (in the distance)

Currently, the parking area and initial approach to the main falls overlook is a combination of gravel and mowed lawn that falls short of an accessible. Just a short distance from the gravel parking area, a paved path leads to the fenced overlook of the falls, where interpretive signs tell some of the unique history of the area. It wouldn’t take much to make this viewpoint fully accessible.

The wide plank bridge that crosses below the old settling pond dam (left) and marks the east end of the paved trail system at White River Falls. The “official” goat path down to the old powerplant begins at the far end of the plank bridge

From the main viewpoint, paved routes head off on two directions. The wide, gently sloping main route heads east, across the plank bridge and then ending abruptly where the goat path section of the main trail begins. Like the main viewpoint, this section could be curated to make the terminus at the bridge more interesting as a stopping point, including history of the concrete settlement pond dam that rises directly above the bridge and some of the penstock pipe remains that still survive here. This is also the point where signage marking the hiker trails ahead is sorely needed – including some cautions about the state of the goat path trail.

The west end of paved trail system ends here, at a profile view of the falls

Another paved trail spur heads west from the main viewpoint, along a fenced cliff to a fine profile view of the falls. The pavement ends here, and a user path continues along the fence to a view of the diversion canal that once fed river water into the old hydro plant. This section of the paved trail system is somewhat narrow and uneven, but it could also be improved with some relatively minor work, including improving the surface and creating a more intentional viewpoint of the falls.

From the end of the paving, the fencing continues west to a view of the diversion channel (center)

New interpretive signage could also be added here to tell the story of this part of the park, since this is where the original grist mill also stood. The views here include Tygh Valley, and new signage could also describe the natural history of the White River and the native peoples who lived here before white migrants settled in the area. 

Profile view of White River Falls from near the end of the paved section of the west spur. This is a fine viewpoint that could be improved to be a more accessible destination with interpretive stories about the surrounding area

Oregon State Parks has provided picnic tables at the main viewpoint in the past, but to make the existing paved routes more accommodating as accessible trails, several benches along the way would be an important addition. This is perhaps the most overlooked feature on accessible trails, yet they are especially important in a hot desert environment. The National Park Service sets the standard on this front in their parks across the American Southwest, where resting spots are prominent on all trails, especially where a spot of shade is available.

Thinking more boldly, a new accessible trail spur could be added along the nearly level grade below the main viewpoint that once carried water in huge steel pipes. Most of the pipes are gone, but a few remain to tell the story of the old power plant. This grade leads to a front-row view of the main falls that is close enough to catch spray during the spring runoff. It’s also an area where park visitors chronically (but understandably) ignore the many “AREA CLOSED” signs to take in this spectacular view. 

Fences and warning signs are no match for these Millennials, but they are right about the view: this lower viewpoint ought to be a spot that more people can enjoy

In this case, the scofflaws are right: this viewpoint ought to be open to the public, and an accessible trail spur would expand that to include all of the public. This proposed accessible spur is shown as the dotted blue line in the trail concept map (above).

Looking east along the existing paved spur to the settling pond dam and plank bridge; the proposed accessible spur trail to the lower falls viewpoint would follow a well-established bench that once held penstock pipe (now covered in blackberries in the lower right)

Another view of the proposed accessible trail spur from the plank bridge, looking west, and showing the blackberry-covered bench that the trail would follow. White River Falls is just beyond the rock outcrop in the upper right

There’s are chunks of penstock pipe along this route, and maybe these could become part of the interpretive history? This entire spur trail concept is possible only because the grade was blasted from basalt for the penstock pipes, which is a great way to connect the industrial history of the site to the park that exists today. From the lower viewpoint, those folks who we rarely provide great accessible trail experiences for would be rewarded with an exhilarating, mist-in-your-face view of White River Falls.

3. Walk-in Campsites

The word is out to cyclists that White River Falls is a perfect lunch spot on touring loops from Maupin and Tygh Valley. The restrooms were recently upgraded, the water fountain restored to include a water supply for filling bottles and there are plenty of shady picnic tables under the grove of Black Locust  and Cottonwood trees that surround the parking and picnic areas.

A growing number of these cyclists are “bikepackers” camping along a multi-day tour, often starting from as far away as Portland, and there’s new interest in bike-in campsites for these folks. Unlike a traditional car-camping format, these campgrounds require only a network of trails and simple tent sites with a picnic table. 

The modern restrooms at White River Falls State Park have been recently renovated to be accessible and are in top condition

This newly restored water fountain has a handy spigot on the back for filling water bottles (and dog dishes, as seen here)

The park has a nice spot for exactly this kind of campground just to the west of the parking lot and picnic areas. Today, it’s just a very large, mowed lawn that slopes gently toward the White River, with a nice view of Mount Hood. Creating a bike-in campground here wouldn’t take much – no underground utilities or paving would be required, just some paths and graded camp spots. The park already has on-site hosts living here from spring through fall to keep an eye on things, and that coincides with the bicycle touring season.

The wide west lawn adjacent to the main picnic area (marked by the group of trees) at White River Falls State Park

Looking toward the west lawn (and riparian Cottonwood groves, beyond) from the picnic area

Perhaps most important would be to add some trees to shade this area. Right now, the west lawn is blazing hot in summer, so more of the tough, drought-tolerant Black Locusts that grow in the picnic area could provide needed shade without requiring irrigation. Even better, our native Western Juniper would provide some shade, as well as year-round screening and windbreaks.

4. Bringing Back the Falls

From roughly mid-July until the fall rains kick in, a visit to White River Falls can be a bit deflating. Instead of a thundering cascade, the main face of the falls is often reduced to a bare basalt cliff. 

White River Falls in full glory during spring runoff

White River Falls by late summer, when most of the flow diverted away from the falls by the old waterworks system

Why is this? In part, seasonal changes in the river from spring runoff to the summer droughts that are typical of Oregon. But the somewhat hidden culprit is the low diversion dam that once directed the White River to the penstocks that fed to the old powerhouse. The hydroelectric plant is now in ruins, but during the dry months the diversion dam still pushes most of the river  into a concrete diversion channel, which then spills down the right side of the falls.

The entire flow of the White River was channeled through the diversion channel on this summer day in August 2021. At this time of year, the glacial silt that gives the river its name is most prominent

The entirety of the diversion system is now a relic, and the old dam should be breached. There are more than aesthetics involved, too. White River Falls creates a whole ecosystem in the shady canyon below, with wildflowers and wildlife drawn to this rare spot in the middle of the desert by the cool, falling water. 

The earlier image of the original grist mill shows that a side tier of the falls always existed, even before the L-shaped diversion dam was built. However, as this aerial schematic (below) shows, the natural flow of the river is straight over the falls, not over the side tier.

The diversion system at White River Falls is simple. The low, L-shaped dam at the top of this aerial view directs water to the concrete diversion channel at the right. From here, river water once flowed into the metal penstock pipes and on to the hydroelectric works, below. Today, the diversion channel simply flows over a low cataract and back into the main splash pool of White River Falls. In this view, the river was high enough for water to still flow over the diversion dam and then over the falls, but by mid-summer, the dam diverts the entire river into the side channel, drying up the falls.

I have argued for restoring waterfalls to their natural grandeur before in this blog, and in this case the same rule applies: nature will eventually remove the diversion dam, but why not be proactive and do it now? Why deprive today’s visitors the experience of seeing the falls as it once was?

5. Thinking big… and bigger?

In an earlier article I imagined a much larger desert park centered on White River Falls. Just 100 miles and about two hours from Portland, it would become the most accessible true Oregon desert experience for those living on the rainy side of the mountains. 

That possibility still exists, thanks to several puzzle parts in the form land owned by the Oregon State Parks and Oregon Fish and Wildlife (both shown in purple on the map, below) and federal Bureau of Land Management (shown in orange) along the lower White River and its confluence with the Deschutes River.

[click here for a much larger view of this map]

There’s a lot of private land (shown in yellow on the map) in this concept of an expanded park, as well, most of it held by about a half-dozen land owners. Such is the nature of desert land holdings, where typical ranches cover hundreds (if not thousands) of acres. Why did I include these areas? Because area surrounding White River Falls includes one of the least-known and most fascinating landscapes in WyEast Country, and it that warrants long-term protection and restoration. 

Most notable is the ancient river channel to the south of the White River Falls that I’ve called “Devils Gulch” for lack of a proper (and deserved!) name, as it is adjacent to a pair of basalt buttes called Devils Halfacre. This dry channel was formed by a massive landslide along the south wall of Tygh Valley that is nearly five miles long and more than a mile wide, and has likely been moving for millennia. The landslide may have begun as a single, catastrophic event, then continued for move slowly over the centuries, eventually diverting the White River north to its current route over White River Falls. I’ll be posting a future, in-depth article on this amazing geologic feature in addition to the following photos and caption highlights (and if any geoscience graduate students are reading this, we could use research in the form of a thesis on this area!)

This is the fascinating view across a massive, jumbled landslide and into the former canyon of the White River before it was diverted by the landslide. Today, the river flows beyond the two flat-topped buttes known as Devils Halfacre, in the upper left corner of this photo, diverted from the dry “Devils Gulch” valley at the center of this photo

This is a closer look at the two buttes known as Devils Halfacre. They once formed the north side of the ancient White River canyon, but the debris in the lower third of the photo diverted the river north sometime in the distant past. Today’s White River flows where the ribbon of Cottonwoods marks the valley floor, beyond the two buttes. White River Falls is behind the larger butte in the center. Snowy Tygh Ridge is in the distance

Below the landslide, the floor of the ancient White River canyon is fully intact. Beyond these dry meanders where a river once flowed is today’s White River canyon, marked by the canyon wall in the upper right of this view

This view of the east end of the landslide shows distinct rows of basalt debris formed by the landslide known as transverse ridges. These ridges form perpendicular to the direction of flow, in this case from the cliffs in the upper right that formed the source of the landslide toward what was the ancient path of the White River, in the lower left

Basalt rimrock is a common sight in Oregon’s sagebrush country, but in this case, the cliffs are a scarp resulted from a massive landslide event, not gradual erosion

This view from just below the landslide scarp looks north, toward Tygh Ridge, and across more than a mile of landslide debris now covered in sagebrush and desert grasses. The landslide covers roughly the bottom two-thirds of this photo

Looking west along the landslide scarp, Mount Hood and the Cascades rise on the western horizon

Another mostly forgotten feature in this larger park concept is a 1.5-mile section of old Highway 197 that was bypassed in the 1950s when the modern route was constructed. Because the desert does a fine job in preserving things, this piece of old road looks as if it were closed yesterday, not a half-century ago. While much of the historic road was destroyed by the modern highway, this section provides a view-packed tour of the Tygh Valley landslide from this graceful old road, including views into Devils Gulch. 

The original highway from The Dalles to Maupin curved with the landscape, as compared to its 1950s-era replacement that used cut-and-fill design to make modern highways straighter and faster. This long-bypassed section of the old road is where the historic highway remnant makes a dramatic descent into the Tygh Valley. Surprisingly, even the painted centerlines still survive after more than 60 years of being abandoned!

Mount Hood rises above the highway for much of this lost highway, as well. If you simply enjoy following old routes like this, it’s a resource in its own right, but it could also be an excellent jumping-off point for hike or bike trails in an expanded park. Like accessible trails, mountain bike trails are lacking in Oregon, especially on the dry east side of the Cascades. For cyclists touring Highway 197, it could be an excellent, traffic-free alterative to a steep section along the modern highway alignment. 

Cracks in the old paving are quickly discovered by moss and grasses. After making a sharp turn in its descent into Tygh Valley, the surviving section of old road points toward Mount Hood for much of its remaining length

Hundreds of mysterious desert mounds dot the slopes of Tygh Ridge, including large swarm along the north rim of the White River Canyon, downstream from the falls

Finally, there are flat-topped bluffs above the White River gorge (one that I’ve called the Tuskan Table, others north of the river) that have never been plowed, and still hold desert mounds – another topic I’ve written about before. Left ungrazed, desert mounds function like raised wildflower beds, providing both wildlife habitat and a refuge for native desert plants that have been displaced by grazing.

This is private land, so I haven’t ventured to these spots along the White River rim, but there’s a very good chance they are home to a threatened wildflower species that grows here and nowhere else in the world – the Tygh Valley Milkvetch. Scientists have documented the greatest threat to this beautiful species to be grazing, and therefore the importance of setting some protected habitat aside for these rare plants as part of the larger park concept.

Tuskan Table is a stunning, flat-topped peninsula of basalt that separates the Tygh Valley from the Deschutes River. In this view the table forms the west wall of the Deschutes Canyon. The White River joins the Deschutes just beyond Tuskan Table, in the upper right of this view

As the name suggests, the beautiful and extremely rare Tygh Valley Milkvetch grows only here, and thrives in several of the areas proposed as part of the larger White River Falls park concept (photo: Adam Schneider)

It turns out there is quite a bit of movement toward expanding park and wildlife lands in the lower Deschutes area. A few miles to the north, the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife has acquired several thousand acres in recent years along the north slopes of Tygh Ridge, where a series of side canyons and ravines drop into the Deschutes River. 

The federal Bureau of Land Management has also been expanding its holdings to the south, along the Deschutes River, and upstream from Tygh Valley, where the White River flows through a deep basalt canyon. In both cases, these acquisitions have been through willing seller programs, often made possible through the federal Land and Water fund for public land purchases.

Making White River 3.0 happen..?

After some lean years in the 80s and early 90s, Oregon’s state park system has seen relatively stable funding thanks to a dedicated stream from the Oregon lottery approved (and later re-upped) by voters. This has allowed the state to open the first new parks in decades – Stub Stewart in the Portland Area and Cottonwood Canyon on the John Day River. Other parks have benefitted, too, with major upgrades at iconic spots like Silver Falls State Park. So, a refurbishing at White River is certainly within reach, if not a current priority.

Rugged canyon country in White River Falls State Park

The first step is a new park master plan. This is the document that guides park managers and volunteers toward a common vision and it is created through a planning effort that includes the public, area tribes and others interested in the future of the park. 

What would a new master plan look like? It might include ideas from this article, along with other ideas for accommodating the growing interest in the area and the need to actively manage the visitor impacts that are becoming visible. It would likely include plans to do nothing at all in places that should remain undisturbed, for ecological or cultural reasons. 

Mostly, a new park plan for White River Falls should go big – not simply be a property management plan, but one that seeks to assemble a complete snapshot of the unique desert ecosystem that surrounds White River Falls through an expansion of the park. Cottonwood Canyon State Park is a fine model, as it was once a private cattle ranch, and is now being restored to its original desert habitat.

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“Make no little plans. They have no magic to stir men’s blood and probably will not themselves be realized. Make big plans, aim high in hope and work, remembering that a noble, logical diagram once recorded will never die, but long after we are gone will be a living thing, asserting itself with ever growing insistency” (Daniel Burnham)

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Once a park master plan is in place, new trails are the easiest and most affordable first step, especially in desert country. Much of what I’ve described here could be built by volunteer organizations, like Trailkeepers of Oregon (TKO). A new tent campground might be as simple as grading and adding water lines, also a manageable cost. 

The White River has carved a deep gorge into hundreds of feet of Columbia River Basalt below the falls

Acquiring land for a greatly expanded park? There are plenty of tools and funding sources for this, but the first step is a vision described in a park master plan. The partners in making it happen would be public land agencies who already have holdings in the area, including Oregon State Parks, Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife and the BLM. Tools for making it happen could range from outright purchase from willing sellers to conservation easements and wildlife easements. 

While researching the area, I discovered that a private, California-based hunting club has already leased hundreds of acres of private land within the expanded park concept for use by its members. Other land trusts may be interested in this unique area, as well, and could lead the way to an expanded park, as they have in other new parks in WyEast Country.

Winter sunset at White River Falls

And how about removing the diversion dam? This would be a more complex project that would probably require an environmental review, among other questions that would have to be answered. The actual removal is less an issue, as the dam is only a few feet tall and could easily be breached. Even without a plan for removal, the diversion dam is doomed. It hasn’t been maintained for decades and will eventually succumb to the wrath of the river. If we don’t remove the dam, the White River surely will!

I’ve written about the future of White River Falls in this article, but you don’t have to wait. You can enjoy it now! Here are some tips for visiting White River Falls: 

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• for maximum waterfall effect and the best wildflowers, stop by in late April and throughout May, but consider a weekday – the secret is out!

• bring hiking poles for the trip into the canyon – you won’t regret it.

• factor summer heat into your trip – the hike out of the canyon can be grueling on a hot August day.

• watch for poison ivy on the boot path below the main falls – the leaves are similar to poison oak, but it grows as a low groundcover, often around boulders that might otherwise look like a great sitting spot!

• make a driving loop through the town of Maupin and a section of the Deschutes Canyon from Maupin to Sherars Falls part of your trip.

• stop at the Historic Balch Hotel in Dufur and a walk down Dufur’s main street to Kruger’s Grocery on your return trip. It’s always important to support local communities when traveling through WyEast Country.

• finally, for Portlanders, stop at Big Jim’s drive-in at the east end of the Dalles for cool milkshake (and crinkle fries?) on the long drive home

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Enjoy – and who knows? I might even see you out on the trail!

Tom Kloster | February 2023

20 years of change on Cooper Spur… and the future?

/ Tom Kloster / 10 Comments

Workers cutting beams from solid pine trunks for the new Cloud Cap Inn during the summer of 1888. The (then) surging Eliot glacier loomed just beyond Cloud Cap in those early days (Author’s note: this is a modified historical image that I have colorized to bring the sense of the distant past a bit closer to our present-day world)

[click here for a large version]

When the builders of Cloud Cap Inn began construction in earnest in early summer 1889, the backdrop for Mount Hood’s first mountain lodge was radically different than today. The Northern Hemisphere was experiencing the final decades of a brief, still unexplained cooling period known as the Little Ice Age that stretched from the 1500s through the 1800s. 

The cooling was modest, but enough to surge the Eliot Glacier down to the tree line, nearly filling the deep trough between the high lateral moraines that were created in the last true ice age, thousands of years prior. The debris-covered terminus (or snout) of the Eliot Glacier was in plain view from Cloud Cap, directly behind the workers on the left side of the photo, above. It was formidable wall of glacial ice and rock rising nearly 300 feet above the valley floor.

Early photo views of the Eliot Glacier’s terminus shows the river of ice already receding between the 1890s and 1920s

[click here for a large version]

The Little Ice Age faded in the 20th Century, and as the photo pair above shows, the Eliot Glacier was already receding from its recent surge by the 1920s. Today, the Eliot Glacier has retreated about a half mile from its terminus in 1889, and lost as much as half its depth to our warming climate. 

The following photo pair shows the dramatic change from 1920 to 2020. The change in the glacier’s thickness can be seen by (A) the exposed cliffs below Cooper Spur were carved into a vertical wall by the glacier at its peak. The glacier’s terminus (B) has receded dramatically over the past century, revealing the high moraines we now see rising above the Eliot Branch. A more subtle change (C) are the alpine forests gradually moving up the mountain as summer snowpacks diminish.

Another, more detailed 1920 view of the Eliot Glacier’s terminus compared to the same view in 2020 shows the radical change over the past century

[click here for a large version]

For much of the past century, these changes were gradual enough that only a few scientists and mountain climbers noticed the ongoing change. But since the turn of the millennium the pace of change has accelerated to an alarming rate as our climate warms.

This article documents this most recent period of change, over the two decades that span from 2002 to 2022, including how the landscape on the mountain, itself, as changed. The article focuses on the area around Cloud Cap and the Eliot Glacier, as viewed from the Cooper Spur trail, as this corner of the mountain has seen some of the most volatile change.

Why 2002 as a starting point? That answer has to do with technology, not climate change. That was the year that I began shooting with a digital camera. For someone who learned photography with a film camera (including plenty of spent time in the darkroom in the 1980s) the age of digital has been a revelation. Film and print paper was expensive, and while I have a lengthy archive of images going back to 1980, the digital era has allowed me to bring back hundreds of photos from a single trip to the mountain, where I might have captured a dozen during the film era that was rapidly winding down by the early 2000s. 

Then and now – my 2002 pocket camera and 2022 digital SLR, along with the 2002 photos I hoped to re-create.

The result is enough archived images beginning in 2022 to create a fairly thorough then-and-now comparison of the Eliot Glacier and surrounding environment along the Cooper Spur trail. The 2002 images came from a Canon A50 PowerShot pocket camera, still one of the best digital cameras I’ve owned over the years. Not long after this trip in 2002, I added my first digital SLR to my camera collection, and I have long since retired my film cameras for good. The 2020 images were captured with an Olympus EM-10 digital SLR, my fifth digital SLR, and easily my favorite (thus far).

To re-create the images from that 2002 trip, I carried a folded-up, modern-day version of a film-era proof sheet from that earlier visit in my pocket on a hike up Cooper Spur last September. Along the way, I did my best to match the scenes as I had viewed them 20 years prior. Once home, I was able to assemble 19 pairs that were close though to allow for nearly identical side-by-side comparisons. I’ve also noted a few points of interest for each image, keyed to both the 2002 and 2022 versions, to help highlight the changes that have unfolded. Because the embedded images in this article are inherently small, I’ve also posted a link below each image to a large version that will open in a new tab.

And now, how about a tour of these places in 2002 and 2022?

Change is constant… and surprising!

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From Cloud Cap, the Timberline Trail route to Cooper Spur makes a dramatic entrance to the upper section of Tilly Jane Canyon and the first big view of Mount Hood. The changes in the first photo pair (above) are subtle, though telling. As is the case throughout the Cascades, groves of (A) Mountain hemlock continue their march to higher elevations, one more indicator of our changing climate. Lighter snowpacks (which translates to longer growing seasons) might also be the explanation for more expansive groundcover (B) of Juniper and Penstemon in the foreground. In distance (C), a pioneering Whitepark pine has survived to grow from a few feet tall to nearly 20 feet.

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Moving further up the mountain, the Timberline Trail reaches a junction with the Tilly Jane and Cooper Spur trails (above), just above the tree line. Here, the most notable change is the battering the old trail sign has taken in 20 years of winter storms and avalanches.  The two signboards were still around as recently as four years ago, but they were finally swept away in the last couple years. The bottom of the 8×8” post remains, though it had snapped off mid-way several years ago — a reminder of the power of moving winter snow in this avalanche-prone area! 

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Just uphill from the trail junction, the next photo pair (above) shows a venerable Mountain hemlock  that has caught the eye of many hikers over the years. Notably, the Whitebark pine just behind the hemlock (A) has grown considerably, a hopeful sign for a keystone species that has been hard hit by climate change and disease in recent decades. The hemlock (B) shows some wear, however. The upper limb that reached out toward Mount Rainier and Mount Adams has lost the battle with the winter elements, and some of the lower limbs seem to be fading, too. But in the timeless cycle of nature, a completely new Mountain hemlock (C) has grown from beneath its elder, no doubt helped along by nutrients from the decaying limbs of the older tree and the protection from the elements the old hemlock still provides.

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Further up the trail, the old stone warming hut at Cooper Spur appears (above). These shelters were built by the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) in the early 1930s, when the Timberline Trail was first completed. Thankfully, almost nothing has changed here, thanks to the work of volunteers who keep this old structure cabled to the ground and intact after nearly a century.

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Above the old warming hut, the Cooper Spur Trail heads into tundra country (above) as it nears the 7,000 foot elevation on the mountain. From this perspective, the retreat of the Eliot Glacier starts to become apparent, especially to those familiar with the area. The rounded ice crest known to climbers as the Snow Dome (A) is notably smaller and the depth of the glacier has receded enough in the lower reaches (B) to drop beyond the top of the east moraine from this perspective. In the foreground (C) alpine wildflowers continue their march to higher elevations where only a few grasses once grew because of once-lingering snowpacks.

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This photo pair (above) is from the first big view of the Eliot Glacier from the Cooper Spur Trail. The change over the past 20 years is unmistakable here. On the upper shoulder of the mountain (A), the snowfields that once led climbers to the summit well into summer are much smaller, making this approach in summer a very sketchy affair today, with much falling rock. 

This pair of images also shows how the lower Eliot Glacier icefall has changed dramatically in just two decades of glacial retreat. The blue chaos of seracs and crevasses (B) that were once a prime ice climbing destination are now well below the “firn line”, the point at which a glacier is losing more ice than it is gaining. This line is generally where a glacier changes from blue and white clean ice to a gray mix of ice and rock, as the glacier gradually shrinks and melts in its descent. Further down (C), the decreasing depth of the glacier is especially notable where blue and white ice have disappeared.

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The next pair of images (above) is from an overlook just below the crest of Cooper Spur, at about the 8,000 foot elevation. Here, the Eliot Glacier is still impressive and awe inspiring as a mass of tumbling ice and wrinkled crevasses. The notable change in these views is the thinning of the ice (A and C) along the glacier’s margins, with piles of rubble appearing between lobes of flowing ice. The main icefall (B) also has some underlying rock showing as yet another sign of the thinning of the ice sheet

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This pair (above) is simply a closer look at the main icefall from the same vantage point, showing (A) where the thinning ice mass has revealed more of the north wall of the mountain, and (b) where rock outcrops are now pushing through the icefall from below. Icefalls form because of these outcrops, so the appearance of the underlying rock is measure of the glacier depth decreasing. Twenty years ago, enough ice flowed over this outcrop to completely overwhelm it, whereas today we’re beginning to see traces of the rock beneath the glacier.

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This is another view of the Eliot Glacier from just below the crest of Cooper Spur, looking across the upper part of the glacier. Here the shrinking snowfields on the climbing route above Cooper Spur (A) are more apparent, as are the exposed cliffs (B) below the north face of the mountain, where the thinning ice has revealed a vertical well. On the shoulder of the mountain, a once-crevassed section of moving glacier has slowed to become a snowfield along the margin of the glacier.

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This photo pair (above) is looking across the Eliot Glacier from the crest of Cooper Spur, at about 8,500 feet elevation. It’s subtle, but the permanent snowfields (A) along the upper end of the Langille Crags are smaller today, and the lower icefall (B) is dramatically diminished, as shown in previous views. In the near distance (C) the silver ghost forest of the 2011 Dollar Lake Fire shows up today along the Mount Hood’s northern foot. In the far distance (D) the massive (and completely unsustainable) logging spree being carried out by timber giant Weyerhauser since taking over the timber holdings in the West Fork Hood River area a few years ago is painfully apparent.

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This pair (above) is a closer view of the previous set, focusing on the lower Eliot Glacier icefall. This comparison shows the thinning of the ice sheet (A and B) against the cliffs of the Langille Crags, and (C) the dramatic change on the near side of the glacier, where the firn line has moved several hundred feet up the mountain over two decades.

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Moving away from the Eliot Glacier, this photo pair (above) shows the broad east slope of Cooper Spur from the crest, looking toward the canyon of the East Fork Hood River. The changes here are subtle, but still notable. Historic Cloud Cap Inn (A) still stands, despite being threatened by both the 2008 Gnarl Ridge Fire and 2011 Dollar Lake Fire. The ghost forests of the Gnarl Ridge Fire (B) are recovering rapidly today, filled with understory and rapidly growing Western Larch seedlings that are now 6-8 feet tall. In the distance, the human scars (C) caused by Forest Service clear cutting on the slopes of Surveyors Ridge in the 1980s and 90s are gradually fading away, too, as the forests there slowly recover.

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Happily, not much change at Hiroshima Rock (above) in 20 years – or even 122 years! This unlikely etching by a 1910 Japanese Climbing expedition has somehow survived more than a century of fierce ice and sand blasting, perhaps because the carving is on the leeward side of the rock? It remains a favorite touchstone for hikers passing through. Here’s an earlier blog article on this unique message from the past.

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This photo pair (above) is looking back toward the crest of Cooper Spur from a bit further up the mountain, with a feature known as Tie-in Rock in the foreground. As in previous photos, the burn scars (A) of recent forest fires can be seen in the distance. The seemingly inescapable modern phenomenon of rock stacking (B) is present on Tie-in Rock, too. Size is hard to gauge here, but the rock is about 15 feet tall and takes some effort scale — much less with rocks in hand! The Newton Clark Glacier’s retreat (C) is somewhat noticeable on the far right, though the changes are much more apparent in the image pairs that follow.

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This image pair (above) provides full-on view of the Newton Clark Glacier from Cooper Spur. This sprawling glacier faces southeast, and because it catches summer sun from sunrise until late afternoon, it is has been more visibly impacted by climate change than the northeast-facing Eliot Glacier. What was once an icefall (A) 20 years ago is now bare rock, with the glacier flowing around it. Along the margins of Cooper Spur (B and C) the shrinking expanse of the glacier is prominent.

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This is a similar view (above) looking south across the Newton Clark Glacier. Like the Eliot Glacier, the lower, blue and white ice crevasses (A) on the glacier have fallen below the firn line, replaced by a grey mix of moving rock and ice. On the far shoulder of the mountain the former icefall at the center of the glacier (B) has receded around the rock outcrop that once produced it. In the foreground (C), the thinning of the overall ice sheet is dramatic over just two decades. Mount Jefferson is visible on the far horizon.

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This photo pair (above) is from far below Cooper Spur, at an overlook above the Eliot Branch called Inspiration Point. I’ve included it in this series because the retreat of the glacier has had dramatic impacts downstream, too. As the glacier continues its retreat, the Eliot Branch is cutting a v-shaped channel into the soft, flat valley floor that was once beneath the glacier, releasing vast amounts of rocky debris into the stream below. Compounding that effect are periodic flood events that have repeatedly scoured the canyon. As this pair shows, the changes are extensive. 

For reference, a grove of three trees (A) in the lower center of the above photo pair have dodged the mayhem, though a group just below this trio has been swept away by the Eliot Branch. Meanwhile, an entire stand of trees (B) on the west wall of the canyon has slipped away in a massive landslide, revealing raw, banded volcanic bedrock, below. Another stand of trees on the east side of the canyon (C) burned in the 2011 Dollar Lake Fire, as did the remaining trees (D) in the upper west side of the canyon. This continues to be a very active, dynamic area, with constant changes to the river channel and canyon walls.

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The final photo pair is a longer comparison of just over 120 years, as seen from Cloud Cap Inn. Mirroring the changes shown throughout this article, the Eliot is a much smaller glacier today than it was when my own grandparents were born around 1900. The mass of ice and rock (A) that once made up the terminus would be enough to fill up much of downtown Portland. The lesser-known Langille Glacier (B) has almost certainly stopped moving, and has become a series of icefields. The Coe Glacier (C) is also in retreat, despite its shady location on the north side of the mountain.

Changes like those we are seeing on Mount Hood are tough to absorb, and thus I was determined to end this article on a hopeful note. Why? Because I’m a hopeful and optimistic person to the core, but also because there is much we can do to slow the climate change that is affecting so much of our world.

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We’re not powerless against these changes, though we do have a limited time on this planet to do our part. And thus, the final image pair (above). Why, it’s me! In 2002 I was a 40-year-old with blond hair and a red beard. Fast forward to 2022 and… well, at age 60 there’s not much hair left and the beard has turned decidedly gray. Time is not on my side, to be sure, but there is plenty more I can do in my life!

The benefit of 20 more years of living is the knowledge that I can still hoof it to the top of Cooper Spur (if a lot more slowly — and feeling it more the next day, too!) and still see things I’ve never noticed before. In 2002 I was still just thinking about how I could help keep the century-old idea of a national park around Mount Hood and the Gorge alive. Two years later, I started the Mount Hood National Park Campaign website to put the idea into words and pictures (and yes, it does need an update!). Six years later, I started writing this blog to continue celebrating the future Mount Hood National Park. That’s something I can continue to do even when getting to the top of Cooper Spur is finally out of my reach!

At age 60 I know I can’t single-handedly stop the changes happening on Mount Hood and in the Gorge, whether it be from climate change to just the sheer growth in the number of people coming here. But age DOES bring the super-power of perspective that can only come from time and lived experience — and in my case, I’ve also got the photos to prove it! I’m able to put a face on those changes to help inspire caring and action toward a new vision for the future, one that focuses on sustainability and adaptation in the face of change. That’s the point of this article and the WyEast Blog, of course.

And what about the future..?

Throughout that day on Cooper Spur in September, I watched a group of young glacier explorers far below me, working their way through rock debris and over crevasses as they approached the main icefall on the Eliot Glacier. I took a few photos of the group along the way, and was thus delighted to run into them on their return to the trailhead that afternoon. I turns out they were students from Pacific University’s Outdoor Leadership Program, led by instructor Philip Friesen. 

If the then-and-now photos of changes on Mount Hood are tough to look, this is where the real hopefulness in this article comes in. Phil’s program at Pacific is pointing a new generation of future leaders toward a life and careers in the outdoors that I believe will be transformational for many of the environmental challenges we’re facing today. 

When I asked, here’s how Phil describes his program:

“I think the main thing to share with the world is that the students in our program focus on addressing systemic oppression and environmental issues while learning how to courageously lead others into the mountains, on rivers, and on the rock–we combine the joy of being outdoors in nature with the challenge of meeting some of our society’s biggest challenges.”

And there are many other educators like Phil out there helping young people of today turn their passion for the outdoors and their hunger to enact positive change into lifelong careers that will have a real impact in making a better world. As an old guy with only a few years left to do my part, I find this so inspiring and reassuring!

Phil Friesen (left) and his group of Pacific University students from the Outdoor Leadership Program are all smiles last September, even after a grueling climb up the Eliot Glacier!

Students in Phil’s program spend extensive time in the outdoors, learning how to hike, climb and kayak, so that they may be able to bring the outdoor experience to others over their lifetimes. This is the very best path toward conservation and sustainability, especially for our public lands. Only when we spend time there can we begin to feel the personal sense of ownership necessary to care for and protect these spaces in perpetuity.

I have great faith in what we have named “Generation Z”, and so does Phil. Young people majoring in Outdoor Leadership at Pacific are readying themselves for a life doing what they love, whether it be as a guide, ranger, naturalist or many other emerging careers in the growing outdoor industry. They’re also learning about the history of exclusion on our public lands, and the urgent need to remove barriers so that all Americans can enrich their lives in the same way that the most privileged among us already do. That hits home for them, too, as they are by far the most diverse generation in our history. 

Phil plans to share these images with his students, most of whom were born around 2002, when I took that first set of photos. They will likely find them jarring, as they only know the Eliot Glacier of today, and may not realize how quickly it is fading away. But they have an abundance  of passion for the environment, and I do think these photos will lend still more urgency to them in their commitment to make our world a better place.

The author getting his head straight in the shadow of mighty WyEast before heading home for  another week in civilization (Photo by Andy Prahl)

The real power of the Outdoor Leadership Program – and this is true for anyone who spends time in the outdoors – is the cascade of reflections that immersion in nature fosters. No matter your walk of life, time on a trail, among the trees or through mountain meadows, ensures the perspective, peace of mind and hopefulness needed to make the rest of our busy lives more successful. I refer to as my mental health time, when I get my head straight before another week of Zoom meetings and e-mails. Phil’s students are learning this early on, and I’m certain it will be as restorative and rejuvenating in their lives as it is in mine.

Phil’s group was all grins after a grueling day climbing up a glacier. Such is life when you’re 20 years old! They don’t know it yet, but they are part of what could be the most consequential generation in our history. They have no choice but to grapple with enormous challenges that my own generation has so short on. But because I do get to spend a fair amount of time around today’s Generation Z, I’m more certain than ever that they are special. They are uniquely up for the challenge. Phil’s students are way too young to know this quote that has guided since childhood, but they are nonetheless embracing it like no generation has before them:

________________

“Unless someone like you cares an awful lot,

it’s not going to get better. It’s not.”

-The Lorax

________________

And a final note to Phil Friesen and his Outdoor Leadership Program students: Thank you for the great things you are about to do!

________________

Author’s postscript: My best to all who have followed this blog over these many years! I greatly appreciate the support and especially your passion and concern for the future of our WyEast Country. I have a bunch of new articles planned for the coming year and look forward to sharing them with you!

In the meantime, I hope to see you on the trail!

Tom Kloster • January 1, 2023

2023 Campaign Calendar!

/ Tom Kloster / 2 Comments

It is that time of year, so I will indulge in my annual plug for the Mount Hood National Park Campaign Calendar, of which all proceeds go to benefit Trailkeepers of Oregon (TKO). This article covers this year’s calendar scenes with some of their backstory, but if you’re itching to get a calendar before reading any further, here’s the link to my Zazzle store:

2023 Mount Hood National Park Calendar

Zazzle does a truly amazing job with these. They are beautifully printed on quality paper and orders typically arrive within about 10 days or so. I’ll post another link at the bottom of this article if you’d like to learn more about the images, first.

Another Year in WyEast Country…

Starting with the cover image (above), I picked an scene captured this fall, near Lolo Pass, on Mount Hood’s northwest side. This is my favorite profile of Mount Hood – a nearly perfect pyramid seemingly cut from solid stone that belies its origin as a stratovolcano. While most big Cascade volcanoes are lumpy and dome-shaped, glaciers have sculpted Mount Hood to have the many distinctive faces that often bely its volcanic origin. The sheer, towering Sandy Headwall in this view is among its most impressive.

For January (above), I chose an image of a stunted group of Oregon white oak over on the east side of Mount Hood. Here, the forests transitions in the dry rain shadow of the Cascades from Ponderosa pine and Douglas fir at higher elevations, to short, tortured oaks that seldom exceed 10 or 15 feet in height – a tenth of what they might achieve under less harsh conditions. Eventually the oaks give way to the sagebrush hills of Oregon’s desert country.

Freezing fog crystals on Oregon white oak leaves

On this particular visit, freezing fog had hovered over the area for several days, leaving everything flocked in elaborate ice crystals. It’s one of my favorite weather phenomena, and it is surprisingly common in select spots on the east side of the mountain, where freezing fog often banks up against the Cascades in winter. 

Freezing fog crystals on an Oregon white oak

The February image (below) in the new calendar features the last light of a winter day on Mount Hood’s crater, as viewed on a snowshoe trick into the White River Canyon. From this perspective, you can visualize the extent of the mountain’s last major eruption in the 1790s. The smooth south slopes on the left that extend all the way from the crater area to Government Camp were formed by debris flows that streamed down the mountain as new lava poured out in the crater. Though it seems timeless, today’s Crater Rock — an 800-foot monolith guarding the left side of the crater — was formed during this event, and is just 230 years old!

This snowshoe trip was memorable for the changing conditions. It was a brief ray of winter sun between storms. It had been a cloudy day, with the mountain mostly hiding in the overcast. The next weather system was already moving in, but as evening approached, the clouds suddenly lifted from them mountain for about an hour. The image below was taken about 20 minutes before the calendar view, as the clouds were still lifting away from the summit. After the brief light show, sun dropped down and the mountain disappeared into clouds, once again.

Winter clouds lifting from the mountain in late afternoon

For March, I choose a sylvan scene at Columbia Hills Nature Preserve, on the north side of the Columbia River in the desert country east of Mount Hood. Here, the wildflowers were just beginning to bloom while the grove of Oregon white oak was still dormant after a cold, windy winter. The wispy spring clouds completed the scene! The Columbia Hills are a gem, and their transformation from cattle ranch to wildland over the past few decades is one of the great recent conservation stories in WyEast county.

While I was setting up this photo, a pair of Western fence lizards were courting on a stack of rocks, nearby. They had found a warm, protected spot on a brisk day and didn’t seem too concerned about me. Just two friends soaking up the sun, or was it a romantic interlude? Hard to say, but they clearly were enjoying the re-emergence of spring, too.

Just friends..?

…or maybe more..?

The April calendar image (below) is a bit of an abstract made possible by weird geology and the brilliant colors of spring in the desert landscape. These are the Ortley Pinnacles, a sharply tilted layer of flood basalts that has been so uplifted that the once liquid layers of rock now stand almost on end. The bright yellow patches are Bigleaf maple flowering on the steep talus and groves (still leafless in this view) of Oregon white oak can be seen in the upper left.

The scale of this image is a bit hard to appreciate, too, so this wider image (below) shows the river, a freight train and the 2,000-foot north wall of the Columbia River Gorge for reference. Though  beautiful at any time of the year, the rainbow of colors in the east Gorge are especially striking in mid-spring.

Freight train passing under the Ortley Pinnacles in the east Columbia River Gorge

Staying on the east side of Mount Hood, the May calendar image features another Columbia Hills Nature Preserve scene. This view, looking toward Mount Hood (and Mount Jefferson for the sharp-eyed), is across vast fields of yellow Arrowleaf balsamroot and blue Lupine that famously carpet the area in spring.

This is an increasingly popular place for hikers and photographers during the spring bloom, with people coming from all over the world to capture the spectacle of these meadows. 

While setting up another photo, I watched an unexpected drama suddenly unfold through my lens (below). A white SUV suddenly appeared, with the driver apparently unaccustomed to driving on backroads. Rounding the corner too fast, they skidded off the soft shoulder and were quickly stuck in the ditch. Another driver soon stopped, and everyone seemed to be okay. Later, I passed a tow truck from The Dalles finally arriving to pull them out. A memorable day for these visitors, but at least they had a lovely  backdrop while waiting for the tow!

If you’re doing to ditch your car, you might has well choose a scenic spot!

For June, an image of White River Falls in all its spring runoff glory is the featured image. This is a favorite spot I’ve been visiting since the early 1980s. Over those years, it has continued to recover from its industrial past to re-emerge as one of the most striking features in the desert country east of Mount Hood. Until 1960, a small hydroelectric plant built at the turn of the 20th Century operated here, and much of the old infrastructure still remains in place as sort of an industrial ruins.

As the park gathered popularity in the late 2000s, the interior of the old power house took a real beating, with lot of tagging and senseless vandalism. Like so many parks, the steep increase in visitation is also taking a toll on the trails at White River falls, with old staircases just wearing out from the heavy use and new user paths sprouting in all directions. 

In recent years, Oregon Parks and Recreation Department (OPRD) has stepped up their efforts at White River Falls, including securely enclosing the power house interior against further damage and increasing their efforts to managing tagging at the park. On-site park hosts now care for the park for from spring through fall, as well. Fact is, any park with a swimming hole is bound to deal with these issues, so it’ good to see OPRD beginning to get ahead of the problem.

These steps made of railroad ties and concrete slabs have seen better days at White River Falls

I continued the White River Falls theme in July, with a view of the lesser-known Lower White River Falls. This lovely spot is a short walk down the canyon from the historic powerhouse and is framed by desert wildflowers in early summer.

The trail to the lower falls – like most in the park – are social trails. Unfortunately, they are have become increasingly tangled and impactful as ever more new trails form with the growth in visitation. In desert environments, managing trail routes is especially important, as new user trails can leave tracks that last decades. 

The good news at White River Falls is that there is a lot of park and thus much potential to spread visitors out a bit with a modest expansion of the trail system. And, the trails in the impacted areas just need some care and management to become sustainable again. Much of the work could be done by volunteers, too. Given the relative remoteness of the park, one option could be “volunteer vacation” events where trail volunteers spend a week working at a site. This would take advantage of the new restrooms and other accommodations already at the park.

Keeping hikers on the few trails that exist at White River Falls is a challenge. These hikers walked right past a closure sign.

In the coming year I’ll be sharing some concepts for expanding trail opportunities at White River Falls with an eye toward accommodating the continued growth in popularity and preserving its beauty and history. Both can be accomplished with some thoughtful planning, much of the work by volunteers.

Moving to August, I made the unusual choice of an image with people in it! That wasn’t really the plan, but these hikers walked through my setup and so I captured a few images. I later decided they added to the story of the pilgrimage experience that hiking up the shoulder of Mount Hood offers so many – in this case, the venerable trail to Cooper Spur.

I had about a dozen images from this sequence and chose one that would be anonymous. However, another consideration was an off-leash dog with the lead group. I’m a dog-lover (I currently have three) and am of the view that dogs in wilderness should always be leashed. There are lots of good reasons for this, mostly for the benefit of both wildlife and the dogs. However, this is not the law, and even in the few National Forest areas where leashes are mandated, the U.S. Forest Service does little to enforce the rules.

Hikers (and a hiker’s best friend) on the trail to Cooper Spur

Given that reality, I’ve got a mostly-written piece on “dog etiquette for hikers” that I will eventually post on the blog. Dog owners are just looking for a great outdoor experience, after all, and mostly don’t realize the impact of off-leash pets, so in the end, managing how we take our pets into the wild really depends on awareness and culture change. I’m already seeing that happen, albeit slowly.

For September, I chose an image of the Eliot Glacier from the same Cooper Spur hike featured in the previous month. The Eliot remains Mount Hood’s largest glacier, and the view into its mass of crevasses and seracs is truly breathtaking from the upper reaches of Cooper Spur. Yet, for old timers like me, the changes in the glacier in recent years are increasingly worrisome. To put a face on the change over the past couple of decades, I’ll be posting an article soon that does exactly that: side-by-side comparisons of change over the past 20 years. The differences are startling, and hopefully helpful inspiration to do our part to address global climate change.

A pleasant surprise that September day on Cooper Spur were swarms of Ladybugs all along the crest! Entomologists have studied this phenomenon extensively, and the thinking is that when bugs from opposite valleys meet along ridgetops to mate, they are rewarded with genetic diversity. In the moment, however, it was just a wild and crazy party atmosphere among the little beetles!

Scenic spot for a Ladybug convention!

Lots of action, here – beetle romance in the air!

Moving on to October, I chose this image of Mount Hood from the shoulder of Vista Ridge. I’ve spent a lot of time on this side of the mountain over the past couple of decades, and like much of the mountain, this corner has seen a rapid increase in visitation. The Vista Ridge trailhead is really just a stubbed logging road, and thus ill equipped to handle the amount of traffic it sees, with cars park at crazy angles and backed up down the road on busy weekends.

Therefore, another piece I’m planning to post in the coming year is a new trailhead concept for Vista Ridge that I’m actively working on with Trailkeepers of Oregon (TKO) to advance. 

The idea is to solve the current trailhead crowding issues while also converting a section of the current access road to become an accessible trail – turning the roadside view captured above into a trail destination for less able-bodied visitors or those with mobility devices. Far too few of these opportunities exist on the mountain, so this seems like a good starting point.

Future Vista Ridge trailhead? Maybe…

The relocated Vista Ridge parking area would move downhill by a half mile to a recently logged area (above) that is already disturbed and better situated as a trailhead. Some of this work could be done by volunteers, but it will take a partnership with the Forest Service to make this happen. More to come on this concept!

For November, I chose a wintery scene from the Ponderosa pine country of Lookout Mountain, located just east of Mount Hood in the Badger Creek Wilderness. This image is from still another freezing frost event, along with a skiff of snow on the ground from an early winter storm.

The contrast of rust-colored Ponderosa bark to the cool blues and greens of frost-covered pine needles is truly striking during these events. The effect is also fleeting, as even a light breeze can shake the ice crystals loose in a miniature snow flurry, and a break in the clouds would quickly melt them away.

Freezing fog scene in a Ponderosa forest

Ice crystals decorating Ponderosa pine limbs

Last up, the December image is from another winter trek into the White River Canyon (below). On this quiet trip, I followed another snowshoer and her dog into the canyon on a weekday afternoon when crowds on the mountain were few. 

Heading into the White River Canyon in winter

On the way back down the canyon, I set up the camera for some evening views of the mountain using long exposures to capture the movement of the White River. This image (below) ended up being my pick for the calendar.

However, I wrestled between a couple of images from this trip for the calendar, both taken from exactly the same spot, though about 20 minutes apart. So, if you like pink alpenglow scenes, you’ll be disappointed in my choice of the previous photo for the calendar!  The image below was last light on the mountain that day.

Alpenglow along the White River

As with most years, I chose the 13 calendar images for 2023 from about 150 “keepers” that I had pulled aside over the year as favorites. The best thing about putting the calendar together each year is sharing my experiences in WyEast Country, while also challenging myself to see new places, or see familiar places in new ways. Every year I learn new so many new secrets about Mount Hood and the Gorge!

Also among the photos each year are nine wildflower images on the back of the calendar. My thanks to Paul Slichter’s for his terrific Flora and Fauna Northwest website and to the Oregon Wildflowers Facebook group administered by Greg Lief and Adam Schneider for their help on identifying several of these beauties.

So, there’s the backstory! If you’d like a calendar, they’re easy to order online from Zazzle – and to repeat, all proceeds go to Trailkeepers of Oregon (TKO), as always. Just follow this link:

2023 Mount Hood National Park Campaign Calendar

As always, thanks for following the WyEast Blog for another year. I hope to run into you on the trail sometime in 2023!

Tom Kloster | December 2022

10 Years After the Dollar Lake Fire

/ Tom Kloster / 1 Comment

The Dollar Lake Fire at its peak in early September 2011

On August 26, 2011, a lightning storm ignited a small wildfire near Inspiration Point, just below the Elk Cove Trail on Mount Hood’s north side. What became known as the Dollar Lake Fire started in full view on a Friday, during the busy summer hiking season. The fire was immediately photographed and reported to the Forest Service by several hikers – and in full view from the Hood River Ranger Station near Parkdale, a few miles north.

The initial Forest Service response was to allow the fire to burn, consistent with agency policy on wildland fires. It seemed to be a small, slow-moving event, and it was located completely within the boundaries of the Mount Hood Wilderness, where no structures would be threatened. Besides, there were several other big fires burning in Oregon that summer already competing for the agency’s stretched resources.

Forests exploding into flames near Vista Ridge as the Dollar Lake Fire moved west

Over the next ten days everything changed. Unseasonably strong east winds began to fan the blaze, exploding the fire to more than 4,500 acres. And it was still spreading fast, with just 10 percent of the fire perimeter contained. As the fire continued to spread, it made a run toward Lolo Pass, threatening the Bonneville Power Administration transmission corridor and Portland’s Bull Run Watershed – the source of drinking water for more than a million people. 

Suddenly, it had become the top firefighting priority in the state. At its peak there were hundreds of firefighters battling the Dollar Lake Fire as it continued to burn and spread westward.

By the time the fall rains arrived that October, the fire had consumed more than 6,300 acres of subalpine forest in a 5-mile swath stretching from the historic Cloud Cap Inn on the east to Cathedral Ridge on the west. The historic Timberline Trail was largely spared, surprisingly, but much of the high elevation forest just below the tree line was completely burned. These forests were dominated by  Mountain Hemlock, Noble Fir and Western Larch stands that had last burned more than a century ago.

Dollar Lake Fire from above the Hood River Valley in early September 2011

Like the Eagle Creek Fire that would follow in 2017, the Dollar Lake Fire provided a front-row seat for people in the greater Portland area to better appreciate the awesome power of a wildfire. Much of the media coverage focused on the destructive force of these fires, but in the aftermath, both events have also served to raise awareness of both the need and benefits of fire, as well as the resiliency of a recovering forest. 

In 2016 I posted this 5-year progress report on the forest recovery in the wake of the Dollar Lake Fire. At the time, the recovery was in its earliest stages, though making remarkable progress. The past summer marks the tenth growing season since the fire, and this article is a visual update on the ongoing forest recovery in the wake of the fire.

The recovery has come a long, long way…

Charred forests along Vista Ridge in June 2012

When I first ventured into the burn zone in June 2012, the devastation seemed nearly complete. Much of the Dollar Lake Fire had been a scorching crown fire that killed entire forests, as opposed to a beneficial ground fire that might have burned away forest debris, but left many of the mature trees surviving. As a result, there is little of the desirable “mosaic” burn pattern in the Dollar Lake burn, where islands of trees spared by the fire help spur the forest recovery and provide refuge for wildlife during the burn – another beneficial effect of a less catastrophic fire. 

Bark piles forming one year after the fire in 2012

Living conifers don’t really burn in a high-intensity event like the Dollar Lake Fire. Instead, they’re quickly killed, but mostly left standing. The heat of the fire torches green needles, blackens tree bark and explodes the thin, moist cambium layer under their bark — the living tissue that connects a tree’s roots to its green foliage — but leaves the solid interior of a tree unburned.

This effect of a very hot fire could be seen all over the ground in the immediate aftermath of the fire in 2012. Great piles of scorched tree bark had sluffed off the standing trees, no longer attached by a living cambium layer. Early in the recovery, these bark piles were crucial in helping prevent erosion of the bare, burned ground, and also provided the first protected spots for pioneer seedling to take hold.

The ground itself was also scorched and black, but even in that first spring after the fire it was clear that some of the understory plants had survived. Thanks to their protected underground root systems., Beargrass and Avalanche Lily were already sprouting from the burnt soil just eight months after the fire.

Beargrass emerging from the blackened soil in June 2012

Avalanche lilies emerging from the burned forest in June 2012

In the first year after the fire, the bare, de-barked snags of trees killed by the fire were a striking reddish color, but just one summer of sun exposure quickly began to fade them into the silver “ghost forest” of today. A full decade of harsh mountain weather has since removed many of the smaller limbs from the standing “ghosts” and as their roots decay with time, many of the killed trees are now falling. This growing accumulation of downed logs adds still more organic debris to the burned ground, and provides shade and nutrients to help young plants to germinate and grow.

At 10 years the post-fire pioneers are still at work

As the Dollar Lake Fire recovery progressed over the past ten summers, a familiar sequence unfolded in the most intensely burned areas, where the fire had burned to bare soil. Pink, abundant Firestar (aka Fireweed) [add a blog link here] was the first to reseed into the burn area. The surviving Avalanche Lilies also took advantage of cleared soil, and within just a few years these tiny plants were creating a spectacular flower show for early summer visitors to the Dollar Lake burn.

This intensely burned ravine along Vista Ridge was filled with Firestar in the first years after the fire, but has not transitioned to shrubby understory plants, a few small conifers and sun-loving perennials Pearly everlasting and Goldenrod

In the first summer (2012) after the fire, only a few Avalanche Lilies grew in this section of the burn. Five years after the fire (2016) Firestar dominated this area with its lush foliage and beautiful blooms, growing as much as 4 feet tall. Ten growing seasons after the fire (2022) shows the transition from the early post-fire pioneers like Firestar, to shrubby plants like Huckleberry and Azalea, with many 2 or 3-foot tall confers mixed in.

Next, conifers and shrubby plants began to appear, and they have steadily expanded their presence to dominate the areas where the recovery has made the most progress. In other areas – especially at higher elevations in the burn zone – the pioneering Firestar still dominates, and small conifers and shrubby understory plants are only beginning to appear, yet these slower areas are following the same succession pattern from wildflowers to young trees and shrubs.

Huckleberries growing from surviving roots in a heavily burned area five years after the fire

Heading into the recovery, a surprising number of mountain Huckleberry plants that had dominated the understory before the fire were emerging from their unburned roots. After ten years, familiar thickets of Huckleberry are already producing heavy berry crops in places where the fire burned less hot. However, outside these less-burned areas new Huckleberry plants have been slow to take hold, and are only just beginning to appear, despite their prolific fruit production and subsequent distribution of seeds by bird and other wildlife. 

It turns out that Huckleberries spread mostly by layering – the term for roots that form when a sprawling branch or twig touches the ground, starting a new plant that will eventually grow separately from the parent. It’s a slower process than spreading by seed, but the post-fire recovery of Huckleberries is revealing the advantages of a deeply rooted plant that can readily regrow from its many sprawling, rooted stems.

Huckleberries bounced back quickly in lightly burned areas, producing fruit within five years of the fire

They don’t produce a tasty fruit like Huckleberry, but our native Azalea (and its lookalike, False Azalea) have also bounced back strongly in areas where the fire was less hot, allowing more of their roots to survive. Before the burn, these plants were one of the most prolific understory shrubs, often mixed in with Huckleberries. But while Huckleberries are beginning to take hold in more intensely burned areas, thanks to their broad seed distribution, few Azalea (and False Azalea) have appeared in these areas at this point in the recovery.

Azalea returning in a lightly burned area  five years after the fire

In the early years of the recovery, Firestar dominated the entire burn and formed spectacular drifts with its elegant, violet flower spikes. Firestar are sun-loving perennials that grow readily from seeds carried in the wind on silky sails, and thus their ability to rapidly colonize a burn in the years immediately following a fire.

After ten growing seasons, Firestar continue to dominate higher elevations in the burn, where the summers are shorter and the forest recovery is slower. At lower elevations in the burn, the shade these plants initially provided for other seedlings has allowed a diverse array of other understory plants to become established and thrive, largely replacing Firestar. These are workhorse plants that are essential to post-fire recovery, yet their role is a fleeting one.

Firestar was everywhere in the early years of the forest recovery

Firestar still carpets the higher elevation ghost forests of the Dollar Lake burn where the recovery is unfolding more slowly

One of the less obvious pioneers of the early recovery are Rushes. Normally associated with wet areas, they were a surprising piece of the forest recovery puzzle when they appeared scattered throughout the burn in the first years. These are perennials with tough root systems that help hold bare soil and also make them somewhat drought tolerant.

Rush

Were Rushes growing here before the fire, and simply emerged from surviving roots after the burn, just as some of the Beargrass that survived? That’s probably the best explanation, but Rushes are one of the surprising early workhorses in the recovery that continue to be thrive as part of the recovering forest.

Berries are among the new arrivals

After ten growing seasons, the recovery in the aftermath of the Dollar Lake Fire has entered an explosive new phase. The diversity of plant species in the regenerating understory is rapidly expanding to include a surprising variety of new shrubs and small deciduous trees that are taking hold among the surviving huckleberries and azaleas.

Among the new arrivals are five new berry-bearing shrubs and small trees, including (pictured below, in order) our native Wild raspberry, Mountain ash, Thimbleberry, Red-flowering currant and Red Elderberry. Add these to the freely fruiting Huckleberries, and the recovering burn has become a summer magnet for birds, bears and other wildlife that thrive on our native berries. These animals, in turn, spread the seeds from these berries, further accelerating the forest recovery.

Wild raspberry

Mountain ash

Thimbleberry

Red-flowering currant

Red elderberry

 Broadleaf trees are also making a comeback in the burn zone, though they tend to be scattered and still somewhat uncommon at this stage of the recovery. Among these are Scouler’s willow, Cottonwood and the subalpine Sitka alder – three species that typically colonize forest openings and mountain roadsides where they have access to sun. 

Within the burn zone, Scouler’s willow and Sitka alder can thrive all the way to timberline (at 6,000 feet), while Black cottonwood typically grow below about 5,000. These species are likely to expand their presence in coming years, as they are fast-growing pioneers that can outpace young conifers, and often fill recently burned or cleared areas in the first decades of recovery. 

Scouler’s willow

Young Cottonwood seedling

Cottonwood foliage

Sitka alder

This natural progression from deciduous trees to conifers in recovering forests is purposely skipped over in most commercial logging operations on both public and private timber lands. Timber companies typically use herbicides to kill the surviving understory in the first growing season following a new clearcut, including deciduous trees like these. Then conifer seedlings are planted to accelerate the production of new saw logs. 

While this practice maximizes profits, but it also robs the soil of years of organic debris from deciduous trees, along with the nitrogen that species like Red alder uniquely fix in the soil with their root systems, enriching it for future, larger conifers to thrive. New research has also revealed that Red alder and other nitrogen-fixing deciduous species actually break down solid rock into available minerals for other tree species to absorb, including the conifers that typically follow Red alder in forest recovery. This newly understood benefit of the deciduous phase of forest recovery is especially crucial in our mountain forests, where soils are thin and rocky.

Wildflowers continue to expand their role, too

Wildflowers were the first pioneers to the burn, and they continue to play an important role in the recovery. After ten growing seasons, the list of prominent wildflowers in the burn has expanded from Avalanche Lily, Beargrass and Firestar to include many new species. The most prominent among the new arrivals are Goldenrod and Pearly everlasting. Both are late-blooming, sun-loving and drought tolerant species that are now thriving and spreading throughout the burn.

Goldenrod

Other new wildflower arrivals include purple Asters and several species of Lupine. These are sun-lovers that were not present in shade of the forest before the burn. Their arrival shows the ability of plants to reseed across miles of burned forest with the help of birds, other wildlife and hiker’s boots. Over time (as measured in decades) returning conifers will shade these slopes, once again, and these wildflowers will fade away, ceding the burn area to more shade-tolerant species, once again.

Aster

Dwarf lupine

A new forest is emerging… slowly

The mystique of replanting burned areas runs deep in Oregon lore, with Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) crews replanting burns throughout Oregon in the 1930s and school kids from Portland helping replant the infamous Tillamook Burn – a series of four large, overlapping burns in the Coast Range that stretched from 1933 to 1951. As it is today on private timber lands, the focus then was on salvaging burned trees and planting conifer seedlings to produce new, harvestable trees as quickly as possible. 

Colony of Noble fir seedlings growing in a protected enclosure of fallen logs on Vista Ridge

In nature, conifers do readily reseed after fires and logging, but compared to understory plants capable of regrowing from surviving roots, conifer seedlings are initially slow to compete. They’re also vulnerable to the harsh conditions in mountain settings – long, cold winters with a snowpack measured in feet followed by very dry summers with almost no precipitation from July through September. 

At ten years, the Dollar Fire recovery includes plenty of young conifers, though most are still just a foot tall and less than five years old. Few of these seedlings will survive to become large trees. The lucky few that do are typically found in protected spots – in the shade of standing snags or among fallen, decaying logs that provide shade and nutrients.

Noble fir seedlings growing along a fallen log, where their roots are shaded and the log helps conserve soil moisture and provides nutrients as it slowly decays

Noble fir seedings huddled  on the cool, shaded north side of standing ghost trees

The clumping of young conifers is a preview of what is to come in the recovery. Walk through a 30 or 40-year-old burn and you will find trees growing in groups, providing protection for one another and sharing the best spots for young trees to grow. Over decades, these groups will expand and grow together, forming a continuous stand. Over centuries, just a few of these original trees will survive to become forest giants. 

Mixed colony of Mountain hemlock and Noble fir competing in a favorable nursery spot among fallen logs

The small grove of Noble fir in the distance survived the fire, and now these trees protect one another in their suddenly exposed setting. In the coming decades, more colonies of young trees like these will begin to reforest the Dollar Lake burn – first in small groups and later spreading to once again form a continuous canopy

In the first years of the recovery, young conifers in the Dollar Lake burn were mostly Mountain hemlock and Noble fir, two species that dominate subalpine forests on Mount Hood. But at ten years, the recovery includes a couple new species in the mix: Lodgepole pine and Western white pine. 

Both pines are common trees in our mountain forests, though with different growth habits. Lodgepole tend to grow in stands, often in dry, rocky sites. Western white pine rarely grow in stands, and are instead sprinkled throughout a mature forest. Both species bring diversity to the emerging forest that underscores the benefit of periodic fires in our forest ecosystem.

Two pines are returning to the burn – Western white pine (left) and the more common Lodgepole pine (right).

All of the photos in this article were taken along the Vista Ridge Trail in the Mount Hood Wilderness, a route the climbs through the heart of the Dollar Lake burn, from about the 4,000-foot level to the Timberline Trail, at about 6,000 feet elevation. This is prime Noble fir country, but at lower elevations in the burn, conifers like Western larch are an important part of the forest recovery. Oddly missing (thus far) at the lower elevations of the burn are Douglas fir. In time, this iconic species will undoubtedly join the rest of the evergreens re-establishing the forest here.

Why is tree species diversity so important in a forest? While it’s true that we have many ancient stands that are largely of a single species, climate change will almost certainly affect the recovery of the Dollar Fire burn. The recent fires on Mount Hood and in the Gorge will give us a living laboratory to see just how individual species fare with longer, warmer summers and milder winters. The new watch word in climate science is resiliency – the ability to adapt and survive in rapidly changing conditions.

For our forests, species resiliency will be the key, as our climate is expected to change too quickly for individual species to adapt to through natural selection. Instead, it will be the species already suited to warmer, dryer conditions that will be able to survive and thrive in the future. The best guess in the Pacific Northwest is that our climate zones will shift north by a few hundred miles. That could mean Portland someday having a climate like today’s Roseburg or Medford, with Mount Hood’s forests someday looking more like today’s Southern Oregon Cascades. 

The roles are reversed in this Cascade forest, located 300 miles south of Mount Hood at about 5,000 elevation; Lodgepole pine are the predominant species, with young Noble fir and Mountain hemlock sprinkled within the Lodgepole stands. The debris piles are part of a fuel reduction effort in this forest near Crater Lake.

Forest scientists are already experimenting with this possibility by planting test stands of Southern Oregon forest species in British Columbia, hundreds of miles north of their native latitude. The larger question is whether whole forests will adapt this way over time through gradual migration, or whether it will up to individual species to quickly select more drought-tolerant mutations in their gene pool – a proposition that will centuries to play out. 

In the meantime, some tree species already present on Mount Hood are already poised to gradually assume a larger role in the forest of the future. 

Today, Lodgepole pine are mostly found in scattered groves near rocky outcroppings and on dry slopes on Mount Hood, but the species still dominates areas where the volcanic eruptions of the late 1700s laid down deep layers of debris in the White River, Zigzag and Sandy River valleys. While they may look young, these are often very old trees, stunted by their harsh growing conditions.

Stunted, slow-growing lodgepole pine are still the dominant conifer some 200 years after the Old Maid eruptions laid down deep gravel deposits on the floor of the Sandy River canyon

Newly forming soils are thin at Old Maid Flat, revealed by shallow-rooted Lodgepole that are easily tipped  in winter storms

Just five inches in diameter, this stunted Lodgepole at Old Maid Flat was over 75 years old when it was felled for firewood

Lodgepole are well-adapted to these sandy, nutrient-poor soils. After more than two centuries, other conifer species are only beginning to appear in these Lodgepole stands. These slowly recovering forests may be a preview of how future burns will recover in Mount Hood’s future.

In this way, having a few Lodgepole pine and Western white pine join the recovering forest mix as part of the Dollar Fire recovery is a good insurance policy, should the Noble fir and Mountain hemlock forests that once stood here struggle to thrive in a changing climate.

What’s next for the Dollar Lake Fire recovery?

While much has changed in just ten growing seasons, the forest recovery from the Dollar Lake Fire has only begun. The lives of our big trees and mature forests evolve over centuries, not in the few decades of a human life. Everyone reading this article will be long gone when the forests here look anything like they did before the fire, though we will witness the earliest stages of a new forest forming.

Hikers in the ghost forests on Vista Ridge in August 2022

We’re accustomed to pushing our forests to grow on our terms for maximum profit – mass replanting of marketable conifers and skipping over the initial recovery of understory plants and deciduous trees by aggressive use of herbicides. Like most of our forest practices centered on log production, we’re now learning that nature knows how to do this better than we ever will, and in ways we’re still just beginning to understand. 

On Mount Hood, nature has been given the opportunity to recover on her own terms where the Dollar Fire roared through, without logging and plantation planting. This is because much of the burn had been set aside as an expansion of the Mount Hood Wilderness just two years before the fire, in 2009. Thus, no rush to “salvage” burned trees by the timber industry. Instead, the slow-motion recovery of the forest, as it has done countless times before over the millennia. 

Fallen logs within the Mount Hood Wilderness must be cleared with hand tools

Though the Dollar Lake Fire was caused by lightning, most of the intense fires we have seen on Mount Hood, in the Gorge and around Oregon over the past two decades are a product of human carelessness. The large majority of forest fires are human-caused, in fact, and made more catastrophic by fuels built up from 120 years of fire suppression and our warming, drying climate.  

It’s safe to assume this is the “new normal”, too, and thus the importance of understanding how our forests recover after these events – and most importantly, turning our attention to the future, when conditions favoring these fires will be increasingly common. The good news is that nature is remarkably resilient, especially when we don’t get in the way. We’re seeing that unfold in just a decade of recovery across the Dollar Lake burn.

As the forest recovery continues to evolve, there will be plenty of changes for those who walk the trails on Mount Hood, too. We have already entered a phase of the recovery where the shrubby understory has begun to return with gusto at lower elevations. This is going to mean lots of brushing by hand to keep once-shady trails open, along with ongoing logouts for snags that will drop across trails for decades to come. It’s hard work, but also rewarding – and a another way to better understand how the forest is recovering.

Hand-sawed log among more than 70 cleared by Trailkeepers of Oregon (TKO) crews in 2020

Most of this trail maintenance on the Vista Ridge trail is done by volunteers with Trailkeepers of Oregon (TKO). In 2020 and 2021, alone, TKO’s volunteer sawyers cut through nearly 100 fallen logs along this trail with crosscut saws – a requirement inside the wilderness area, where mechanized equipment is not permitted. Brushing will also be done by volunteers for the foreseeable future, by hand with clippers and loppers. 

If you’d like to lend a hand you can watch the TKO events calendar. You can find more information about TKO events here:

Trailkeepers of Oregon (TKO)

One-day trail parties on Vista Ridge and other trails within the Dollar Lake burn are scheduled every summer, usually from mid-July through September. No experience is needed and all abilities are welcome – the only requirement is a desire to give back!

Let’s get this restarted..!

/ Tom Kloster / 7 Comments

2022 brought new life for our 80-year-old house in North Portland!

Why, I haven’t posted an article since the end of May! Where have I been? Painting, scraping, nailing… repeat! For 30 years we have lived in a World War II-era tract house built above the North Portland shipyards back in 1944, and this year we celebrated three decades of living here by adding some much-needed space on our second floor.

Like so many workers in the COVID era, the pandemic converted me to full-time teleworker overnight, so the new space on the second floor is a new home office where I’m spending (too much) time in Zoom meetings by day and working on the house at night.

Lath from our old plaster-and-lath walls cleaned and bundled for reuse by the deconstruction crew

If you follow the photo sequence (opening image), you might note that our house was without a roof during the month of April this year – a month when Portland set the all-time record for the wettest April ever. It rained every single day! The roof had been scheduled to be installed the first week of that month, and we finally got it tacked on during the first dry stretch in early May, after 6 weeks under a leaky, whole-house tarp. The frosting (quite literally) during this saga was a freak snowstorm in mid-April (again, climate change at work) that nearly destroyed the tarp. It was like camping in our own upstairs!

My role in the project has to install trim and window casings throughout and complete all of the interior painting – work I enjoy, but also really time-consuming. Thus, the unintended “sabbatical” from my blogging. With this article, I’m happy to be putting the paintbrush aside (for a moment) and getting back to writing a few articles about all things WyEast. If working on the house left precious little time for anything else except my day job, the monotony of painting and trimming gave me time to dream up lots of new topics to write about here – so, much more to come!

Eighty-six years of very slow Douglas fir growth created this perfectly straight trim board, first installed in 1944

This article stems direction from the trim work. Whenever possible with the remodel, I recycled old trim, doors and casings from the original 1944 construction, as it is mostly made from dense, incredibly solid old-growth wood. Most lumber cut in the Pacific Northwest in the 1940s was still from centuries-old trees. This piece of 4” baseboard trim (above) was typical – it has 86 growth rings! Modern wood trim of this dimension might have ten rings, and it’s finger-jointed, engineered wood made up of foot-long sections glued together, not cut in a single plank, straight from a tree.

This was on my mind while taking a much-needed day off from nailing and painting trim a few weeks ago when I came across this fallen giant (below) along Elk Creek, near Lolo Pass. It’ an old growth Douglas fir that survived in an island of ancient forest that was passed over by the logging heyday of decades past, when much of the north side of Mount Hood was clearcut.

That’s a big log! This Douglas fir giant fell along Elk Creek in the Lolo Pass area last winter, temporarily blocking Lolo Pass Road

How big is it? Just over 4 feet in diameter – very large for a forest located just below timberline on Mount Hood

I’d always admired this old stand of trees, so I stopped to measure the fallen giant – four feet in diameter. It was not even close to the largest trees I’ve come across in Oregon’s remaining old growth forests, but then I began to count the growth rings, and stopped at two hundred when I was less than halfway toward the center of the tree! Surprised at its age, I took several photos so I could count the rings more definitively at home with the aid of computer monitor. Upon later inspection of the photos, this ancient Douglas fir turned out to be 516 years old when it was finally tipped by a storm last winter!

All around this downed giant are dozens of equally ancient Western hemlock, Western redcedar and Douglas fir growing in a spectacular, species-diverse stand that I had passed through scores of times over the years. I’d always appreciated these big old trees, but I had no idea just how long they had been growing here. How lucky we are that they have survived multiple waves of logging over the past 150 years!

These giants – Douglas fir, Noble fir and Western hemlock – are the surviving neighbors of the big tree that came down along Elk Creek last winter

Then I thought about the 86 growth rings on that old piece of base trim I’d been working with. It occurred to me that it had likely been milled from just such a tree, and was likely hundreds of years old, just as much of the wood in my 1944 house is. In the 1940s logging was still mostly focused on old growth forests, with trees that were centuries old, and the mistaken belief that it would all grow back and we would never run out of big trees.

What struck me about this 500-year-old giant is how casually it had been sawed out of the road, as like any other blowdown that got in the way. We’re still learning to appreciate these irreplaceable monarchs as more than just the board feet of lumber or sticks of firewood they can be converted into. So, to honor this ancient Douglas fir I attached a few human milestones from our frail, checkered history to its long, peaceful timeline, as told in 516 annual growth rings (below).

500 years covers a lot of recent human history. This big old fir took root as a seedling a couple years before the first Spanish settlements appeared in North America in 1508 A.D.

[click here for a large version of this graphic]

Thinking of pre-1960s homes as “old-growth homes” was a bit of a revelation for me, though it makes sense. While private lands had been heavily logged for a half-century or more at that point, second-growth forests still weren’t being logged in a significant way until well into the 1950s. Logging on public land also went into full swing in the late 1940s, flooding the market with a new supply of old-growth logs cut from mountainsides that had never been logged before.

That’s why I was pleased to learn that a big, old Portland home just a few blocks down the street from mine was being carefully deconstructed this summer, and the materials set aside for reuse. When I took at closer look at the notice posted in front of the home, I learned this was no whim of the developer – a few years ago, houses like this were routinely razed, and the debris sent to the landfill in Arlington. Now, the City of Portland now requires homes built before 1940 to be deconstructed and the materials made available for reuse.

What it looks like to un-build a house, one floor at a time – this home will be replaced with multiple dwellings in growing Portland

Behind the disappearing old home, salvaged wood and bricks are stacked in neat piles, waiting to be transported to the Rebuilding Center, a recycled building materials nonprofit working in partnership with the City of Portland in this effort. There, old reclaimed lumber and other construction materials can be reused by builders in older homes where it matches the varying lumber dimensions that were common before modern standards were applied.

Salvaged wood is organized by dimension on site and prepared for reuse at the Rebuilding Center

While it was great to reuse my old wood trim, fact is that original, old growth wood is increasingly an artifact from an era that will never repeat. Yet, wood-frame homes aren’t going away, either. Instead, they are increasingly being built with engineered wood products that are stronger, more stable and use wood cut from fast-growing, farmed tree plantations, not public lands.

Many of the new structural beams in our remodeled home were produced this way, to exacting dimensions that would be impossible with conventional cut lumber. All around Portland multi-story buildings are also being constructed with engineered cross-laminated timber beams and panels that replace steel and concrete.

This new six-floor office building on Portland’s east side streetcar loop is a wood structure, constructed entirely with cross-laminated timbers and panels, one of several new mid-rise buildings proving the value of this new material

This new industry of manufacturing cross-laminated materials (also called “mass timber”) is growing in Oregon, and has the benefit of using very small trees that can be harvested from commercial farms or – importantly – from plantation thinning on our public lands. In this way, there’s a tremendous potential for this new industry to restore rural economies around Oregon that were left behind when old growth logging faded in the 1980s and 90s. You can read more here about this emerging opportunity.

Big trees left behind during the logging heyday of the 1960s, 70s and 80s on Mount Hood’s north side now tower over the crowded plantations that cover old clearcuts. Many of these giants are hundreds of years old. Now that technology has created modern wood products that are superior to traditional lumber, will we allow these recovering forests to grow old, once again?

I like this glimpse into the future. It’s one that could allow our magnificent mountain forests to finally recover, without the future threat of commercial logging of large trees, while also providing the materials needed to house future generations of Oregonians.

This end result of having better, stronger building materials while also restoring our public forests is encouraging. If we do manage this transition, future generations will surely thank us, too.

_______________________________

Tom Kloster | October 2022

Mount Hood’s Juniper Forests

/ Tom Kloster / 3 Comments

Mount Hood rises over the Western Juniper forests on the east side of the Cascades

One of the most startling features of the Cascade Range comes from the rain shadow effect the mountains have on approaching Pacific storms. Through a process known as “orographic lifting”, weather systems rolling in from the ocean are forced up and over the wall of mountains when they reach the Cascades. This lifting has the effect of wringing out moisture from the clouds, resulting in rainforests on the west side and deserts on the east side of the mountains.

The rain shadow effect it especially prominent in WyEast country, where the Cascade range is at its narrowest, just 50 miles wide, compared to more than 100 miles or more across in much of the range. In less than an hour traveling through the Columbia Gorge from Troutdale to Hood River, the landscape changes from deep rainforests where up to 140 inches of rain fall annually to the Ponderosa pine and Oregon White Oak forests of the east slope, where annual rainfall dips below 20 inches.

Western Juniper finally give way to desert grasslands and sage in the rain shadow of Mount Hood, where annual rainfall drops below 10 inches

In the extreme rain shadow of the Cascades, where rainfall dips below 10 inches annually, the big conifers that define our forests finally give way to a sagebrush, grasslands and a rugged desert tree, the Western Juniper. Long overlooked as “non-commercial” (meaning it is not easily harvested as saw logs), these scrappy trees have been flourishing over the past century on the desert plains and buttes east of the mountains.

Mount Hood has its own juniper forests, though they are less widespread here than elsewhere in Oregon’s high desert country. The reason for this is agriculture. Much of the rolling desert terrain east of the mountain has been cultivated for well more than a century, originally for intensive grazing, and today for highly productive wheat farming.

Western Juniper still thrives at Juniper Flat, taking hold wherever the ground isn’t actively plowed

Yet, there are still Western juniper stands sprinkled through even the most heavily cultivated areas, and as you move away from the farms and the lowlands of the Columbia River Basin — Western Juniper mostly grow above 2,000 feet elevation — there remain many thriving Western Juniper forests.

The most extensive of these is (appropriately) at Juniper Flats, located 25 miles to the southeast of the mountain, on a rocky tableland adjacent to the White River Canyon. This is typical Western Juniper country — cold, sometimes snowy winters and hot, very dry summers. The soils here are thin, resting on a bedrock of basalt. The few areas that can be farmed have been cultivated, but the rest of Juniper Flat is grazing country where Western Juniper flourish.

When Juniper Flat got its modern name from white settlers arriving on the Oregon Trail, it’s very likely the juniper forests here looked much different than what we see today. That’s because our juniper forests are on the move and expanding.

Botanists generalize juniper forests into three community types:

• Mixed forests – these are where Western Juniper are mixed with Ponderosa Pine, Douglas Fir and other big conifers on the margins of the mountain forest zone.

Large Ponderosa Pine anchor this mixed forest, surrounded by lighter green Western Juniper that take on a tall, slender form in mixed forests

• Juniper forests – these occur where Western Juniper dominates and the trees grow relatively close together, with a canopy that typical covers 10-20% of the landscape

Juniper forest on the march at Juniper Flat where these trees are recolonizing a fallow farm field

• Juniper savanna — where Western Juniper are widely scattered in desert grasslands and their canopy covers less than 10% of the landscape

Juniper are widely scattered across this savanna in the shadow of Mount Hood, along the west edge of Juniper Flat

Scientists have documented an exponential increase in Western Juniper growing in Oregon since the late 1800s, in many cases transforming former juniper savannah to become juniper forests. This was likely the case at Juniper Flat, and today it mostly qualifies as a juniper forest.

In a landmark report published in the late 1990s, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) found that over half of Oregon’s juniper forests we established between 1850 and 1900. Still more startling is the spread of Western Juniper since the 1930s, when the first comprehensive assessment was made. At the time the BLM study was released in 1999, an estimated a five-fold increase in juniper forest coverage had occurred over the previous 60 years.

That number of Western Juniper in Oregon continues to increase today, though there is an upper limit for these trees. Their sweet spot is desert lands above 2,000 feet elevation and between 10” and 20″ of annual rainfall. They do not seem to spread much beyond these areas, and in Oregon they are now present across most areas that meet these criteria.

Western Juniper berries are a critical winter food source for coyotes, foxes, rabbits and many desert bird species. These are also the berries the Dutch famously learned to distill in the 17th Century to make gin (a word derived from the Dutch word “jenever” for juniper), and a craft distillery industry using these berries has emerged in Oregon

Western Juniper foliage is evergreen and made up of tiny, overlapping scale-like leaves that help these trees conserve moisture in their harsh desert habitat

Western Juniper bark is tough, shaggy and fire-resistant, allowing larger trees to survive moderate intensity range fires

Given their recent spread in Oregon, Western Juniper forests are also remarkably age-diverse when compared to the even-aged stands we often see with young conifer forests. A typical juniper forest contains a diverse range of trees, from young to old. These trees are tough survivors, with fully one quarter of Oregon’s juniper forests more than a century old, and over a third of these forests have century-old trees in their mix.

Why are Western Juniper forests spreading? One answer is lack of wildfire in the ecosystem over the past century due to human fire suppression. Another could be effects of climate changes that scientists are only beginning to understand. Still another is the parceling and residential development of our desert lands, and a shift away from farming and ranching, where juniper forests were routinely cleared or burned.

Most think of Nevada as the heart of Western Juniper country, but more than three quarters of Oregon falls within its range, and a good share of California, Washington is also prime habitat for these rugged trees

As desert survivors, Western Juniper have adapted in ways that help them out-compete with other desert plants. They have enormous root systems that can extend several times beyond the size of their crown, spreading up to two and half times the height of the tree in all directions, compared to most trees with root systems roughly proportional to the width of their crown. This helps explain the wide spacing of Western Juniper. Where our big mountain conifers often grown just a few feet from one another, juniper forests might have as few as ten trees per acre, thanks to their huge root systems.

Western Juniper crowns are also part of their competitive strategy. Their dense foliage is estimated to capture more than half the precipitation that falls upon them. Some of this is absorbed, some evaporates, but the net effect is less moisture making it to understory plants or the soil.

The small Western Juniper on the left will have to work hard to complete with its larger neighbor for water and soil nutrients. Juniper are highly efficient in their ability to gather and store moisture, out-competing other species and even their own seedlings to survive

Juniper root systems also out-compete the desert understory species that are most associated with juniper forests. These include several sagebrush species, Bitterbrush, Rabbitbrush and a few other hardy desert shrubs, along with desert grasses and wildflowers. This has emerged as a chief concern for the BLM, since this translates into impacts on the cattle industry that leases federal grazing allotments. Beyond the economics of cattle grazing (and more importantly), the loss of understory also has impacts that ripple through wildlife populations, as well.

Another concern with the spread of our juniper forests is the potential risk to private property and human life from wildfire. Western Juniper is adapted to fire, and large trees are likely to survive low-intensity fires, but they can also burn hot when conditions are right. If juniper forests have spread rapidly in Oregon’s deserts over the past century, human development in juniper country has spread still faster, placing tens of thousands of rural homes at risk to wildfire.

This BLM fuels reduction work removed about one third of the trees in this juniper forest – mostly larger trees. The cut wood and limbs are simply stacked and left to decompose. The goal is to mimic the effect of fire in maintaining and open forest and understory that might otherwise be pushed out by juniper

These concerns have led the BLM to carry out “fuels reduction” projects in juniper forests on federal lands in Oregon as early as the late 1980s. One approach is controlled burns, a practice used in other conifer forests to reintroduce wildfire to the ecosystem after a century of aggressive fire suppression. This method ideally leaves the largest junipers standing and thins out younger trees, and it has been used successfully throughout juniper country. However, fires sent intentionally continue to be a controversial practice, as evidenced by the massive New Mexico wildfires currently burning that were ignited by controlled burns. In the era of climate change, land managers will need to revisit “safe” seasons for using this tool or risk public backlash that threatens to ban the practice completely.

Another approach to “fuels reduction” is simply cutting down trees and leaving them behind as debris piles, as pictured above. This approach works where there isn’t enough understory to support a controlled burn, or where proximity to private property makes a controlled burn too dangerous. However, it’s also labor intensive compared to controlled burns and still leaves cut debris behind as potential fuel.

In areas where these approaches were employed in the 1980s and 90s, subsequent monitoring by the BLM slowed that young juniper were already colonizing burned or cleared areas within just five years. Therefore, so long as natural wildfires are suppressed in juniper country, techniques like these will be needed in perpetuity to maintain some semblance of a natural ecosystem and to protect human life and property.

This craggy old fire survivor is surrounded by young Western Juniper quickly colonizing a former burn

This points to the larger problem of rural over-development throughout the West that continues to encroach on our forests. We’ve created a perfect storm with fire suppression and sprawling that climate change is only escalating, with whole communities now facing the risk of being swept up in catastrophic fires.

In Oregon, strict land use planning has blunted rural sprawl since the 1970s, yet some of the impetus for statewide planning was the “sagebrush subdivisions” that were already underway when legendary Governor Tom McCall railed against them in 1973. Loopholes in county zoning codes have since allowed thousands more homes to be built in the deserts of Central Oregon, in particular. For these spread-out communities that already exist in juniper country, fire prevention campaigns are encouraging those living there to “harden” their homes against fire. Yet, if you spend much time in juniper country, you know that the vast majority of homes continue to be built with wood siding and most of the older homes have highly flammable composition roofing.

Many of these areas should never have been developed as home sites, of course. And as fires continue to consume whole communities in the West, there’s a good chance that cost of fire insurance or the inability to secure home loans might prevent simply rebuilding when fires in high-risk areas do occur. We’ve seen this play out in chronically flooded areas in other parts of the country, after all. The West is still coming to grips with the permanent reality of wildfire, however, and it’s unclear if we have the collective will to say no to development in fire-prone areas like our juniper forests.

Before farming, much of the juniper country near Mount Hood looked like this – open desert grasslands and scattered groves of Western Juniper. This remnant landscape at the edge of Juniper Flat, looking north to Tygh Ridge

Meanwhile, the juniper forests continue to spread and flourish in Oregon. The situation in Wy’East country is more complex, though: much of the historic juniper habitat east of Mount Hood was converted to agriculture long ago. Yet, today, some of that ground is going fallow, whether by economic realities in a global agriculture market, or because large farm parcels are being picked up by non-farmers, reverting to native plant cover. Some fallow land is being purchased for conservation purposes, either by public agencies or conservation non-profits. If these trends continue, we may see the juniper forests spreading in Mount Hood’s shadow, too.

There aren’t great trails or developed recreation sites in Mount Hood’s juniper forests (someday, hopefully!), as much of the area is in private hands. But if you like exploring rustic backroads, Juniper Flat and nearby Smock Prairie are scenic and rich with history. Dozens of abandoned homesteads and barns, a couple old schoolhouses and some fascinating pioneer cemeteries are sprinkled along the gravel roads that crisscross the hay fields and juniper groves. Juniper Flat is located immediately west of the community of Maupin and about 125 miles from Portland, along US 197.

Postscript: Shepperd’s Dell Fir

/ Tom Kloster / 4 Comments

Hand-tinted view of the Shepperd’s Dell bridge and the Columbia River circa 1920s

Serendipity was at work after I posted this recent article on the venerable old Douglas fir that grows at the east end of the historic Shepperd’s Dell Bridge. First, I’ll share some great comments on the article from readers that shed more light on the story of the big fir. Reader Rosemary Shepperd Guttridge writes:

“I use that tree as an indication of age of photo. My photo by Weister has the top in the tree. A slightly newer photo by Kinsey with a date of 1925, the top is out.”

Rosemary is George Shepperd’s great, great-granddaughter and keeper of the Shepperd family history. You can read my 2014 interview with her and see some of Rosemary’s rare photos of Shepperd family history in this article:

Heirs to George Shepperd

Reader Jerry King shared this fascinating bit of history:

“Labor Day weekend in 2017 wasn’t this tree’s only threat. In the summer of 2016, my wife and I were westbound approaching the fir when smoke came up out of the canyon! We parked after crossing the bridge and saw flames crawling up the east bank (north of the bridge). I quickly called 911 and then began the 26-minute wait for the first Corbett Fire truck to arrive. Flames came within 20’ of the grand old fir!”

Jerry’s account raises the question of whether this earlier fire might have actually saved the big fir by burning some of the accumulated fuel and brush on the slope beneath the tree before the big fire swept through in 2017? 

_______________

On the same day that Rosemary and Jerry posted their comments on the article, a couple of historic postcards I had bid on arrived in the mail. Both were of Shepperd’s Dell, and both are new images to my ever-growing collection of old photos and postcards. The first is the hand-tinted image at the top of this article. You can view a large version here:

Shepperd’s Dell and the Columbia River (1920s)

What sets this image apart from the many Shepperd’s Dell postcards I’ve collected is the wide view that includes the Columbia River, Sand Island and the pasture land in the floodplain that has now reverted to forests, meadows – and a freeway, of course.

The second image (below) is even more unusual, so I will dissect this one a bit for some of the stories it tells. This is the full image, shot (somewhat impossibly) from the steep cliff at the west end of the Shepperd’s Dell bridge. It features a parade of touring automobiles coming across the bridge, and visitors parked at the east end pullout, as well. Like the first image, it also shows the Columbia River and Sand Island in the distance.

Traffic jam on Shepperd’s Dell bridge in the early days of the historic highway

Photographers back in the day hauled around large format cameras and even larger tripods to capture these photos – a testament to the photographer who staked out this image. There’s good reason why this view is rare!

A closer look at the three vehicles on the bridge (below) suggests that, while this was a well-planned image, it probably wasn’t staged. Only the woman in the middle of the backseat in the first vehicle is looking up at the photographer, and cars still stack up like this on the bridge today as tourists take in the amazing views of Shepperd’s Dell, no prompting required. Given the popularity of auto touring in the early 1900s, it’s likely the historic highway looked like this on any given sunny, summer afternoon (and I’m basing that on the tops down on the cars and shadows showing the sun moving toward the west horizon).

Well, at least SOMEBODY spotted the photographer on the cliff above the bridge! (…the woman looking up from the backseat of the first car)

This photo was taken between 1914 and 1917, and there are surely some auto buffs out there who can identify the makes and years of the vehicles in this image to me, too. While I’m definitely not an auto buff, I did notice that two of the three (!) vehicles on the bridge have their steering wheels on the right side of the car – not unusual at the time, as left-side steering only because predominant with the introduction of the Ford Model T in 1908.

A closer look (below) at the pullout at the east end of the bridge reveals a scene with all manner of activity. Several cars are parked or stopped, with visitors walking onto the bridge for views of the river and Shepperd’s Dell waterfalls – just as we do today. Two children are playing under the big fir – perhaps picking up its fallen cones? The big tree is already impressive in this view, too – at least 3 feet in diameter more than a century ago.

Lots going on at the east end of the bridge (and below the big fir) in this scene!

The scene beyond the pullout, directly under Bishops Cap, really caught my eye. There are several people walking about in the middle of the road and what looks to be a car stopped in the middle of the road. That would be hair raising on this blind corner today, and it probably was back then, too! It is this part of the scene, along with the overall level of activity, that makes me think this photo was captured when the historic Columbia River Highway was dedicated in June 1916.

How did I narrow the image on this card to between 1914 and 1917? The message on the back is key (below), as the postmark confirms the date, and that it was sent from Portland. The Shepperd’s Dell bridge was completed in 1914, and thus this image was captured sometime during that period. The postmark means this card was sent almost exactly one year after the highway was formally dedicated.

1917 Message on the reverse of the Shepperd’s Dell Bridge postcard.

As postmarked postcards go, this one is a real gem. The sender (“Margaret”) not only dated her message, she also describes her “grand trip” along the road pictured on the front of the card – surprisingly few postcards contain messages that speak to the image on the front  We can only guess who young Eliott might be in relation to the sender, only that he “is a mighty good boy and wishes to be remember to Aunt Elizabeth.”

Yes, it still is a “grand trip”, Margaret!

Out of curiosity, I looked up Miss Elizabeth’s address and it turns out to be an impressive, turreted townhome (below, with red doors), now part of the Moreland Street Historic District in south Boston. Margaret and Elizabeth would be shocked at the changes both Portland and Boston have seen over the past century, for sure. 

Meanwhile, the scene at Shepperd’s Dell remains largely the same as it appears in this old postcard. Even the big fir survives. We should be proud of that, as it didn’t happen by accident – beginning with George Shepperd donating his dell to the public in 1915, and later, federal protection of the Gorge as a national scenic area and restoration of the historic Columbia River Highway. 

The lovely townhome in Boston where Aunt Elizabeth lived in 1917 still stands!

Reading century-old postcard messages like this always makes me wonder just what bits of ephemera from our time might even survive to be looked upon a century from now as a glimpse into how we lived. I think about this when I write these articles and post the images into a digital ether, to be stored on servers 1,000 miles away, then temporarily viewed on computer screens and electronic gadgets. 

Paradoxically, the same digital era technology that reduces our words and memories to electrons also allowed me to find an old postcard sent to Massachusetts a century ago and bring it back home to Oregon. 

I’m not sure there are any lessons here… just a reminder to go write a few postcards!

________________

Tom Kloster | April 2022

The Big Fir at Shepperd’s Dell

/ Tom Kloster / 9 Comments

1920s postcard view of the Shepperd’s Dell Bridge and its iconic Douglas fir (colorized for this article)

A reader reached out a few weeks ago with a question about “that big fir tree at Shepperd’s Dell, and as it turned out, I had been working on an article on that very subject! The tree in question is unmistakable: it stands near the east end of the iconic Shepperd’s Dell Bridge, perhaps the most recognizable of the many graceful bridges along the Historic Columbia River Highway.

The big tree is a Douglas fir, Oregon’s official state tree, and it has been growing here since well before this section of the historic highway was constructed in 1914. The tree grows in a protected hollow, surrounded on three sides by basalt cliffs. George Shepperd, the local farmer who donated what is today’s Shepperd’s Dell State Natural Area to become a park, walked under the tree with his family on their regular visits to visit the waterfalls at Shepperd’s Dell from their farm, located just to the east. Today, countless visitors admire it from the shady wayside at the east end of the bridge.

1910s view of the west approach to Shepperd’s Dell with the big fir rising in front of Bishops Cap

Early photos of the new Shepperd’s Dell Bridge taken in the late 1910s (above) show the tree prominently framing the rock outcrop known as Bishops Cap, more than a century ago. At the time, the tree was large enough to easily be 60-70 years old, though it still had the symetrical shape of a relatively youthful tree.

The image below shows the 1910s scene in reverse, from atop Bishops Cap, with the big Douglas fir standing out in the foreground and a few early motorists parked along the opposite side of the highway.

1910s view looking west from the top of Bishops Cap toward Shepperd’s Dell Bridge, with early motorists and the big fir front and center at the east end of the bridge

This hand-colored postcard (below) from the 1930s features Bishops Cap, and the big Douglas fir is especially prominent in this view. The construction of Historic Columbia River Highway was famously designed to blend with nature and follow the contours of the land, but that still required road engineer Samuel Lancaster to do some fairly heavy blasting and grading to complete the scenic route. At Shepperd’s Dell, he graded the slope above the big fir, but clearly took care to protect the tree from fill debris, likely extending its life for another century.

1930s hand-tinted postcard view of Bishops Cap with the big fir prominently featured to the left

Here’s another hand-tinted 1930s postcard view (below) from the west end of the Shepperd’s Dell Bridge showing Bishops Cap and the big fir. When I first came across this image, I assumed that a fair amount of artist’s license was used to create the scene, since it appears to be from a point in space, where a vertical cliff drops directly below the historic highway.

1930s hand-tinted postcard view of the Shepperd’s Dell Bridge and the big fir in the upper left

However, I eventually came across the 1920s era photo (below) that the previous, hand-tinted image was created from. It turns out the photographer was part mountain goat and managed to capture the scene from a vertical slope below the old highway! As in the hand-tinted view, the big Douglas fir rises beyond the bridge, on the left.

This is the 1920s photograph that the previous hand-tinted scene was based upon, with the big fir in the upper left

This 1910s view (below) is perhaps the most popular of the early images of the Shepperd’s Dell Bridge. It appeared in both its black and white original form and in colorized versions on countless postcards and in souvenir folios that were popular with early motorists visiting the Gorge. At the time this photo was taken, many sections of the new highway were still unpaved, including the section at Shepperd’s Dell.

This is perhaps the most popular 1920s postcard view of Shepperd’s Dell Bridge, with the big fir on the left

Over the century since Samuel Lancaster built his iconic highway through the area, the big fir at Shepperd’s Dell has thrived, as shown in this pair of images (below). The arrows provide reference points on Bishops Cap that helps underscore just how much the old fir has grown in just over century when viewed from the same spot at the west end of Shepperd’s Dell Bridge.

A century passed between these views, but the big fir remains and has grown noticeably larger — the 2021 view is somewhat wider than the 1920s view to fully capture the big fir!

[click here for a larger version of this comparison]

In the 1920s view, the top of the big fir was visually just a big higher than the top of Bishops Cap. By 2021, the tree had not only added some 50 feet to its height, it had also spread out and formed a more rounded crown that is typical for mature Douglas fir. The upper arrow in the 2021 image points to what was the approximate top of the tree in the 1920s. The spread of the tree is noticeable in the 2021 image, as well, as it now obscures part of Bishops Cap from this perspective.

The big fir at Shepperd’s Dell after the fire..?

The charred base of the big fir at Shepperd’s Dell in 2018, one year after the fire

Today, the Shepperd’s Dell fir remains a familiar feature to those stopping at the wayside, a true survivor that stands out from the surrounding forest. Its stout trunk is much larger than other trees in the area, and there has always been a bit of a mystery about a plank attached to the tree and metal cable that disappears into the canopy (I won’t attempt to solve that in this article!). So, when Eagle Creek Fire swept through the Gorge and reached Shepperd’s Dell over Labor Day weekend in 2017, the fate of this old tree was on my mind.

In the immediate aftermath of the fire, it was clear that the big tree hadn’t crowned (meaning the fire hadn’t engulfed the entire tree), but a significant part of the crown had been scorched and the bark at the base of the tree was badly blackened. The understory around the tree was completely burned away, so it was clear the fire had burned hot when it swept through. Because the fire occurred toward the end of the growing season, when conifers are becoming dormant with the approach of winter, it was impossible to know if the living cambium layers under the big fir’s thick bark had been destroyed by the heat of the burn. That would have to wait until the next spring, when the stress of producing new growth would test the its ability to survive.

By the fall of 2018 — one year after the fire – the situation was discouraging. The old tree had put out very little new growth on its remaining green limbs in its first growing season after the fire. And while it retained many of its surviving limbs over the course of that year’s summer drought, many had dropped their needles and died back (below), leaving the tree with less than half its canopy intact. Still, it had managed to survive the first year following the fire.

Looking up at the badly scorched canopy of the big fir in 2018, one year after the fire

The group of younger Douglas fir around the big tree didn’t fare as well. Some had been immediately killed by the fire, while others that survived the initial blaze seemed to have lost too much living canopy to recover from the fire (below). During that first summer, the combined loss of green canopy and stress from the annual drought season was too much for many of these trees to survive their first year after the fire.

The scorched big fir and its smaller companions in 2018, one year after the fire

As the big fir at Shepperd’s Dell entered its second winter season after the fire in 2018-19, it wasn’t looking good at all. It has put on almost no new growth that year, and the annual needle drop that fall left even more blackened, bare limbs exposed.

Worse, the Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT) was cutting down what it deemed to be hazard trees along the historic highway in the wake of the fire. This included scores of trees around Shepperd’s Dell, some of them living trees that were impacted by the fire, but still surviving. Its haggard appearance at the time (below) put the big fir at great risk of being defined a “hazard” by highway crews, but thankfully, it was spared from the chainsaws.

The Shepperd’s Dell fir in 2019… with less than half its canopy intact, the old tree was still hanging on…

Then, in the spring of 2019, the big fir pushed out a modest flush of new growth on its surviving limbs in its second season of growth following the fire. It wasn’t much, but it did signal that the tree was finally starting to rebound from the fire. It was no longer losing ground in its recovery.

As the spring of 2020 unfolded, our world seemed to stop as the COVID pandemic swept the globe, but for the big fir at Shepperd’s Dell, things were clearly looking up. The tree put on another flush of new growth in its third year following the fire, then another flush of new growth followed in the spring of 2021. While we hunkered down in the pandemic, the big fir was making its comeback (below).

The big fir makes a comeback: three growing seasons between these images show significant recovery of the crown and middle canopy

[click here for a larger version of this comparison]

Looking up into the canopy in 2021, the change in just three years of gradual recovery is dramatic (below). The big fir has been rebuilding its living canopy and thereby restoring its ability to actively grow, once again. Surprisingly, some of the new growth was also emerging from limbs that seemed to have been lost in that first year after the fire, but apparently had just enough living cambium layer left to allow new growth to emerge through the blackened bark.

Looking up into the recovering canopy of the big fir in late 2021

Today, the future of the big fir at Shepperd’s Dell seems much brighter. Its recovery is remarkable, considering how many of its neighbors were lost to the fire (below). But that’s no accident. Our largest conifers — Douglas Fir, Ponderosa Pine and Western Larch — typically drop their lower limbs as they grow. This adaption focuses growth at the top of their canopies, where they can absorb the most sunlight, but it also helps protect their living crowns when fires sweep through by denying a “ladder” of lower limbs that allow fire to climb up the tree to the main canopy.

Low intensity fires reinforce this adaptation, with the lowest limbs of moderately burned trees often succumbing to the fire, even as the tree survives, placing its crown still further above the reach of future moderate intensity burns. These “cool” fires are beneficial, helping thin the forest, remove accumulated fuel, invigorate the leafy understory and allow the largest trees to live on to continue anchoring the forest. Combined with thick, fire-resistant bark, these big conifer species define the “fire forests” along the east slopes of the Cascades, where fire is an essential part of the ecosystem, though Douglas Fir grows throughout the Cascades.

The big fir survives! But some of its companions did not…

While some of the area burned in the 2017 Eagle Creek fire fit the definition of “beneficial”, vast areas burned far too hot for any trees to survive, requiring whole ecosystems to restart from bare soil, and in turn, exposing bare soil to serious erosion. Today, modern forest management is increasingly embracing prescribed burns with moderately hot fires to mimic the frequent beneficial burns that were common before modern fire suppression began in the early 1900s. While still controversial for the risk that prescribed burns can potentially bring to rural property, their overwhelming benefit to the forest and role in preventing catastrophic fires is unquestionable.

Look closely at the burn patterns following the Eagle Creek Fire, and you will also see big conifers growing in moist canyons or shaded north-facing slopes were more likely to survive the fire. This has to do with the timing of the blaze. When the fire swept through over Labor Day weekend in 2017, Oregon’s forests were at their most stressed point in the growing season, with several months of drought and hot weather drying trees out and making their extremely vulnerable to fire.

Yet, trees with better access to moisture during the annual drought cycle are able to stay fully hydrated, and are much less vulnerable to the intense heat of a forest fire. This is also why some of our largest trees are found where summer moisture is available. Look at the bark on many of these trees, and you are likely to see ancient burn marks, often from multiple fires that these trees have survived over their long lives. As our forests cope with a changing, warming climate, these conditions favorable to survival will become increasingly important if we hope to continue to have big trees in our forests.

Aerial view of Shepperd’s Dell from 2019 showing the historic highway curving gracefully around the shaded hollow holding the big fir (ODOT image)

What does the future hold for the big fir at Shepperd’s Dell? In the near future, this old tree suddenly has less competition for water and nutrients from nearby trees that succumbed to the fire. For the longer term, it enjoys an excellent location for survival, growing in a shaded, moist bowl surrounded by protective cliffs that buffer it from the seemingly perpetual Columbia Gorge winds.

Douglas fir can live for centuries, and there’s no reason this old tree can’t outlive every human being walking on the planet today – and their children and grandchildren, too! Its most lethal threat is probably us. So, hopefully we will continue to give it the respect and space to grow that Sam Lancaster provided with his curving highway design more than a century ago, allowing many future generations to marvel at this old survivor, just as we do.

Previous WyEast Blog articles on the remarkable George Shepperd:

The Farmer and his Dell

Heirs to George Shepperd’s Legacy