Words by Kyle von Hoetzendorff, Interviews by Daniel Wakefield Pasley
“You say volunteer group, I say no way, there are enough delinquents, lay bouts, and wasteoids out there to pick up 10 worlds full of highway trash. Tell you the truth the last time I checked, money walked and bullshit picked up trash along the highway. Why do you think I would have time to volunteer? Time is money, money is time, and when I am not making one I am losing the other. The world is one big time money pie and I eat pie, boy do I eat pie.”—Asshole
Fortunately not everyone thinks this way. And fortunately volunteering is not strictly limited to picking up roadside refuse, not that there is any shame in volunteering to gather the cigarette butts and McDonald’s soda cups of the our commercial arteries. Sure we all have to make our way in this world. The gift/burden of birth is our ingrained drive to survive and that drive does much to determine our decisions, but that doesn't mean we have to be all Gordon Gekko and rush to pillage the worlds jewels. In fact, some of us actually like the idea of being able to insure that others will have the chance to pillage if they want to or maybe and hopefully they don’t want to because maybe they are more interested in seeing and experiencing nature with the same level of appreciation that drove the previous generation to work to secure the worlds jewels.
Groups like the Siskiyou Mountain Club put in penal colony level work so that others can experience a Natural Habitat. They restore old trails and develop new trails, putting side cuts into the rock serpentine geology of the Kalmiopsis, brave the chance bear, the entrenched drug cartels, and pernicious mining companies just to spend all day sweating in the high alpine sun working on a stretch of trail that at a regular walking speed would take less than 10 minutes to cover. They chip away, submit forms, hold meetings, gather signatures, and carpool in their free time to make sure that you and I have the ability to see a place that could so easily have been consumed by the rapacious gluttony of modern culture. Volunteer groups like the Siskiyou Mountain Club so often serve as the thankless stewards of our outdoors. They don't wear uniforms, they have no badges, and there is nothing about their act of volunteering that encourages braggadocio. Yonder Journal would like to give a special salute to the Siskiyou Mountain Club and other clubs and volunteer organizations out there that have been instrumental in developing and maintaining wild spaces for the rest of us. Without their hard work future generations would be forced to hike through the potted ferns staged between the HotDog On A Stick (HDOS) and the Cinnabon, wondering exactly what type of animal the new cologne from Maxim (For the Maxim Man) most strongly evokes, and for that we are eternally grateful.
What follows is a series of brief interviews with members/volunteers of a Siskiyou Mountain Club mini-Spike on the Illinois Trail, 4 January 2014.
Gabe Howe, Siskiyou Mountain Club Executive Director
We are a 501(c)(3) organization founded to maintain and promote trails in the Siskiyou backcountry, and to provide the public with outdoor experiences. There are a variety of challenges you face with trail maintenance: clearing brush, removing downed trees, building and maintaining drainage features, rock walls, steps, et cetera. We have a few different programs. For the community at large as well as college students we lead trips for a day or the weekend or an entire week. I'm really excited about a program we run that employs youth (18-25) from southwest Oregon (Josephine, Jackson, Curry counties) during the summer; they not only get a lot of good work done for the Organization but it's a great opportunity for them to experience the Siskiyous.
There is a lot of focus (from the outside) on the rivers, the flowers, the animals—all of which really are what make this region so spectacular—but the reason I do this, is for the opportunity to provide experiences and form relationships, it's for the people. When we engage new volunteers on a trail trip it does two things. First, you're providing volunteers with the chance to experience and enjoy the wilderness through an unusual and gratifying activity, in a place they would likely never see otherwise. Second, you're providing future hikers with a better and less negatively impactful trail experience—e.g., those places where people are forced to circumvent the established trail, because of poor trail conditions like downfall and other types of obstructions, will invariably suffer from erosion and impact on the native tread. Working on these trails limits those negative effects.
I do, personally, find the technical aspect of trail work really cool, and obviously it's fun cutting big trees and solving complicated problems, but ultimately I'm most interested instruction. Showing someone where and how and why to use various tools and techniques empowers them, it encourages them to take conservation into their own hands. People are inundated with abstract ways to "do good." On the other hand, volunteering is a way for people to experience the environment first-hand, to contribute through sweat and effort, and to clearly see the difference they've made—as soon as you start working the difference you make becomes immediately apparent, and that's a powerful feeling, especially for young people.
Trail Skills Colleges all around the country offer certification, but I think you learn the most by working with others outside of a formal or bureaucratic setting. I favor the Old tricks, wisdom that gets passed down. We work really closely with a gentlemen named Wayne, he consults professionally. Over the years I've probably spent less than sixteen hours total working a trail with him, but in that time he's taught me a tremendous amount about different techniques. All of the skills we use are very basic; the expertise comes from using those skills over and over, and using them in different situations with different problems. Honestly, the tools themselves are cool; the crosscut saw for example is an amazing piece of American engineering. But most of the work you actually do out here is quite basic—there are always different setups and challenges but at the end of the day all you're trying to do is preserve a trail that's attractive and useful and low impact for users.
Without the SMC there would be no strategy in place for restoring Southwest Oregon's wilderness trails. There were historic wildfires and historic maintenance deferments (starting with George W. Bush) happening concurrently. In general trails need to be maintained on about a five year cycle; after five years trails start to get brushed in, after ten years they become difficult to pass, after fifteen years they become difficult to follow, and after twenty years it's likely the trail will become invisible. There are a large number of trails out here that haven't been touched at all in over ten years, and that's compounded by the fact that we've had big wildfires come through. The agencies, especially the Forest Service, have been so strapped financially that without the SMC there would be no plan in place to restore these trails, which are historic, beautifully engineered and which represent a legacy constructed by previous generations. Historic trails to the Chetco River or Mule Creek would be totally lost and impassable without the work we've done. They grow over, get logged in, and then there's no option but to remove them from maps. They become lost.
Will Volpert, Siskiyou Mountain Club Board of Directors Chairperson
Before working with the SMC I'd never done trail work before, however I had enjoyed the benefits of trail work plenty of times, including all over Southern Oregon— I own and run Indigo Creek Outfitters, a white water rafting company in the area. When Gabe first contacted me about volunteering with SMC, I immediately recognized that trail work would put me in the kinds of remote places I wanted to be in, for any number of reasons. I'm still far from an expert on trail work; most of the trips we do are what we call Spikes (10+ day trips) in the summer when I'm the busiest with rafting. While trail work is our primary function, being on the Board is about planning for the future of the organization, developing strategic plans, finding funding, and growing the organization. There are 65 official members of the Club; the majority of our funding comes from grants and contracts. It's a 501(c)(3), and we raise less than $100,000 a year. We do things efficiently, we are constantly looking for ways to conserve funding and we avoid unnecessary expenses. We try to spend money in the field, on the trail, on things that directly affect the work.
I remember the first time I went out, Gabe took me out into the Soda Mountains to work on a trail off the PCT. We found three huge trees stacked up next to each other. I'd used a chainsaw before but never a hand tool, especially on something so large. After we cleared those trees, I was a believer.
The biggest thing we ask of our volunteers, is a great attitude. Pushing people past their limits in not our goal, but our trips require people to be pretty self-sufficient. We always meet and screen people who want to go on extended trips or Spikes, but any beginner who is eager and positive is welcome to come, regardless of what training they have. When it comes down to it, we can basically hand anyone a pair of loppers and they will learn a lot of helpful and useful skills just by tagging along.
Aaron Babcock, Siskiyou Mountain Club Field Coordinator
The first thing about the Kalmiopsis is that it's rugged, it's tough to get in here. But if you're willing to deal with the slopes and the trees and the brush, you'll be amply rewarded.
I grew up just west of Portland in a town called Banks. I sell Fatwood, its fire starter made from the centers of old stumps—a byproduct of logging. The centers are really pitchy so they light very easily. Before selling Fatwood I fought fires for about seven years, I was based out of Oregon but I went all over. Eventually I ran a 20-person crew. Trail clearing is a continuation of that, although it's a little more predictable. I'm not going to get called up in the middle of the night and given two hours to get ready.
I think the Government entities who control all of these places have kind of let them go, so when Gabe started the SMC I was happy to come out and help. There are some beautiful areas out here, some great trails that let you see places you wouldn't be able to otherwise. In general, trail clearing and trail maintenance seems to have taken a step back in the last few years. Things have just gone downhill. And as trails go by the wayside fewer people come out to enjoy these areas, which means there are fewer and fewer people interested in and/or inspired to protect the same—it's this simple, in order to protect these places we have to get people into them. Seeing a picture and seeing a map is just not the same as first-hand experience. So when someone wants to start mining a creek that no one has ever been to it's like well, maybe that's fine.
Any type of hoe is great if you're doing tread work, although a Pulaski is almost always a better choice. If it's tree work, the hand saw is my favorite tool. The cross cut saw is great but it's a bit limited.
Lori Ann Turbes
I came to explore the Kalmiopsis, and to help get it protected from all these damn miners. I think the big saw is my favorite trail tool.
Kimberly Rachel Vasquez Gonzalez
I've hiked a lot and kicked plenty of sticks out of the way, but I've never really done trail clearing before. Cutting that huge log with the crosscut saw was awesome, I felt powerful. I'll definitely do it again. I do plenty of stuff for myself, so why not come and help out? I feel like it's something I should do.
Geoff Phillips
I'd never seen a two-person crosscut before today. It has a buttery quality and I'm amazed at how efficient it is, especially considering how archaic the technique appears. I'm a river goer so the Illinois Valley has long been on my list of places to see, but in general I find this whole area fascinating. Now the Chetco is on my list as well.
Michael David Dodson
I definitely believe in giving back to the communities you live in, and I certainly use these trails. This is the first time I've done trail work without a pulaski or McLeod, which are trail building and marking tools—this trip has been more about clearing trail. I really love making and blazing new trail, it's rewarding.
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