MVTC Early Season Work through 5/10/2025
We hired a second Nick to add capacity to the collab crew. He loves running saw, and clearing trails. Increasing our paid staff is important since the FS’s work force is so diminished this year. With a diminished workforce comes fewer trails logged out, and you may wonder where to go to learn what has been maintained this season. That is why we are creating the log blog, a public resource where you can learn what has been maintained by Collaborative staff, volunteers, or partners across the Methow Valley Ranger District. Here’s a highlight reel of work accomplished since both Nick’s started on April 28th.
Wolf Creek: logged out road and the first three and a half miles of the trail on 04/30. The Nick’s cleared about 25 logs in this distance, so expect more down beyond since most of the trail is in high sevarity burn. The trail is cleared past the foot log MVTC installed in 2024. The tread is in good condition, and the annual brush has not yet grown.
Lake Creek: A lighter log load than usual, with only 18 smaller diameter logs between the trailhead and Black Lake. After 1.5 to 2 miles, the brush on this trail becomes can be intense and varies from annoying to downright frustrating for another 2(ish) miles. The lake however, will happily greet any user who can pull through the thick of it.
Eagle/Oval: There were about 8 trees down on the road just to get to the trailhead. Thankfully, Nick(the other one) keeps his chainsaw chain sharp and his gas tank full. From the trailhead to the wilderness boundary had 20 small trees whose only tactic of intimidation was a mess of entangled limbs. The creek crossing as of 5/7 is up to the mid-shin at deepest and moving swiftly, but certainly negotiable. The half mile from the wilderness boundary to the where the trail junctions stayed consistent with logs(12), but mostly smaller, easy to step over- with one notable exception. Based on previous years, it’s reasonable to expect more logs heading to either lake, but hopefully few of the kind that stick out in your memory at the end of a trip.
Scatter Creek: Nick, Nick, and one really strong volunteer swamper cut out all the logs up to the wilderness boundary; about 50 decent sized trees deemed “good cuttin’” by trigger happy sawyers. MVTC then hosted a volunteer work party of 6 hardworking folks and 3 of our staff to expand upon some long overdue brushing and tread work that was done last year. We successfully cleared 1400 feet of heinous brush and repaired 500 feet of tread, tying off the brunt of the work needed before the wilderness boundary. While the work done was impressive, there is still more brush and logs past the wilderness boundary.
West Fork of the Methow: Logged out to the Trout Creek crossing. Only a few logs down, and some narrow tread addressed. Two rattlesnakes were spotted, some next to snow patches.