Tom's National Park Adventure

Today I branched out and took a short drive to check out the coastal area close to where I am camped.

The entire national park came about much after the state of California had already taken steps to protect the Redwoods. In 1908 the first “Society to protect the Redwoods” was formed in the San Francisco area. There was even one gentleman who purchased over 300 acres of Redwood forest and donated it to the state in order to protect them. The state created three different state parks to do the same. In 1968 the federal government created the national park. The enlarged the size of the park in 1978.

The logging industry kept on cutting down the trees the whole time this was happening. There were protesters in the 1970’s that went so far as to climb into the trees and live in them to prevent them from being harvested. There was one lady who lived in a Redwood for over two years. She was able to save that tree, but all the forest around it was cut down.

The Redwoods dominate the sky and are the roof of the canopy in these forests. There are other large trees like Douglas firs that also live here.

Occasionally you will see several Redwoods that have grown in a straight line. That is because there was a “nurse tree” that fell down long ago and the new trees started life growing in the downed tree.

Each Redwood is its own ecosystem. There is all kinds of life that lives in and on each tree. There are micro areas of soil that collect in the voids and areas where branches grow out from the trunks. Years of birds nest and other organic material collect there and other plants and fungi grow on the trees. There is a type of salamander that lives in these areas. They will go their whole lives living up there and never touch the ground!

There are many streams and rivers that run through this area. The Smith River is the largest around here. Steelhead/Cutthroat Trout and Chinook Salman spawn in these bodies of water. The indigenous people used to harvest them with nets, spears and water wheels.

The largest animals in the area are the Roosevelt Elk. I was lucky enough to see three of them while driving up the 101 highway. No time to take a picture. There are also Black Bears, Mule deer and Fishers that live here too. I literally almost walked into a Mule deer doe today on a hiking path when I came around a blind corner. Again not enough time to get a picture!