Spring Cleaning

April has been a busy time for the Trail Crew. We are currently in the process of hiring our summer seasonal employees, and there is a great deal of preparation to be made so that we can make full use of our extra (wo)man power in the coming months. Our first priority has been tying off loose ends by putting the finishing touches on our various projects at Green Valley State Park. This will allow us to smoothly transition to the more trail oriented projects we will work on once our summer team has been assembled.

The bulk of our time has been spent with shovels and chisels in hand, as we installed new rock borders around each of Green Valley's three cabins and re-graded the ground around the newest cabin. This was time consuming and tedious work, as we had to ensure that each of the borders was straight, (reasonably) level, and properly aligned with its corresponding cabin. We then had to adjust the soil height within the borders so that a sufficient volume of gravel could be placed around the cabin, the goal being to prevent the formation of mud holes under the roof's drip-line as well as to keep weeds from growing around the cabins.

Adam and Ceith break ground to install a new limestone border.

Our limestone border in place and properly aligned.

The rest of our time at Green Valley was spent working on various miscellaneous projects, such as cleaning and touching up the cabin interiors, cleaning the house we've been staying in, minor maintenance on the facilities of the park, and cutting down cedar trees to be used in another project (more on that later). However we have more preparatory work to do beyond tying up our loose ends. In order to be effective leaders this summer, we must have a solid understanding of the methods Trail Crew employs on the trails, and the ability to efficiently coordinate a sizeable team of people with varying levels of experience.

Delilah and Ceith detail a cabin by staining the interior.

Adam works on felling a tree.

Timber!

Delilah drags the freshly felled tree to the limb pile...

...Where Ceith cuts off the limbs...

...And then loads the log onto our truck for transport!

Always trying to be efficient, we stationed ourselves at Palisades Kepler State Park near Cedar Rapids, Iowa. This park had been affected significantly by the flood of 2008, and still needed some minor attention. It is also in close proximity to several parks that Trail Crew has worked at over the years. This made it easy for us to accomplish several things at once: to revisit several former projects (and thereby gain a better understanding how to address specific trail problems), and to provide assistance to a park in need.

Our project at Palisades was to replace a flood damaged fence, using the cedar logs we had cut down at Green Valley. While we wanted to participate as much as possible, there was too much to get done in a week, and assistance was needed. This came to us in the form a corrections crew that was serving community service in the area. We trained this crew to prep the cedar logs, dig appropriately sized holes, and to erect the limestone pillars that would serve as the foundation for the fence. This then freed us up to tour trails at Palisades, Pleasant Creek, and the Mines of Spain.

Adam mixes mortar for our stone pillars.

Members of the corrections crew use the mortar to build the stone pillar.

A finished stone pillar, ready to be attached to the process cedar logs we brought from Green Valley.

While touring trails we explored the various problems that trails can face as well as the potential solutions. The most common problem is erosion of a trail due to a combination of rain water and heavy usage. This can not only make a trail difficult or uncomfortable to use, it can also make them dangerous. It also makes them aesthetically unappealing and disruptive to the natural experience that most hikers are looking for on the trail. Luckily there are many solutions to the problem of erosion.

The first and best solution is preventative: construct the trail so that water sheds off the trail easily and evenly so that ruts and gullies don’t form and channel even more water. It is a simple fact of physics that water will follow the path of least resistance, and so a trail must be constructed with the natural terrain in mind so that water will “choose” to travel across the surrounding terrain rather than the trail itself. Constructing the trail grade so that it is shallow in relation to the natural terrain is the best way to accomplish this, as a steeper grade provides less resistance to water flow.

Unfortunately it is difficult to predict the behavior of water on a trail as it being created, so post-construction solutions are often required. These include (but aren’t limited to) rolling dips, water bars and culverts. Rolling dips are gradual undulations in the trail’s grade that cause water to shed off the trail (as it can’t travel uphill). Water bars are physical objects (such as railroad ties) that are buried under the trail to elevate its surface, thereby creating mini dams that push water off the trail. Culverts are a situational solution, serving as a conduit for water to travel through under a trail. Unfortunately this also causes water to concentrate in a small area, and can cause erosion problems downhill if they aren’t installed conscientiously.

With the summer hiring process coming to a close, Trail Crew has plenty more preparations to make and our real work has just begun. Bringing in the summer team is only going to increase Trail Crew’s workload, and that means more to report here! So expect even more exciting updates as we begin to move into summer. Happy Spring everyone!