No destination just a report of lesser publicized hiking activity
I joined some folks from the MATC Saturday to do some corridor boundary work over on the AT north of Andover ME. Corridor Boundary work is definitely a little publicized definitely non glamourous part of keeping the AT from being encroached upon whether intentionally or unintentionally by abutters and others.
Dave Field the long term "guru" of the AT lands in Maine led the trip. Dave was instrumental in laying out the parcels in Maine over the years and was instrumental in routing the trails to the ridgelines out of the valleys over the years. Some interesting "factoids" was that the AT at one point stayed off the ridgeline and was mostly on old roads from the Frye Brook in Andover all the way to Piazza Rock near Sugarloaf. Another interesting one was that the Maine AT has a longer boundary that requires maintenance than Yellowstone NP (301 miles). I expect that Yellowstone has a lot of BLM and other federal lands that really dont require similair maintenance as there are no private abutters.
The area we worked in is abutted by working forest land and as evident by the drive in and the condition of the woods, is being targetted for harvesting as the trees are of merchantable size and are predominately sugar maples. The AT corridor was aquired approximately 25 years ago and generally the strip is 1000 feet wide (but is subject to vary). Each sideline was ax blazed and AT monuments were set approximately at 600 to 800 foot intervals. Each monument has three blazed witness trees to assist in relocation the monuments which have been known to get covered with vegetation.
In the ensuing 20 plus years, the blazes on the trees are starting to fade with many of the line trees dead or fallen over. Luckilly responsible abutters like to keep their lines intact so some of the lines have been reblazed over the years. The goal of the weekends effort was to locate the sidelines, clear them minimally to develop a sight line, repaint all the blazes, verify and record the monuments existence and check the witness trees. The surveys were done by a variety of surveying firms (generally the low bidder) and the quaility of the surveys and blazing varied. The section we were on was done by a firm with less than a stellar reputation at the time, so we also took notes on how well the survey held up. GPS was not in common use at the time so we had to work off the original NPS tract maps (although I expect the monument coordinates could be calculated using the survey data).
The MATC has a commitment to the NPS that every line will be walked on a yearly basis, sooner if there is activity in the area and if the area is very remote, possibly at longer intervals. In order to to walk it, the line has to be followable so thats what the work trip entailed. Cooridor monitors are not required to clear their section (although many do), so the work weekends are a way of getting sections done with a group.
We lucked out for part of the day, getting to traverse mature hardwood stands with minimal understory and then regenerating stands where the moose have been trimming the understory for years. In a few spots we encoutered large fern beds which were obvious bedding spots for the local moose. We really didnt trim agressively in thse areas as hobblebush and striped maple would start regrowing as soon as we cut it.
My weapon of choice was swedish brush ax, while others had some slick folding bush cutters that allowed cutting of low brush without bending over. It was a good combination with Dave Field yielding the paint can and brush. Dave's task was pretty daunting as he had to keep the can upright in dense growth without getting covered with paint. In the open woods he had go pretty fast to keep up, but in the dense stuff he got to wait as we cut a path.
Eventually we had ascended the mountain up out of a gap from C Surplus Pond and encountered the softwood band. This was very slow as the trees were dense with softwood and there were few large line trees. We resorted to skipping around the thickest spots and then backtracking, on occasion taking a bearing. Mostly we looked for older trimming, pieces of old flagging and a occasionally a standing tree (usually dead) with a blaze on it. From there we would trim out the line while not leaving too much of a swath (usually 2 to 3 feet wide). This was extremely slow work, at one point we spent more than an hour going less than 500 feet. Luckilly we broke out of little stuff eventually and got in some nice mature softwood carpeted with moss.
After getting a bit of shower we elected to head back via the AT's easterly boundary (closed to southerly in this area). One of the bigger challenges of the day was to locate the sideline by walking perpendicular to the AT, we followed a very well developed moose path, but it still took a lot of looking to find a faint ax blaze with some faded out paint. From there we headed south skirting open hardwoods, unfortunately running into thick fir stands right along the line. After officially calling it a day we cut back to the AT and headed back to the campsite at C surplus Pond. I had to head home but other folks were coming in for the next day.
MATC is a no nonsense club, they have a big piece of the AT and definitely the most remote, they tend to be based in Central Maine and therefore western Maine get a bit less attention than it deserves. If you are interested in getting out where few folks go and like routefinding its a nice way to give back to the trail.
I joined some folks from the MATC Saturday to do some corridor boundary work over on the AT north of Andover ME. Corridor Boundary work is definitely a little publicized definitely non glamourous part of keeping the AT from being encroached upon whether intentionally or unintentionally by abutters and others.
Dave Field the long term "guru" of the AT lands in Maine led the trip. Dave was instrumental in laying out the parcels in Maine over the years and was instrumental in routing the trails to the ridgelines out of the valleys over the years. Some interesting "factoids" was that the AT at one point stayed off the ridgeline and was mostly on old roads from the Frye Brook in Andover all the way to Piazza Rock near Sugarloaf. Another interesting one was that the Maine AT has a longer boundary that requires maintenance than Yellowstone NP (301 miles). I expect that Yellowstone has a lot of BLM and other federal lands that really dont require similair maintenance as there are no private abutters.
The area we worked in is abutted by working forest land and as evident by the drive in and the condition of the woods, is being targetted for harvesting as the trees are of merchantable size and are predominately sugar maples. The AT corridor was aquired approximately 25 years ago and generally the strip is 1000 feet wide (but is subject to vary). Each sideline was ax blazed and AT monuments were set approximately at 600 to 800 foot intervals. Each monument has three blazed witness trees to assist in relocation the monuments which have been known to get covered with vegetation.
In the ensuing 20 plus years, the blazes on the trees are starting to fade with many of the line trees dead or fallen over. Luckilly responsible abutters like to keep their lines intact so some of the lines have been reblazed over the years. The goal of the weekends effort was to locate the sidelines, clear them minimally to develop a sight line, repaint all the blazes, verify and record the monuments existence and check the witness trees. The surveys were done by a variety of surveying firms (generally the low bidder) and the quaility of the surveys and blazing varied. The section we were on was done by a firm with less than a stellar reputation at the time, so we also took notes on how well the survey held up. GPS was not in common use at the time so we had to work off the original NPS tract maps (although I expect the monument coordinates could be calculated using the survey data).
The MATC has a commitment to the NPS that every line will be walked on a yearly basis, sooner if there is activity in the area and if the area is very remote, possibly at longer intervals. In order to to walk it, the line has to be followable so thats what the work trip entailed. Cooridor monitors are not required to clear their section (although many do), so the work weekends are a way of getting sections done with a group.
We lucked out for part of the day, getting to traverse mature hardwood stands with minimal understory and then regenerating stands where the moose have been trimming the understory for years. In a few spots we encoutered large fern beds which were obvious bedding spots for the local moose. We really didnt trim agressively in thse areas as hobblebush and striped maple would start regrowing as soon as we cut it.
My weapon of choice was swedish brush ax, while others had some slick folding bush cutters that allowed cutting of low brush without bending over. It was a good combination with Dave Field yielding the paint can and brush. Dave's task was pretty daunting as he had to keep the can upright in dense growth without getting covered with paint. In the open woods he had go pretty fast to keep up, but in the dense stuff he got to wait as we cut a path.
Eventually we had ascended the mountain up out of a gap from C Surplus Pond and encountered the softwood band. This was very slow as the trees were dense with softwood and there were few large line trees. We resorted to skipping around the thickest spots and then backtracking, on occasion taking a bearing. Mostly we looked for older trimming, pieces of old flagging and a occasionally a standing tree (usually dead) with a blaze on it. From there we would trim out the line while not leaving too much of a swath (usually 2 to 3 feet wide). This was extremely slow work, at one point we spent more than an hour going less than 500 feet. Luckilly we broke out of little stuff eventually and got in some nice mature softwood carpeted with moss.
After getting a bit of shower we elected to head back via the AT's easterly boundary (closed to southerly in this area). One of the bigger challenges of the day was to locate the sideline by walking perpendicular to the AT, we followed a very well developed moose path, but it still took a lot of looking to find a faint ax blaze with some faded out paint. From there we headed south skirting open hardwoods, unfortunately running into thick fir stands right along the line. After officially calling it a day we cut back to the AT and headed back to the campsite at C surplus Pond. I had to head home but other folks were coming in for the next day.
MATC is a no nonsense club, they have a big piece of the AT and definitely the most remote, they tend to be based in Central Maine and therefore western Maine get a bit less attention than it deserves. If you are interested in getting out where few folks go and like routefinding its a nice way to give back to the trail.
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