Goal is to reduce fire hazards along popular biking and walking path where Almeda Fire swept through in 2020

By Shaun Hall, Rogue Valley Times

Work is underway to remove woody debris, berry bushes and hazard trees along the Bear Creek Greenway through Talent and Phoenix, where the Almeda Fire burned in 2020.

The work, undertaken with a $685,000 grant from the Oregon State Fire Marshal, is intended to reduce fire hazards along the popular walking and biking path.

The work includes thinning vegetation up to 30 feet on each side of the trail and access paths. The cut vegetation and woody debris will be chipped and mulched and some of it burned.

The job also includes the cutting of dead trees, but leaving a few standing trunks, their crowns cut off, as wildlife “snags.”

The work began April 10 and is expected to continue into the fall except during fire season. Closures of the popular hiking-biking trail through certain work areas are expected to take place 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. weekdays. Closures are posted on the parks page of the Jackson County government website.

Work currently is taking place on the project’s southern end, in a stretch about a mile long from the Creel Road area in Talent to the Wrangler’s Arena area between Talent and Ashland. In coming weeks and months, work will progress to the north, with the next stretch due to be worked on extending from the Creel Road area north for about a mile to near Wagner Creek.

The work is being administered by Jackson County and managed by The Freshwater Trust, in collaboration with cities, fire officials, law enforcement, parks and restoration organizations. Bartlett Tree Service is doing the work on the ground, under a $522,600 contract.

Steve Lambert, county parks director, said the project has involved collaboration between organizations. For example, tree-cutters don’t always agree with environmentalists, but Lambert said that’s not the case on this project.

“We all got the same kind of goals,” he said. “We want it for different purposes.”

Brian Bolstad, battalion chief with Fire District No. 5, said he had “nothing but good” to say about the project.

“It’s been a very collaborative process,” he said. “I’ve toured it twice now. It’s making a big difference in reducing the fuels and reducing the fire risk.”

The work provides fire crews more access in case of wildfire and provides firefighters with cleared areas that serve as fire breaks, where there’s less fuel to burn.

“We can navigate that area,” Bolstad said. “The fuels aren’t continuous.”

The removal of fast-burning berries in favor of native plants is a win for the environment and fire protection, he said.

“The Freshwater Trust is worried about the ecology and the health of the environment,” Bolstad said. “A good result for them is a good result for us.”

Since 2020, The Freshwater Trust, as part of an Ashland wastewater mitigation project, has been planting native trees in areas along Bear Creek from Ashland to Central Point, in an effort to provide shade and keep water in the creek cool. That project seeks to mitigate the effects of the city’s wastewater system, which adds relatively warm water to the creek.

“We’re very involved in river restoration,” said Taylor Owen, Greenway project manager for The Freshwater Trust. “We do riparian restoration.”

While the Greenway work is focused on fuels reduction, there will be some reseeding of areas disturbed by the work. Much of the fuels-reduction work is focused on removing so-called ladder fuels near the ground, in an effort to keep any flames from reaching tree crowns.

The work mainly involves clearing or thinning of live and dead small trees and shrubs and the felling of dead trees while leaving some as wildlife snags:

• Dead trees less than a foot in diameter will be felled, stacked and burned. Some dead trees a foot or more in diameter will be left on the ground, while some that are safely away from paths will be left standing as wildlife snags, with their crowns trimmed to reduce falling branches. Two to eight snags will be left per acre. Dead hazard trees near paths will be removed. Some dead trees will be left in piles as wildlife habitat.

• Thinning and pruning of live native vegetation is to take place within 20 to 30 feet of the Greenway and access routes. Invasive vegetation such as berry bushes will be cleared outside of a 50-foot buffer on each side of the creek. No work is to take place within 50 feet of the creek. Masticators will grind smaller woody debris and vegetation into chunks and mulch.

In addition to the current project, the county expects to target invasive species such as Himalayan blackberry and poisonous hemlock over the next five years using a separate $900,000 grant, according to Lambert.

To get the latest information about weekday closures of the Greenway, visit jacksoncountyor.gov and navigate to the parks page. For more information, contact county parks at 541-774-8183.

Reach Rogue Valley Times outdoors and environmental reporter Shaun Hall at 458-225-7179 or shall@rv-times.com. This story first appeared in the Rogue Valley Times.

Related stories:

Ashland Parks Commissioners approve contract for continued riparian restoration (Jan. 19, 2024)

High school students help with post-fire restoration (April 6, 2022)

Work continues to revegetate Ashland Pond open space (Feb. 7, 2022)