Franklin Ridge 8/8/2022

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squidvicious
Posts: 525
Joined: May 11th, 2015, 8:41 pm
Location: Troutdale

Franklin Ridge 8/8/2022

Post by squidvicious » August 10th, 2022, 7:57 am

tl;dr: Franklin Ridge is brushed out

On Monday I set out to hike Larch Mountain from the top. When I got to the junction with Franklin Ridge, I noticed that the signage had finally been replaced. I'd last been that way around the end of June and it was terrible, but surely they wouldn't put up shiny new signs without also clearing the trail? A loop to Oneonta sounded more appealing than a simple out-and-back, so I decided to check it out for my return.

At first it didn't look like anyone at all had been that way recently, but as I went on I started seeing signs of recent trail work. It was already growing back in, but it had definitely been cleared at some point. I happily pressed on until the trail... just stopped. Wall of solid matted brush. Well, it's not that much worse than last time, and at least this time it will be a bit shorter, so I pressed on.

After a while of blindly forcing my way through I thought I heard voices. And sure enough, before too long I popped out of the brush onto clear trail again, and a trail crew working at it from the opposite end. So assuming they didn't just stop again, Franklin Ridge should now be clear for your looping and connecting pleasure. Please go out and give it lots of use to keep it that way.

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bobcat
Posts: 2764
Joined: August 1st, 2011, 7:51 am
Location: SW Portland

Re: Franklin Ridge 8/8/2022

Post by bobcat » August 10th, 2022, 9:21 am

I think TKO crews are going up there. I was on some of the first crews that cleared Franklin Ridge after the fire - but only after two solid summers of growth. We had six-foot willows and cherries growing up in the middle of the trail and thimbleberries spreading their rhizomes with abandon. The lack of a canopy after the fire just encouraged an explosion of undergrowth. The ridge itself is actually a scree pile of compacted rock, which roots can penetrate but cannot be dug out of unless you gouge a two-foot deep trench out of the rock, so the shrubbery will come back again and again, less aggressively after a canopy forms after about 25 years. You can't just clear this trail and leave it alone for a few years or it will disappear. Indeed, after only two years there were sections we couldn't find and so we did some reroutes closer to the edge.

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