In October 2012 Jim Erdman submitted a 26-page report http://mummyrangeinstitute.org/glacier-view-natural-history.pdf to the Mummy Range Institute which has featured it on their website. It is a “must read” for those of us who love the ecology, geology and beauty of GVM. Thank you Jim for your lucid writing and beautiful photos! For more information on the important work being done by the Mummy Institute, visit their website http://mummyrangeinstitute.org/.
4/3/2011 In the previous post, Jim accessed the new Elkhorn Creek Trail from the Log Cabin Rd. I asked him if that was the same as the Boy Scout Rd. He emailed: “Log Cabin Road and Boy Scout Road (CR 68C), the same, although the latter name appears in Among These Hills: A History of Livermore, Colorado. The former stems from the Log Cabin Hotel, post office, and stage stop at the T juncture of CR 68C with the Red Feather Lakes Road (CR 74E). One can still see the concrete foundation of one of the buildings.” Thanks for the clarification and history lesson, Jim.
Jim sent additional information from that book on p. 26 : “The two-story [hotel] structure was originally built at the Ashley Grange, a place for training young English ‘remittance’ men how to become ranchers. It had been moved several miles north to this site in 1888 . . ..” Jim added “Such men appear to have been not a rarity in the Livermore region.”
Jim Erdman forwarded an email exchange he had with Laurie Huckaby (USFS specialist in the fire history of this region — her passion, tree rings)
On 11/02/2009 Laurie wrote: “The last widespread fire in the Kelly Flats area was actually in the fall of 1871….I pick up the 1871 fire date in Young’s Gulch as well. There was a more localized event in 1880, a date that shows up at Gateway Park, too. The important thing to note about the historical fire regime is that although you could say there was a fire in any given location every 30 to 60 years, many of those fires were very localized, and fire frequency and intensity were not consistent through time. The late 1700s-early 1800s were a cold, wet period with reduced fire frequency; the mid-1800s were warm and dry, with more frequent fire that coincided with the settlement of this area. Direct fire suppression was not all that effective in your area [GVM] until the 1940s and 1950s, but heavy grazing in the late 1800s-early 1900s effectively stopped fire spread during that period. As for the oldest ponderosa pines, there are several living ones that date into the 1300s not too far from you. There is one on the Shambala Mountain Center property (near Red Feather Lakes) that dates to 1321, and one on the north rim at Pingree Hill that dates to 1336. Go to Peter Brown’s OLDLIST website to see a list of old trees submitted by tree-ring scientists. I finally got a chance to cut that stump John [Popp] and I collected. It is a Rocky Mountain Juniper! I didn’t expect that. It has no fire scars but lots of rings. Hopefully I’ll get a chance to date it in the next couple of weeks. I’ll let you know when I do.”
11/2/2009 Part of Jim Erdman’s email response: “…Dating that juniper in what you’d called “a pretty interesting place” — the Mount Peale green belt — may help with that charred ponderosa stump nearby. I cored a close-by, very young ponderosa established since the burn, and you dated the pith at only 1930! The site by Iron Mountain Drive lies in a very mesic spot where I’m sure snow accumulates.”
Read about the observations of Linda Bell and Jim Erdman on the distribution of Mountain Sagebrush in GVM and Red Feather Lakes. Jim also reviewed the recent changes in sagebrush taxomomy he first discussed in his post last fall.
On Wednesday, May 20, at 9:30am Jim Erdman will host a visit by Laurie Huckaby of the US Forest Service. Laura has been dating several of Jim’s cores from large ponderosa pines in GVM. Jim provided these details: Continue reading Fire History Excursion
Glacier View Meadows Ecology 