Note: None of these pictures comes anywhere close to doing this old growth forest experience justice. That said, here's our hike through the Forest Cathedral Natural Area in Cook Forest State Park in NWPA for a circuit hike of three miles.
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| Laura among giants |
Our definition of what is considered to be old growth forest have been shifting as more scientific and cultural history of these ancient places emerges. This tract of 400 acres embedded within Cook Forest State Park is an easily accessible (multiple trailheads and parking areas) designated natural area where we can see how and why those definitions have changed over time. Sure, there are BIG trees, but there is also an abundance of downed trunks that decompose into rich soils, huge standing snags that harbor multitudes of species, and a rich understory that has grown from nurse logs and nursery stands around parent trees. Add to that, some of the biggest live trees we saw (including all of the trees smaller than them) were growing from ancient rootstock, stumps that may have been several hundred years older than the centuries-old trees that grow from them now.
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| Trailhead at the CCC "Log Cabin" access |
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| White Pines, each 350 (l) and 250 (r) years old |
We spent a solid day exploring the Forest Cathedral Natural Area and throughout the week we dipped into it from several access points. We initially entered on a loop trail that began with a steep climb from the Indian Cabins area, but later found accessible entry points at the Log Cabin EE Center (CCC) parking area, the Sawmill Center for the Arts, and even our campground trail system which bordered the natural area. Our campsite at the park's Ridge Campground was surrounded by old growth Hemlock and White Pine. For our first experience of this forest we chose to do a loop that connected several different trails to bring us back to the Indian Cabins area.
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| North Country Trail |
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| Joyce Kilmer Trail |
All the trails were wonderful as we wandered along well-maintained paths. We met up with a few other hikers who were just as in awe as we were. My favorite section was walking a mile of the blue/yellow blazed North Country Trail - the longest long distance trail in the U.S. at 4,000 miles! The forest was massive and it took our breath away more than once, leaving us uncharacteristically unable to speak. There was so much going on from craning our necks to see the tops of the ancient Hemlocks and White Pine, to crawling around on the needle-soft floor to look at mushrooms and massive trunks of old giants, that I needed a break to adjust to the constant state of overwhelm I was experiencing.
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| Xylaria sp. |
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| Pleated Pliteus |
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| Ghost Pipe |
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| Coral Fungus |
Pennsylvania was one of the most heavily logged over states in the U.S. when, by the outbreak of WWI so little remained of its once dominant old growth forest that Governor Gifford Pinchot who served earlier under President Teddy Roosevelt as the first director of the U.S. Forest Service, deemed the restoration of PA's forests a priority under his administration in the 1920s. It was during this period of intense tree planting with community-based conservation programs that the template for a national Civilian Conservation Corps was formed. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt (cousin to TR) elevated the CCC to national service and many of the trails we hiked on this day were created both by the earlier PA and New Deal National CCC service boys. But the fight to save the Cook Forest began a decade before when Gifford Pinchot served as Forestry Director under Governor Sproul in 1919.
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| Sandstone block island forest |
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| Sky openings and young trees |
Private landowners, especially those who owned large tracts of forest for logging interests, became aware of the danger to undisturbed forests in their holdings as demands for lumber sky-rocketed during WWI. At the same time, conservation interests began to raise the alarm for the protection of what was left of the old growth landscape in Pennsylvania. The Cook Family who originally owned the vast forests that now make up Cook Forest State Park entered into a project with several Pennsylvania conservationists to preserve their old growth tract, a project that would take 16 long years to complete. The process was rife with politics and big industry interests where "sinister interests were at work there." (McCreight 1936) The arduous campaign to save Cook Forest resulted in the creation of the Cook Forest Association in 1927, now the Cook Forest Conservancy and is very active today.
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| Indian Trail |
As we climbed the steep-sided valley on the Indian Trail we sunk into a forest tapestry of young, old, and very old trees while the ground cushioned our steps with layers of short needles of Eastern Hemlock and soft long needles of White Pine. We talked about our we interpret time among the old trees where a human life span was inconceivably short when compared to the multi-generational stump nurseries that spanned a thousand years or more of forest growth. The intelligence of trees, as some scientists and artists suggest, is imposed over a timescale so vast that to our minds, it is near unimaginable to think of what kinds of wisdom they hold and transmit. Even the new definitions of what is old growth seemed inadequate, even trivial.
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| The start of a Horses Hoof Fungus |
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| Dog Pelt Fungus |
I considered the idea of regeneration as we walked, passing rotting carcasses of ancient trees draped in moss, lichens, and fungal forms. Indigenous mythologies are full of stories of rebirth arising from ancient landscapes and this forest seemed full of stories. The Seneca People who once lived, fished, and hunted throughout this region (and who maintain an active presence in local conservation efforts) held in high regard the transformative, restorative powers of Storm Wind, Dàgawanoeient, and the Ga-Ha, the Zephyr - great winds that could level giant trees thus starting the process of rebuilding real and spiritual relationships with the land.
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| Allegheny Dusky Salamander |
We passed an old tornado path (1970s) and later studied the effects of a more recent microburst. New forest was evident everywhere. Change and regrowth was the constant. Even in a small circle of sun where a single giant had died and its canopy no longer shaded the forest floor, young vigorous Hemlock and Pine were pushing to the sky. Storm Wind and Zephyr sure had a time of it in this old woods. I gave a little shudder imagining what this place would sound like during a major storm!
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| Sister trees on a long sit-down |
Nearing the bottom of the steep valley path that combined the North Country Trail with the local Baker Trail, we came across some wonderful seeps and springs flowing out of the big hill above. I flipped a few rocks and discovered a few Allegheny Dusky Salamanders. The almost level ground invited straying off the path to find tree and rock formations that made us smile. Two bridges, a truss and suspension, carried across and back over Tom's Run that we followed to our starting point at the Indian Cabins circle.
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| Truss bridge over Tom's Run |
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| Suspension Bridge over Tom's Run |
We drove up the hill to return to our campsite on the edge of the great woods, ready to make our supper and settle in for the night. Two enormous White Pines and a crowd of mature Hemlocks surrounded our little site perched on the edge of a ravine, where waters flowing quietly to Tom's Run began a steep downhill run. That night, snuggled into my truck with a very tired Amos the Coonhound and my open journal, I made a note to find the full text of Mary Oliver's "Sleeping In the Forest" because I could only remember one line "I had vanished at least a dozen times into something better..."
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| Our nearby Ridge Campground (left) and Forest Cathedral Natural Area |
Sleeping in the Forest
I thought the earth
remembered me, she
took me back so tenderly, arranging
her dark skirts, her pockets
full of lichens and seeds. I slept
as never before, a stone
on the riverbed, nothing
between me and the white fire of the stars
but my thoughts, and they floated
light as moths among the branches
of the perfect trees. All night
I heard the small kingdoms breathing
around me, the insects, and the birds
who do their work in the darkness. All night
I rose and fell, as if in water, grappling
with a luminous doom. By morning
I had vanished at least a dozen times
into something better.
- Mary Oliver, from the anthology Poems to Live By in Uncertain Times (2001)
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| Journal page July 7, 2024 |
Night sounds included a sleepy but hungry Raven fledgling, raiding raccoons, and a big Black Bear who seemed to enjoy bumping into the truck and Laura's car as a matter of nightly routine. Amos snored on, unfazed by Sir Bumps-A-Lot. Our doors were locked and all our food stored out of sniff range safe inside so no bear encounters over meals happened to us though our uphill neighbor was paid a very loud cooler-left-outside visit at 3am. Such is life on the edge of the Big Woods.
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| Site #30, Ridge Campground, Cook Forest State Park |
Notes:
Old Growth Forest Network description for the Forest Cathedral Natural Area
M.I. McCreight (1936) Cook Forest Park: Story of the Sixteen Year Battle to Save the Last Stand of Historic Penn's Woods - the when, why, and how of it. Archived in the online collection at Penn State Universities Library https://digital.libraries.psu.edu/digital/collection/digitalbks2/id/9472
Cook Forest Conservancy
Mary Oliver, Poems to Live By in Uncertain Times
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