PA Chrome Barrens Preserve

The Pennsylvania Nature Conservancy and Elk Township of Chester County, PA, work as management/ownership partners to protect this patch of several hundred acres of rare chrome serpentine barrens but on today's hike rather than grasslands and unique ecosystems, there was mostly greenbrier. I shed about a tablespoon of blood hacking a trail for me and Amos. Poor Amos. Without boots, his paw pads were pretty sore from stepping on thorns. 

American Toad Bufo Americanus

But...we persevered and limping and bleeding emerged into some excellent but muddy habitat where there wasn't any sense in trying to stay dry so we just plopped on through. Last evening brought some heavy storms and flash floods to the Chester County area and most of the Chrome Trail (yellow blazed) was still flowing with water. The rain, however, brought out the toads who were gobbling up worms that lay on the saturated surface of the trail. I stopped counting at 50 - all American Toads. 

This is the trail - four-foot high wall of Greenbrier. Just. Ouch. 

A yellow blaze and a faint path

The problem with Greenbrier is that it is incredibly invasive and without a rigorous management plan to include periodic burning, an important aspect of serpentine barrens ecology, it will take over within a few years. This preserve needs a burn so badly, it hurt worse than the thorns to consider all that is lost beneath the shade and tangle of thick thorny vine. I had a hard time reconciling the conservation value of this property without consistent management but I completely get that funding for these efforts is almost as rare as the ecosystem. I heard from another hiker that Pal's Trail on the other side of the road, also Nature Conservancy, is better managed, so I made a note to come back and try that short out-and-back another day. Still bleeding and limping, we crossed a series of small streams that had overflowed their banks the night before. Now we were bleeding, limping, and making slurping-sucking sounds. 

Serpentine rock with its unique weathering 

Stopping by the streams gave me the opportunity to observe how the serpentine rock weathers at the surface into blade-like shards. The ancient rock is high in toxic minerals like chromium. When combined with nutrient poor, thin top soils, a serpentine barrens is not a very hospitable home! But these unique ecosystems are celebrated for the rare plant communities that tough it out from grasslands to open glade forests. But here, everywhere, today was the ubiquitous Greenbrier. 

Flooded trail and Amos' bubbly paw print

According to my map and the AllTrails app, the Chrome Trail is only 1.7 miles in length. After an hour of hacking and slurping we had only traveled three-quarters of a mile.  I decided to stop worrying about time and trying to follow the nearly invisible and neglected yellow blazes and just follow Amos as he expertly found the trail at every overgrown turn. Eventually we turned through some open forest and I was glad of it. My legs were now streaked with blood. And there, a single new blaze hung trophy-like on a Black Oak. We finally made a solid mile. 

Suddenly a new blaze - the only one of the hike. 

The trail followed old roads that may have been associated with the many mines that were operating in the area. This is part of the historic State Line Mining District where local companies extracted feldspar, chromium, arsenides, and nickle from open pits and deep shafts. A quick look at Google Maps will show at least four flooded quarry pits as ponds or lakes near the preserve. It was a very busy industrial landscape during both World Wars and again during the Cold War as rare metals and minerals were needed for weapons manufacture. 

Note at least four quarry "lakes" around the preserve. 

Red Cedar branch wound

As we progressed through open woods it was easy to imagine the fields of grass pasture that followed the closing of the mines. Red Cedars stood dead or nearly so among Black Oak and a few dying Pitch Pine, signs that the open land was shading in. Amos tracked a beautiful male Box Turtle off trail for a few yards. I know that he he's found another when his tail begins to whip back and forth then stands straight on the point when he noses his hissing target. Number 12 for the year. 

Happy tail and a hiss!

Eastern Box Turtle, Terrapene carolina

We climbed through another patch of greenbrier into a small grassland that sadly is also at risk of being smothered by the stuff. Minus the thorny vine and with good management, this could be a few acres of serpentine prairie but for now these plants seem only to  survive only on trail edges and in wet seeps. 

Narrow-leafed Sundrops, Oenothera fruticosa

Pale-spiked Lobelia, Lobelia spicata

I found two small stands of the short-lived prairie flower Pale-Spiked Lobelia and wondered how much longer these little communities will endure.  With its blooming period so quick to come and go and a wall of greenbrier not too far away reaching towards this open patch, I know I won't see it here if I return next summer.  We turned back into an open woods, sloshing through mud and scaring  up a whole lot of frogs kerplunking into the bigger pools. 

Walls of greenbrier are closing in on this little grassland

Greenbrier is a native species that, given the right circumstances - like lack of a fire regime - can consume hundreds of acres of ground in just a few years. Serpentine barrens are unique habitats for grassland and glade forests that have long been associated with managed burns by pre-contact indigenous people. When settlement pressed into the region, farmers found these landscapes quite suitable for livestock which acted as consumers of both native and introduced species of grass and forbs and kept trees and other other invasives at bay.  The mining industries moved in and stripped much of the old pastureland to access to the rich minerals just at the surface. When these industries closed there was little to control the invasive take-over of the open land ecosystem. We turned again into deeper woods, Maple and Oak and a few American Hollies. Approaching the end of our hike, I began to hear the nearby gun range and a few cars on the road. 

Greenbrier slips behind Maple to capture the trail

These areas, if we want to maintain them for their unique flora and fauna, must have fire to reduce competition with aggressive invasive plants. For the Chrome Preserve serpentine barrens the most ecologically devastating consequence of the spread of greenbrier is the rapid modification of its entire matrix of habitats.  Eradication of an invasive plant requires an all-or-nothing approach ( I know this from personal and professional experience) and keeping an invasive plant at bay requires careful monitoring year-to-year. For indigenous land managers fire was an essential tool for creating habitat for elk, deer, rabbit, bear, turkey, and quail. For modern conservation purposes, fire is essential for the survival of rare and endangered plant and insect communities. I'm hoping management plans through the local township and PA Nature Conservancy can come quickly into play for the preservation of this site.  

A tiny trailside stand of Pale-Spiked Lobelia soon to be overtaken the Green Monster

We arrived back at the car muddy, bloody, and sore. As I was loading Amos, another car with prospective hikers aboard pulled into the small lot. The driver rolled down the window and looking slightly alarmed asked "How was the trail?" I told him about the trail conditions and that they may want to be prepared for mud and blood. Without taking his eyes off my bloodied legs he said "Oh, okay then. We'll try someplace else."  Therefore, I'm counting this short-in-distance but not in time trail towards my 2022 52-Hike Challenge #16  because we earned it. 

Notes:

Mindat.org is an excellent resource for finding mines and quarries and explore the historical data contained on various companies and what they were extracting. For this hike I consulted Mindat for the State Line Mining District details that includes a broad swath of Mason-Dixon Line landscape in Lancaster, Chester, and Cecil County on the PA/Maryland border. See https://www.mindat.org/search.php?search=State+Line+Mining+District+PA

Chrome Barrens brochure  https://www.the2nomads.org/FriendsWebSite/TrailBrochures/Chrome.html