» Creative destruction :: Off Track

Jan122009

Creative destruction

Filed under Hiking, Uncategorized, wildlife, winter by andrew wolfe at 10:28 am

Destruction by natural forces is seldom all that bad for the environment. The new growth that follows a forest fire, for instance, can be a boon for many grazing and bird species.

(Human acts of desecration, on the other hand, are often irrevocably catastrophic… as witness the Tennessee Valley Authority’s recent coal ash tsunami. Similarly, natural forces can wreck havoc on our cities).

Last month’s ice storm took down an awful lot of trees and limbs, but those fresh-fallen branches seem to be quite a treat for local deer, who dine on the buds, judging by the tracks I saw while hiking in Beaver Brook just after Sunday’s snow. Dead wood also provides habitat for all sorts of critters low on the food chain, a pileated woodpecker reminded me, and I bet the extra sunlight streaming into the forest will do some good, too.

That said, the state has yet to reopen my favorite winter hiking areas, closed in response to the ice storm. They include:

Monadnock State Park	Jaffrey
Greenfield State Park	Greenfield
Kingston State Park	Kingston
Miller State Park	Temple
Rhododendron State Park	Fitzwilliam
Annett State Forest	Ringe
Russell-Abbott State Forest	Wilton & Mason
Temple Mountain State Park	Temple
Low State Forest	Hillsborough
Monadnock Branch Rail Trail	Jaffrey & Rindge
Casalis State Forest	Peterborough
Haven State Forest	Jaffrey
Vincent State Forest	Weare
Woodman State Forest	Northwood