Tree planting expedition restores Abbott Creek

Volunteers are replanting Abbott Creek. Nugget News photo

Local stewards of the forests planted trees on Abbott Creek Saturday, April 24, as part of an effort to restore the area burned last summer in the B&B Complex Fire.

Buses left hourly from the Camp Sherman turn-off of Highway 20, ferrying volunteers to the blackened site.

The forests of Abbott Butte, west of Camp Sherman toward Mt. Jefferson, were utterly destroyed by the B&B Complex Fire. The trees are still standing, but charred. Every tree was scorched, in this area, to the point where they are all dead.

Jeremy Fields, reforestation technician, calls this area, "the drop zone."

Twenty to thirty people negotiated the burned remains of the habitat along Abbott Creek to plant willows, ponderosa pine, Douglas fir, maple, aspen, alder, roses, and bitter cherry along the banks of the creek.

There are still dangers here in the B&B "drop zone." The reforestation crew had come through where the tree planters' project was going to be and removed potential widow makers. A widow maker is a dead tree that could fall easily and take a life.

Dave Priest, reforestation technician, explained to the group that in his opinion the line drawn for the spotted owl habitat was too inclusive.

He thinks that had this area not been included within the owl habitat, it could have been more aggressively managed and perhaps saved from such extensive fire damage.

The B&B Complex Fire covered more than 90,000 acres of forest land west of Camp Sherman during August and September 2003.