trail help how do I volunteer?

[toyotaguy]

Hey, I'm in the Fresno area and would l[*]ike to help work on trails but don't know where to start.

[leafmold27]

High sierra volunteer trail crew. They are on the web.

[RoguePhotonic]

Lots of groups get involved with trails all over. Some of the common ones I know of are as mentioned the High Sierra Volunteer Trail Crew, The SCA, Friends of the Inyo and the PCTA.

There are other groups that don't really operate with a web page and you just sort of meet people and get on their mailing list. It just depends on how far your willing to drive. If you want to do something around a state park you can contact them to get information on groups they have partner ships with. I'd say you could generally do this with BLM or the Forest Service as we never just go out and do work. We have partner ships and operate under and with permission from what ever management agency is in charge of the land we are on.

I do most of my volunteering with the PCTA and agreed to be the section chief of Section G from Walker Pass to Kennedy Meadows. Your always welcome to join us on a project when we have them.

I'm working 7 days a week right now but as soon as I have free time I am going to survey the trail and try to get a project together for a weekend to remove trees. Your welcome to join us.

[KathyW]

I have to say there's good and bad trail maintenance. Most of the time I think the trail folks deserve a pat on the back for their hard work, but I wish they'd stop building those awful steps, filling the trails with rubble, and overly engineering the trails with tons of switchbacks.

The other day I was out on a section of the PCT in Southern California and a 1.5 mile long section had been cleared of vegetation 5 feet on either side of the trail - I have never seen so much damage to the vegetation in the name of trail maintenance.

[RoguePhotonic]

Steps are energy dissipaters and aren't actually made to be a step for you on most modern trails. Water is the number one enemy of most trails and when you cannot get it off the trail you use steps which are called check dams in order to slow the water down as it rolls over each step. This is why so many of them are really high. They were not built so high but the water rolling over them has dug out the trail.

I don't know anything about putting rubble in the trail since we don't do that but cutting the vegetation back 5 feet on each side is what we might call giving it the 10 year hair cut. In Southern California our biggest problem is vegetation and when it is over grown you get the added bonus of being covered in ticks as you walk. The problem comes from the fact that we simply do not have the funding or man power to maintain these trails so it can be many years before a section gets anymore work. You would think that this state would be full of volunteers but I only see new ones now and again. Mostly it is a core group of people and a few scattered others that maintain 700 miles of trail down here. So be glad you can walk freely and not be bush whacking!

But yes there is good and bad maintenance in many ways!

[KathyW]

It doesn't hurt anyone to touch a few bushes along the trail, and if you're afraid of ticks you shouldn't be out on the trail.

I have seen brand new steps that are very high.

[RoguePhotonic]

If a new step is built high then it wasn't done right. That isn't surprising though because it's a difficult art to build that sort of stuff right.

[KathyW]

Yes, building steps looks like difficult work.

I don't mean to carry on, but when a trail is overly engineered it takes away from the wilderness experience for me. It's one of my pet peeves - we all have them. To me, it looks like sometimes those steps and excessive switchbacks do more damage than good because many people just cut the switchbacks and steps when they can.

[AlmostThere]

HIgh Sierra Trail Crew puts on a really really good feed, and takes care of their volunteers really well.

[Tom_H]

REI has volunteer trail maintenance trips:

http://www.rei.com/adventures/activity/ ... tions.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;