Two signs, one forest and a huge wildfire
(Plus some photos of wonderful giant sequoias)
Volume 1, Number 14 - Monday, Nov. 7, 2022
Signs along General Highway, November 2022. — Claudia Elliott
Perspective
YESTERDAY, my husband and I had an opportunity to visit Sequoia and Kings Canyon national parks and a part of Giant Sequoia National Monument that we had not seen before.
Our timing was perfect because the skies were clear and even at about 6,500 feet in elevation we almost didn’t need to wear our jackets. This morning, though, I saw that a portion of Generals Highway — the road we traveled from Highway 198 east of Three Rivers to Highway 180 east of Fresno — is closed today due to a winter storm.
At the highest elevations along the road that connects two national parks — and goes through portions of a national monument and national forest — there was a bit of snow from last week’s storm but the road was dry for our trip.
In earlier visits to Sequoia National Park and Kings Canyon National Park, which are separate parks but administered jointly, we traveled up 198 or 180 from the San Joaquin Valley, depending on our destination. But neither of us had ever made the amazing drive the entire length of the Generals Highway.
The road is named for two of the largest giant sequoia trees, the General Sherman and General Grant trees. I found a quote from an early National Park Service brochure that noted “park roads are for leisurely driving only,” and that is certainly the case. But traffic was light yesterday and we weren’t in a hurry. The parking lot for General Sherman was hopelessly packed, though, and we’ve seen that biggest-of-the-big trees before, so we continued north to Grant Grove, home of the General Grant tree and other amazing monarchs.
The signs you see in the photo above were one of the rewards for taking the Generals Highway. Actually, the photo is of two faces of the same sign and it marks a boundary between Sequoia National Park and Sequoia National Forest. Much of the national forest in that area is actually part of Giant Sequoia National Monument.
The northern portion of the monument sort of wraps itself around the part of Kings Canyon National Forest in the area of Grant Grove. You can see a map here that shows the relationship.
And, as you can see in the photo, the forest around the sign was hit very hard in the 2021 KNP Complex Fire. There are green trees, as you can see, but we covered many miles where the former forest has been reduced to blackened tree skeletons.
This map shows the giant sequoia groves within the boundaries of the KNP Complex Fire. At 88,047 acres, it was not the largest of recent wildfires. But as they say in real estate, location is everything. According to the NPS, the species exists in about 70 groves on a total of about 28,000 acres on the western slopes of the Sierra Nevada mountains. Sixteen giant sequoia groves were within the fire’s perimeter. The fire burned more than 4,000 acres of giant sequoia groves.
Much of the damage was in the Redwood Mountain Grove, the largest of all giant sequoia groves. Part of the grove is on NPS land and part is on Forest Service land (and it’s in the vicinity of where I took the photo above).
I like the photos of the two sides of this sign because they illustrate that a massive wildfire doesn’t pay any attention to governmental boundaries. It may appear in this photo that the side of the sign that is on Forest Service land may have fared better than the NPS side, but that is just because of the angles I had to shoot to get photos of both sides of the sign. At that particular place, I could see no difference in the impact of the wildfire.
What I would like you to know is that there have been major differences in how the two agencies have managed public lands through the years and that’s because they have had very different missions. They are even under two different Cabinet secretaries. The NPS is part of the Department of the Interior and the Forest Service is part of the United States Department of Agriculture.
In recent years, though, the two agencies and other governmental and private groups with lands on which giant sequoias grow have teamed up to create the fledgling Giant Sequoia Lands Coalition. At this point, it’s still an informal effort because as far as I know the coalition has no official status or funding. Both the Senate and House versions of the Save Our Sequoias Act would change that. But whether there will be movement on this in Washington remains to be seen.
The coalition has been beating the drum to raise awareness about the unprecedented giant sequoia mortality in recent years. The astounding statistic bears repeating: Thousands of giant sequoia trees are dead or dying, with some estimates suggesting that 20 percent of the trees have been lost since 2015.
Still, there is good news. Snow is falling in the Sierra Nevada this morning. The cold will be good for the trees and brings with it hope for a break from the continued drought.
Bonus photos
Usually, I publish only one photo in this weekly newsletter, but the giant sequoias we visited yesterday were so wonderful — despite areas of significant wildfire damage — that I’m sharing more photos and skipping some of the other regular sections of the newsletter for this week. I hope you enjoy seeing them!
Here’s a photo of my husband walking along the trail in Grant Grove:
And some more…
Above, Skyler Eggleston shares information about Sequoia National Park near the Sentinel Tree at the Giant Forest Museum on Nov. 6, 2022. — Claudia Elliott
Above, a hiker near the Sentinel Tree at the Giant Forest Museum on Nov. 6, 2022. The NPS sign says this tree is “average.” — Claudia Elliott
Above, a view along the Generals Highway, Sequoia National Park, November 2022 — Claudia Elliott
Above, the base of a monarch in Grant Grove, Kings Canyon National Park, November 2022 (for size comparison notice the person standing on the left to the rear of the tree). — Claudia Elliott
A group of monarch giant sequoias in Grant Grove, Kings Canyon National Park, November 2022 — Claudia Elliott
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