Calling on all biologists, botanists...Old Wittenberg Jeep Road- Catskills

[woodstrider]

I was recently there and was shocked at the change in this very familar road that I often use to go up or down Wittenberg Mtn. (via Terrence Mtn.).

Last year it scoured clean by the spring storms and now it is a jungle of nettles, saplings and timbleberry.

Can any one explain the drastic changes?

 

[Tom Rankin]

I was recently there and was shocked at the change in this very familar road that I often use to go up or down Wittenberg Mtn. (via Terrence Mtn.).

Last year it scoured clean by the spring storms and now it is a jungle of nettles, saplings and timbleberry.

Can any one explain the drastic changes?

Perhaps the caterpillars have eaten away the cover, and the other plants you mention now have more sunlight and therefore grow better?

 

[Mark Schaefer]

I have not been to that location in a few years. I think Tom's theory is correct. The are similar heavy growth of nettles in much of the Catskills this year. This summer was theoretically the megadeath year in the current cycle of forest tent caterpillars in the southern Catskills. We will know next year if that was true. We should also be able to currently see a reduction in the egg masses on host trees, although I have not been looking. Some areas of the northern Catskills probably have another year to go in the cycle.

 

[woodstrider]

Tent Caterpillars..

yeah- that may explain it. I did noticed that at some places the leaf cover was a bit thin.

Also- the eradication of the plants that were there and then "washed" away in the spring of 2005 may have left open for colonization new territory fro these very fast growing plants. Just a theory.

 

[grouseking]

Tent Caterpillar Pic

http://community.webshots.com/photo/550085208/2682578280049158222UYNMdd

Here is a pic of what I thought was a gypsy moth but is most likely a tent caterpillar. I saw these back in mid May in southern NH. Maybe this will help.

grouseking

 

[Mark Schaefer]

Hey Woodstrider, thanks for the current status of this old trail. I also saw your Trail Condition Report. To my knowledge the tower on Wittenberg was not a fire tower, but an observation tower. There is no mention of a Wittenberg fire tower in Fire Towers of the Catskills, Martin Podskoch, 2000, Purple Mountain Press. This book documents both existing and removed fire towers. If you have further info on a fire tower I would be interested. Fire, however, was in the history of the Terrace Mt trail. Here is the history of the trail up Terrace and Wittenberg Mts as best I know it:

• circa 1851. A bark road existed, probably built by the Phoenix Tannery (after which Phoenicia was named), owned by James A Simpson. Terrace Mountain was then known as Simpson's Plateau. The bark road extended to 2975' on Wittenberg. Michael Kudish, The Catskill Forest, a History, Purple Mountain Press, 2000, pp 78-79, 109.
• 1880s. The bark was extended to the Wittenberg summit during the grand hotel building days: "Every mountaintop along the Ulster and Delaware (railroad) was being explored by prospective builders of such hotels. Old-time tanners like James Simpson of Phoenicia, now that a shortage of bark had closed their tanneries, were working out routes to the tops of mountains such as the Wittenberg from which their efforts had stripped the forests, and were trying to raise enough capital to go into the summer hotel business." Alf Evers, The Catskills, From Wilderness to Woodstock, Doubleday, 1972, p. 499.
• July 1884. John Burroughs spends the night on the Wittenberg on an aborted bushwhack to Slide Mt from Weaver Hollow. John Burroughs, The Heart Of The Southern Catskills, from In The Catskills, 1910. No tower existed as Burroughs does not mention it, and he climbs a dead tree to catch a glimpse of Slide Mt. John Burroughs descended down the Wittenberg / Terrace Mt trail to the Woodland Valley. Ibid and Kudish, op cit, p. 109.
• June 1885. Burroughs climbs Slide Mt and mentions the "rude lookout" tower built in 1880 by Jim Dutcher on the Slide summit. Burroughs, op cit.
• most likely late 19th century. A wood observation tower is built on the Wittenberg probably by the Simpson family or boarding house proprietors in the Woodland Valley. A photo of the crude tower is in: Evers, op cit, following p. 584.
• 1890s - 1900. Terrace Mt burns several times as a result of the tannery deforestation. Kudish, op cit, p. 108. The old bark road was likely used to fight these fires.
• May 1901. NYS reforests two badly burned sites on Terrace Mt with a thousand Norway Spruce seedlings. By 1970 half of these had died. The largest Norway spruce was then only 7" diameter, and these were overspread by native hardwoods. Ibid. Kudish concludes that these plantations had failed, however, no subsequent fires occurred here which is some success.
• by 1903. The Wittenberg trail is extended over Cornell Mt to Slide Mt. 1903 Phoenicia and 1905 Slide Mt USGS quads.
• 1934. The bark road is widened by the CCC for skiing. This is concurrent with the opening of the Simpson Ski Center on Romer Mt. near Phoenicia. Ibid, p. 109 and ski map.
• 1935. The Terrace Mt lean-to was constructed. Kudish, op cit, p. 109.
• 1976. The Wittenberg-Cornell-Slide trailhead was relocated to the Woodland Valley campground. Lack of parking at the trailhead was the principle reason. A secondary reason was to improve the loop hike potential by locating both the W-C-S and Phoenicia-East Branch trailheads at the campground. Ibid.
• 1987. The most recent rebuilding of the lean-to. Carol and David White, Catskill Trails, ADK, 2005, p. 158.
• Recent. Perhaps the DEC had plans to remove the old trail bridge over the Woodland Valley stream as the AMC guide went to press with this statement describing the old trail: "Hikers staying over at the lean-to can explore this old trail, which drops downhill to the south, switches back at Fiddler's Elbow, and drops through a maturing sugar maple forest, dropping 1.2 mi. to the Esopus Creek (sic) and the site of the old cable footbridge, which was removed several years ago (the concrete anchors remain)." Peter Kick, Catskill Mountain Guide, AMC, 2002, p. 127.

The report of the bridge's demise was apparently greatly exaggerated (or at least premature). The 2005 ADK Catskill guidebook reports that it is still there (White, op cit, p. 158), although the text of the ADK book was also completed about 2002. The AMC book also adds that there is no legal outlet at the old trailhead. The NYNJTC map #43 also shows a KO at the Woodland Valley Rd as it indicates the narrow strip of land between the road and stream as private. Your report indicates the access to the bridge is public which is good to know.

 

[imarchant]

I have not been to that location in a few years. I think Tom's theory is correct. The are similar heavy growth of nettles in much of the Catskills this year. This summer was theoretically the megadeath year in the current cycle of forest tent caterpillars in the southern Catskills. We will know next year if that was true. We should also be able to currently see a reduction in the egg masses on host trees, although I have not been looking. Some areas of the northern Catskills probably have another year to go in the cycle.

Two weeks ago, while hiking up Friday from Moon Haw Road we noticed many gypsy moth egg sacks around the bases of the beech trees. Next year may also be a bad year for defoilation.