Buckeye Trail

I have notified the Mena office of the Forrest Service about the downed trees on the Caney Creek trail. I am trying to get some kinda answer from them as to when the trees could be cleared but I am not holding my breath very long! From what I was told the trail is impassable from the Caney creek crossing past Katy creek all the way to the Cossotot.

Can a lot of the downed trees be cleared off the trail with hand tools? If so I would be willing to pitch in if someone has some one or two man buck saws that we could use. I don't know what the regs. are for use of power tools in the wilderness areas, but you can do a lot with hand powered saws if you have some experience.

Well there can be no use of any power tool in the wilderness. I have a Fano K-24 saw, it cuts on the draw stroke. FoOT does have a cross cut saw that could be borrowed. I know that the forrest service would have one. I reported the trees down to the FS today by email and emailed back about when a crew could get back in there to clear the trail but haven't heard back yet. I may call them in the morning. As far as regs on you going into the area to work you, for that anybody that is reading this, can contact the Mena office of the FS. I don't know how big the trees are. I haven't seen them for my self. All that I know from what I have been told is that they are big. I think that they are pine.

The person to contact is:

Sharon House
slhouse@fs.fed.us
479-394-2382

I just talked to the Mena office of the Forrest service. I was told that there
wasn't any plans at this time to go and clear the trail. I was also told that
any one that wanted to help clear this trail MUST talk to them first. That
is the best I can do at this time. I will continue with the minor trail work.

HAVE CHAINSAW - WILL TRAVEL.

So does that mean they're willing to let someone in there with power tools?

Is there a short route into the area? (Sure, I'm trying to get in better shape, but lugging my Husqvarna for miles ain't my idea of a good workout plan.)

Jay,

NO POWER TOOLS ALLOWED! That would be a quick way to the jail house! Not even any thing on wheels allowed in any wilderness area. From what I have been told you would encounter the trees pretty soon after fording the Cossotot on the West end of the Wilderness area. The fellow that I talked to Sun. said that from the crossing to about the first crossing of the Caney Creek after leaving the junction of the Buckeye trail and the Caney Creek trail. I am at school and I don't have my trail book so I can't say just how many miles that is. My best guess would be in the area of 3 to 3.5 miles of trail are blocked. I would like to go in and see for myself and take some pics of the trees. Any way I had better not bug the forest service. I have asked and that is all that I can do.

If you are up to it we might go in some week end soon and scope it out.

That makes me wonder: Does the FS use power tools there? Most of my experience in actual wilderness areas was off-trail bushwacking stuff, so I didn't know if they maintain the trails at all or if they made concessions for people to use power tools at very special times or something.

I know I cracked wise about the chainsaw, but in my opinion, wilderness areas are supposed to be just that: wild. If nature saw fit to lay a tree right there, that's where it should stay. We should adjust to her. That's just my opinion.

Jay,

When I started working with the FS I was told that they would send a crew in on foot with crosscut saws to clear any big trees. There has been plenty of timber that has fallen over the years in this area, mainly because of the Pine Bark Beetle outbreak and where the trees have been cut you can tell that they were cut with crosscut saws.

By the way if you are to use a chainsaw to clear trees of the trails you have to go thru one of their approved chainsaw courses. I had a chance to do that but it was in the middle of the week when I was in school.