Innholdsfortegnelse for January/February 2019 i Adirondack Explorer

Three land preservation groups announced transactions protecting nearly 2,500 acres in the Adirondacks this fall, with most of that acreage coming in a single conservation easement around waters containing a native strain of brook trout. Other purchases on the Adirondack Park’s east side will protect historic Fort Ticonderoga and a scenic mountain near Lake George. The big transaction was at the Little Charley Pond tract, west of Little Tupper Lake. The Adirondack Land Trust purchased the 2,122-acre tract with three ponds for $2 million in 2007, executive director Mike Carr said. Now a buyer wishing to remain anonymous has purchased the trust’s property for $1.9 million and granted a conservation easement ensuring that no more than one new camp will be built there. Back in 2007 the fear was that…

For someone who doesn’t ski, the sport looks ridiculous. First there’s a skier’s willingness to wear clunky, inflexible boots. Then there’s the cold ride on a chair dangling from a cable dozens of feet over frozen ground. And when you get off? You lose even more mobility by anchoring your feet to two slippery boards and letting gravity take over. But if you love to ski, those are all little deals you’ll make without a thought. Because being in love with skiing is the cold, clean smell of winter air. It’s the sound of skis sliding over snow and the click of boots in bindings. It’s the feeling of flying, held to the earth by the push and pull between muscle and gravity as you carve a turn across the…

Josh Wilson knows the Jackrabbit Ski Trail as well as anyone. He tells us the Old Mountain Road in Keene—which we’re skiing today—is not his favorite part of the 24-mile trail, but it comes in a close second. His favorite? The six-mile stretch between Lake Placid and McKenzie Pond Road near Saranac Lake, which provides backcountry skiers an exhilarating 1.5-mile downhill run. PHOTO GALLERY I tend to agree, but others might differ. After all, Old Mountain Road has lots of downhill, too, and it’s considerably more scenic, offering views of dramatic cliffs, attractive forests, and peaceful beaver meadows. Josh is the executive director of the Barkeater Trails Alliance (BETA), a nonprofit that maintains the Jackrabbit as well as other ski trails and mountain-bike trails in the region. Mike Lynch and…

I’ve heard it said that they’re not making any more wilderness—meaning that we’ve got to cherish what we have. That may be true in a general sense, but not in a bureaucratic sense. Just this year, the Adirondack Park Agency expanded the High Peaks Wilderness Area to 274,000 acres. It is by far the largest designated wilderness area in the park and one of the largest east of the Mississippi. Of course, the character of a landscape is not transformed by APA fiat. The wilderness designation is often aspirational. It’s a management tool whose aim is to allow land to return to a more or less primeval state. The APA’s State Land Master Plan defines wilderness, in part, as “an area where the earth and its community of life are…

Standing at the Sawyer Mountain trail register, his snowshoes pushing through more than a foot of snow, Ned yelled out: “The last person to sign the register was six days ago.” That wasn’t a surprise to me. There were no tracks in the snow and the snowbank along the parking lot was 5 feet high, with no indication anyone had scaled it to get to the trail. PHOTO GALLERY Hiking crowds generally dissipate after peak colors fade in the fall, and this trail doesn’t get the number of hikers that frequent popular back-country destinations such as those in Keene Valley and Lake Placid. The lack of people would actually make the trip a bit more interesting. It meant we would have to break trail as we made our way through…

As a state park, the Adirondacks belong to all of us. So decisions made about the park—how much road salt is used, how trails are built, how land is classified and developed, how we are dealing with a warming climate and invasive species or how conservation easement deals are being managed—should be made with transparency and in public. They aren’t always. And that’s where independent, nonprofit journalism makes a difference. For the past 20 years, the Adirondack Explorer has worked hard to make sure our readers know what’s happening in the Adirondacks by giving them all sides of news and issues that involve protection of the park, while also strongly encouraging them to use these lands and waters wisely. This even-handed and deep reporting is more important than ever as…

From publications such as the Lake Placid News and Peeks, and from agencies such as the New York Department of Environmental Conservation and the Adirondack Council, a dark narrative has been presented during the past few years, one that communicates the High Peaks region is facing grave peril due to increased hiker use. This popular crisis narrative has us envision this region plummeting into a post-apocalyptic dystopia that rivals any scene from Mad Max. It will be a grim future, this total annihilation of the mountains, and at the end of it the purveyors of the crisis narrative will have but one smug question left for us: “Are you happy now?” This is all nonsense, of course, for there is no crisis. As a former trail builder who specialized in…

The first time I ever ogled the phantasmagoria that is the northern lights was during my junior year at Middlebury College. Late one evening, I was trudging back to my dorm from the library when I realized I was not alone. Instead of traversing an empty corner of campus on a frigid, starry night, I found myself surrounded by people. Classmates were scattered in bunches, a few here, a few there, dozens of them, every head angled toward the sky. I might have thought I’d blundered into a deleted scene from Close Encounters of the Third Kind, but that paradigm-shifting film of alien visitation would not be released until the following year. I joined the mob. I looked up. My lower jaw fell. Great, glittering curtains of diaphanous green and…

Winter in the Adirondacks provides new opportunities to get outdoors. From skiing to hiking, our readers sent in some wonderful photographs that capture how they stay “On the Move” in a snow-covered landscape. The top five photographs each will receive a free one-year subscription to the Adirondack Explorer. The Reader’s Choice, which received the highest number of likes on our Facebook page, was by Seth Jones, skiing in the High Peaks region. Our next Views of the Park theme is “Animal Tracks” We encourage readers to take advantage of all the snow to capture photos of tracks left by wildlife. Be creative! We’re excited to see what you submit. As always, post your photos to Instagram and Facebook using #adkexplorerpix.…

Hikers value protecting the Adirondack Park’s wild character more than expanding recreation opportunities. That was one of the key findings in a survey of roughly 1,000 hikers at High Peaks Wilderness region trailheads earlier this year by the Adirondack Council and Colgate University’s Upstate Institute. About 70 percent of those surveyed favored wilderness protection over accommodating unlimited recreation, according to the Council. More than 80 percent of hikers want more information regarding appropriate trail use, etiquette and safety by the state and stakeholders. About 75 percent of hikers said the park should receive additional state funding and the state Department of Environmental Conservation should hire additional staff and forest rangers. “Hikers were least likely to support wider trails or bigger parking lots, and favored protection over recreation,” Council Executive Director…

The Adirondack Park Agency’s board voted 10-0 in December to approve a change to the Adirondack Park State Land Master Plan that will allow the state to go forward with a controversial plan to remove 34 miles of railroad tracks between Lake Placid and Tupper Lake. The board’s action was a response to a court ruling more than a year earlier that the state’s proposal to tear up the tracks and create a multi-use rail trail violated the master plan. EARLIER STORY: Court ruling Before work on the rail trail can begin, the state Department of Environmental Conservation must revise the unit management plan (UMP) for the rail corridor. The UMP will require approval from the APA. Tom Martin, a natural resources supervisor for DEC, expects the UMP will be…

Environmental leaders, current and former staff officials, and legislative operatives will say they think the Adirondack Park Agency is under the thumb of Gov. Andrew Cuomo. Many grumble privately. Some will talk about it openly. Others point to it indirectly. For example, a headline in the annual report of a key environmental group put it this way: the APA has been “Reined In.” “The Park Agency has not recently demonstrated, or been allowed to exercise, its past degree of independence,” the Adirondack Council also stated in its report. It gave Cuomo a thumbs-down in that “State of the Park 2017-18” APA review. How much influence does Cuomo exert? The governor went into the holidays set to appoint a full-fledged chair of the agency, widely expected to be acting chair Karen…

“Wilderness is the feeling of being completely engulfed by the trees, the mountains, the rocks, the lakes, not having any man-made objects in sight. And you can find wilderness less than a mile off the trail if you’re fortunate enough, and bushwhacking is probably the best way to get in touch with wilderness for me.” James Hopson, Dolgeville “To me, wilderness means freedom. The woods have always been a way of understanding the world. Being in the wilderness is one way I ground myself. When I have needed to return to my essential self, I have returned to the woods. After years of this push/pull, I look forward to the day when I can live in the Adirondacks, and no longer need to go in search of nature.” Tamara Johnson,…

In the mid-1970s, the McClelland family built The Mountaineer gear store in Keene Valley out of local hemlock and spruce. “I pounded the nails into this thing,” Vinny McClelland said. Now more than 40 years later, the McClellands have sold the iconic store to the Wise family. PHOTO GALLERY: Mountaineerthrough the years The Mountaineer is recognized regionally and nationally, with a client base that extends well beyond the Adirondacks. In 2015, it took home first place in the retail category at the Outdoor Inspiration Awards at the Outdoor Retailers show in Salt Lake City. The store caters to hikers, trail runners, backcountry skiers, anglers and climbers. It hosts a series of annual events, including its Mountainfest and the Great Adirondack Trail Run, which raises money for local nonprofits and charitable…

Evidence of climate change We are seeing the effects of climate warming all over the Adirondacks. The boreal forest of the western-central Adirondacks is giving way to oak/hickory hardwoods. Streams once noted for trout fishing such as the Moose and Black rivers have given way to overcrowded smallmouth bass populations. The lower ground and water temperatures, combined with short growing seasons that protected the Adirondacks from many invasive plants and animals, no longer exist. I was born in the southern Adirondacks and have hiked, hunted and fished the Adirondacks for 70 years. I am not a professional writer but as an environmental chemist have made many observations of climate warming, acid rain, and invasive species in the Adirondacks over my 70 years. Thomas Prevost, Inlet Save your cheers for a…

Tupper Lake has a real champion in Ellen Maroun. When the longtime community activist looks around the town of almost 6,000, she sees only promise: businesses moving into the downtown; two new craft breweries; a new arts center, Tupper Arts; the Wild Center; the Sky Center; dilapidated buildings finally torn down and new standards applied. She’s had a hand in some of the improvements, too. As adviser to her brother’s fund, the Alfred M. Aseel Legacy Fund, she is supporting the Tupper Lake Heritage Trail, which will mark historic sites to celebrate Tupper’s rich history, including the immigrant families who settled there like the Lebanese population of which Maroun and her husband, Camil (J.J.) are a part. Beginning in the mid-’60s, Maroun advocated for—and successfully brought—services to the area for…

Evening grosbeaks were a species of northwestern North America until the late 1800s when they began an eastward range expansion. In the early days of the Saranac Lake Christmas Bird Count in the 1940s, evening grosbeaks comprised a quarter of the birds counted. Numbers then declined somewhat but peaked again in the late ’70s and early ’80s when they accounted for as many as half the birds counted. Folks used to complain how the grosbeaks would empty their sunflower seed feeders in less than a day. But in the last 20 years evening grosbeaks have declined in the Northeast. They have not been observed on the Saranac Lake count since 2011, and the absence of these colorful finches is now of concern to feeder-watchers. In 2016 the Committee on the…

I didn’t think it would be difficult to find a bookstore in Elizabethtown, and I have the address. But as I drive slowly down Water Street, past a restaurant and past the Post Office, the business district turns into family homes. I park and walk along the same stretch of road. No luck. I need Harry Potter to wave his wand and direct me to Diagon Alley, that hidden world of commerce. Fortunately Mike Lynch arrives, his camera slung over his shoulder. He points to a neatly painted red Victorian and says that is the place, according to Google Maps, our magical helper. The front walk isn’t shoveled so we knock on the back door. It opens and we find ourselves in a bright room with polished wooden floors. The…

Adirondack Wild and a former high-ranking state environmental official contend that the state’s plan to cut a snowmobile trail in the Blue Ridge Wilderness violates the forever-wild clause of the New York Constitution. Adirondack Wild and Christopher Amato, a former assistant commissioner of the Department of Environmental Conservation, make the argument in a letter to Nick Addison, a DEC forester. DEC is proposing to build a “community connector” that will enable snowmobilers to travel between the hamlets of Raquette Lake and Long Lake without crossing frozen lakes. About four miles of the trail would pass through the Blue Ridge Wilderness. Ordinarily, snowmobiles and other motorized vehicles are not allowed in wilderness areas, but the Adirondack Park State Land Master Plan allows snowmobile trails to be created in wilderness—“in limited instances”—within…

Environmentalists see Democratic control of both New York’s Senate and Assembly starting in January as a sea change improving prospects for bills protecting the Adirondacks. The November election removed a GOP roadblock in the Senate that has stopped several conservation measures in the past, advocates said. The Assembly kept a Democratic veto-proof majority of 106 seats, with 43 held by Republicans and one by an independent. New York’s new Senate will have 39 Democrats, 23 Republicans and one Brooklyn Democrat who has been caucusing with the Republicans. Climate Change “We have, for the first time, an incoming majority that publicly is concerned about the adverse impacts of human-induced climate change,” said Sen. Brad Hoylman, a Manhattan Democrat on the Senate’s Environmental Conservation Committee. “There was no acknowledgement on the part…

If Gov. Andrew Cuomo appoints retired lawyer Karen Feldman as Adirondack Park Agency chair he will make some people happy—especially Feldman herself. “I don’t want to sound effusive, but I enjoy it,” she said a few days after the November APA meeting, her third as acting chair. “We have an opportunity to make a difference to New Yorkers.” Her widely expected appointment would signal an opening to a larger pool of future appointees to the job, as she would be the rare agency leader selected from outside the Adirondack Park. That’s a problem for some park residents who prefer a full-time neighbor as chair, though some who have previously lobbied against outside candidates have dropped that opposition in her case. The 61-year-old outdoorswoman, who likes to ski, golf and fish,…

It’s almost impossible to travel far in the Adirondack Park—literally or virtually on park-related websites—without seeing signs or banners proclaiming “help wanted.” In the Adirondacks, finding the right employee can seem as elusive as that last peak in the quest to become a 46er. The employment signs are both good and bad news. The good news is that overall unemployment is low, meaning that a lot of park residents have jobs. The bad news is that economic growth is almost impossible without additional workers to perform the work. The overall unemployment rate in the North Country as of July was 4.8, according to Susan Matton, vice president of economic development for the North Country Chamber of Commerce. That’s a drop from 5.7 percent in a year. In October, the only…

New York State’s Frontier Town Campground, still under construction, is intended to attract horseback riders, snowmobilers, hikers, campers and craft beer enthusiasts to the 300-acre development about midway between the tourist hotspots of Lake George Village and Lake Placid. PREVIOUS STORIES:Frontier Town proposal The Department of Environmental Conservation will operate the campground on land owned by the Town of North Hudson and Essex County, located less than a mile off the Adirondack Northway. The state is spending nearly $19 million on design and construction, and plans to have it fully operational by summer. The eponymous Frontier Town, a commercial, western-themed amusement park, closed on the site almost 20 years ago. “North Hudson is a prime location to introduce visitors to all that the Adirondacks have to offer and encourage travelers…

Anyone who regularly drives Route 73 between the Northway and Lake Placid knows there has been a tremendous spike in activity in the High Peaks over the last few years. Parking has exploded, with vehicles sometimes lining the road for a mile between Chapel Pond and St. Huberts, dangerously crowding the trailhead at Cascade Mountain and overwhelming lots at Adirondac Loj, the Garden, Ampersand and elsewhere. Trail use has soared correspondingly. The Cascade trail regularly sees hundreds of people on summer weekends. Many other trails are badly eroded and even remote summits can be crowded. This increase is no anomaly: the trend lines show it is the new normal. This year these concerns came to a head, with extensive media coverage of “overuse” and plenty of discussion among residents, visitors,…

Sleek and beautiful, pale silver gray with a subtle wash of brown around the head and neck and several small but intensely colored markings, Bohemian waxwings get the first half of their name for their nomadic, wandering—bohemian, if you will—lifestyle. They feed primarily on berries and have an uncanny ability to locate abundant food supplies, with the result that they travel far and wide and, unlike most birds, do not maintain a territory. They breed where they find an ample food supply, and when they exhaust it they move on. They get the second half of their name from the brilliant, bright red, wax-like nubs on the tips of their secondaries, nubs that become more numerous and prominent with age and probably have something to do with the social structure…

Dippikill. It could be one of my ridiculous ski falls—careening into a gully, limbs akimbo at the bottom, not coming up the far side. Luckily, there were none of those the day we tracked the new powder at Camp Dippikill, just west of the Hudson in northern Warren County. But there were at least 18 fluffy inches over an ample base, and no hard falls. Officially, it’s the Dippikill Wilderness Retreat (dippikill.com), the largest student-owned natural preserve in the country. It has belonged to the Student Association of the University at Albany since 1956, on a back road in the highlands of the Town of Thurman. Its mission is “to keep the area pristine, limit development, and offer a glimpse of nature’s beauty while enjoying overnight visits in rustic-style lodging.”…

Great Sacandaga Lake has gone quiet for the season, with many of the roughly 4,500 lakeside camps and nearby cottages now shuttered. For much of the fall it appeared to property owners that lake life could get more expensive in the seasons ahead. State lawmakers seeking to broaden the base of beneficiaries paying for upkeep on the reservoir’s dam had reignited a debate by sending Gov. Andrew Cuomo a bill mandating a fresh look at revenue sources. Cuomo vetoed the bill in December, without saying whether lakeside owners who benefit from a dam first built in 1930 to control floods should do more to help downstream interests keep it up. The funding issue remains before the Hudson River-Black River Regulating District’s board. “Everything is status quo,” board chairman Mark Finkle…

Plan ahead and prepare Lack of preparation leads to most search-and-rescues. Check weather reports and avalanche warnings regularly and monitor snow conditions. Bring extra layers, an emergency shelter, food and water. If recreating in avalanche terrain, pack an avalanche beacon, probe and shovel. Bring a map and compass; tree markings, rock cairns or flagging might be covered in snow. Leave your itinerary with someone and travel in small groups. Travel and camp on durable surfaces Snow is a great durable surface when it is more than 6 to 8 inches deep. Whenever possible, stay on deep snow cover and camp in designated campsites. Wear snowshoes and skis to keep the trail safe for everyone and to travel more efficiently on snowy ground. Dispose of waste properly Pack it out. Pick…