In late September the Tulsa Urban Wilderness Coalition, of which I am a member and a Board Member, had a trail workday at the Herman and Kate Kaiser YMCA on Turkey Mountain.
It was starting to sprinkle but it was too late to postpone the date as we had already done that once already for this event.
We got our canopy and tables set up and got waivers from everyone so we were ready to go. It was kind of a light turnout that day. But that’s okay.
Here is an action shot of me, that I have stolen from the TUWC. We were clearing the trails that day so I have my loppers. There was lots of poison ivy so I didn’t wear my usual tshirt and shorts for long sleeve shirt, pants, and gloves.
Here’s a shot of a cleared trail. We lopped the brush and poison ivy back. The YMCA has their own trails on Turkey Mountain that are extensively interconnected with the more well-known Tulsa RiverParks trail system.
Our little Pomeranian Kodi loves to go swimming but his enthusiasm and joy are greater than his skill so when we take him swimming Heather has to hold on to him. Our rescue Terrier, Sadie, is not into swimming at all.
On another bike ride on the Arkansas RiverParks Trails here in Tulsa I captured these two great blue herons flying low over the water below Zink Dam.
A great egret fishing
And a bunch of great egrets and great blue herons trying to catch their breakfast.
I stopped at a bench on the trail to rest up adjacent to this sculpture of geese.
A couple weeks ago I worked “Monarchs on the Mountain” representing the Tulsa Urban Wilderness Coalition. TUWC was deeply embedded in the event. We are a co-sponsor. A couple of our board members were on the organizing committee, and another was the MC of the event. Another board member takes care of the online part of the event using our website. Monarchs on the mountain is festival celebrating Monarch Butterflies and all other pollinators and the monarch migration which is happening now.
My role (that’s not me in the photo) was to man the booth and tell people who TUWC is and what we do.
This is a diorama that another board member made a couple years ago where we illustrate Leave No Trace principles for kids. We have a little story about Hans and Hilda going on a hike with their dogs. So we talk about leashing animals, staying on the trails, don’t throw your apple cores and banana peels out into the woods in the mistaken belief that you are helping feed the animals. Those little brown round things at the bottom of the photo are dog poops, not cinnamon rolls, so we throw them out and ask, “What do you do when your dog poops in the woods?” Answer is of course that you bag it and dispose of properly.
Working the booth is a lot of fun. I’ll tell you one thing, we get lots of Girl Scouts come by and they have the life cycle of monarch butterflies and Leave No Trace principles down. I’m very impressed with them and their adult leadership.
I went to see my brother Bob here in town the other day. He is staying at a nice place. Lots of things for them to do. I got comped a meal with him. It was excellent.
Desert was bread pudding!! It was right out of the oven.
On July 4th, while I was in bed sleeping. Bob got up and did a mile in the halls of his place in his wheelchair. Six laps, he got this medal to celebrate. Not only was I asleep, I had covid so I couldn’t go cheer him on and take photos.
Last weekend, the Tulsa Urban Wilderness Coalition had a work day on Turkey Mountain. Lots of people showed up to do some really hard work repairing erosion damage and rebuilding jumps and all that heavy work. Kudos to them.
What did I do that day? I watered the butterfly garden.
And took videos of the cottonwood trees shimmering in the breeze.
I also gathered up my loppers, a trash bag, and my 32 oz water container and ventured out onto a lesser used trail picking up litter and lopping limbs that intrude on the trail too much. So I didn’t do the big heavy lifting that others were doing but I was doing what I could.
So for a musical interlude, “American Kids” by Kenny Chesney. A fun summertime song. Enjoy
Sunday evening I attended a stakeholder meeting on Turkey Mountain with the Tulsa Urban Wilderness Coalition and others to get a tour of the new trail they are building and get our feedback. Previously I had paralleled the trail this time we actually got to walk on it.
It’s going to be a bi-directional multi-use trail for bikers, runners and walkers. It is nice and wide and after seeing it I think it will work well.
For bicyclists they have a “Choose your adventure” options where you can take jumps if you want to or bypass them.
A huge difference from the existing trails is the extensive work they are doing to cut down on water erosion. They are following the land contours and the trail is side sloped one to two degrees to encourage water running perpendicular to the trail than down it. They are also taking the rocks they find and putting them downhill from the trail to help contain the dirt.
They have some great banked turns.
Here is an action shot of me (on the right) stolen from a friend’s facebook post. Hopefully he won’t sue me.
We came to end of the construction. They only have about a half mile or less to finish this segment. This is the first mile out of 13 or 14 miles in phase one of five phases.
They hope to open this in the next few weeks. I think it will be epic. They asked each one of us what we liked and what our concerns are. Everybody loves the trail, the main concern is minimizing conflicts between bicyclists and walker/runners. This trail will be the fastest bicycling trail on the mountain when it is completed and will be popular with the jumps and steep banks. The Riverparks Authority is planning on a lot of mitigation measures such as making sure that the turns have clear sight lines and education measures so everybody understands who has the right of way (people on foot do) and encourage mutual courtesy.
So we are pretty excited about our new trails. There are other changes coming as well. They might be having the first prescribed burn. That will help a lot getting rid of non-native species and clearing out the understory.
