As the summer outdoor recreation season hits its peak, there might not be enough boots, and chainsaws, on the ground to clear Wyoming trails of trees that keep falling over dead, or getting blown over and blocking the trails.
With an apparent shortage of federal trail crews to clean up the mess, the responsibility is increasingly falling on outfitters, local volunteer groups and others.
It’s hard, dangerous work. It can be time-consuming, not to mention, expensive.
Blocked Trails Cost Big Bucks
“It’s been slowly getting worse,” outfitter and guide Lee Livingston of Cody told Cowboy State Daily.
He and other outfitters have had to divert manpower, equipment, horses and money to trail-clearing duties.
Pulling a three-man crew and their horses to clear fallen trees from trails to provide access for clients can easily cost $1,500 a day in direct expenses, said Livingston, a board member and past president of the Wyoming Outfitters and Guides Association (WYOGA).
Factoring in the revenue lost because he can’t take clients out while waiting for the trails to be cleared, the cost can soar to $3,000 per day, Livingston said.
“That is a block of days I can’t take a group of people on a trip”, he said.
Lee’s company offers clients adventures on two national forests, The Shoshone and the Bridger-Teton.
In the fall, most of his clients are hunters. In the summer, his company offers horseback camping, fishing trips and sight-seeing rides into remote areas.
When a tornado touched down east of Laramie on June 17, it leveled countless trees, burying a section of a trail connecting the Happy Jack to Pilot Hill areas. (Courtesy Michael Kusiek/Wyoming Pathways) 
Maintaining public hiking and biking trails, like these on Casper Mountain, frequently requires hard work from local volunteer organizations. (Courtesy Austin Burgess, Central Wyoming Trails Alliance) 
Maintaining public hiking and biking trails, like these on Casper Mountain, frequently requires hard work from local volunteer organizations. (Courtesy Austin Burgess, Central Wyoming Trails Alliance) 
Maintaining public hiking and biking trails, like these on Casper Mountain, frequently requires hard work from local volunteer organizations. (Courtesy Austin Burgess, Central Wyoming Trails Alliance)
Did Forest Service Drop The Ball?
There’s been frustration with what some say is a decline in trail maintenance from the U.S. Forest Service.
Recent staff and budget cuts to the agency might account for some of the decline, and the Forest Service can’t help that, Livingston said.
“There’s some mismanagement there too. I’m not letting them (the Forest Service) completely off the hook,” he added.
Commercial logging has been diminished on national forests, for instance, he said.
Wyoming loggers echoed that sentiment recently before a Wyoming Legislature committee, telling lawmakers that can’t start cutting trees soon enough or fast enough to clean up its forests.
Forest Service officials could not be reached for comment on Friday.
Tornado Alley
There’s also concerns on the recreational side of things, Michael Kusiek, executive director of Wyoming Pathways,” told Cowboy State Daily.
His group lays the plans for new trails and hires professional companies to build them. The demand for good hiking and mountain biking trails is ever-increasing.
However, when are blocked by fallen trees, they aren’t good assets for Wyoming’s growing outdoors recreation economic sector, he said.
Trails require huge investment in time and money, so cuts in federal trail maintenance programs are coming at a bad time, he said.
In addition to providing a high-quality outdoors experience for Wyoming residents and tourists alike, trails are hugely important to local economies, Kusiek said.
For instance, if a local business offers shuttle service to trail heads for hikers and mountain bikers, that business will suffer if the trails are choked with fallen trees, he said.
Local and regional trail associations, cycling clubs and others are helping to fill the gap, Kusiek said. Those groups can form memorandums of understanding (MOUs) with federal agencies or local governments, to help train and equip people to do trail work.
And there’s no shortage of work, he said.
For example, tornado touched east of Laramie on June 17, completely burying a section of connecting trail between the Pilot Hill and Happy Jack areas with blown-over trees, he said.
That’s one massive clean-up job among many all across Wyoming, Kusiek said.
County, Volunteers Keep Casper Mountain Trails Clean
The Central Wyoming Trails Alliance has an MOU with the Natrona County Parks and Recreation Department, alliance president and director Austin Burgess told Cowboy State Daily.
So far, that’s worked well for maintaining roughly 20 miles of non-motorized trail on Casper Mountain, he said.
The alliance is authorized to keep the trails clear, and to remove “hazard trees” that are threatening to topple over onto trails or campsites, Burgess said.
They’ve managed to keep up, he said.
Last year’s work entailed falling 60 standing dead trees, and clearing out another 200 or so dead tress that had fallen over, he said.
So far this year, they’ve had to remove about 30 trees, Burgess said.
The only wrinkle is unauthorized cutting that’s sometimes done by individuals or private companies, he said.
For example, sometimes people try to cut firewood too near to trails, which can be a safety hazard, or create a mess, Burgess said.
Most of the time, unauthorized cutting happens because people aren’t aware of regulations, changes in management policy and the like – not because they’re deliberately trying to break the rules, he said.
Mark Heinz can be reached at mark@cowboystatedaily.com.
