Clark County Forestry and Parks reveals work plan for 2025
By Cheyenne Thomas At the Clark County Board of Supervisors meeting held Dec. 19, the Clark County Forestry and Parks Department unveiled the plans it has for work to be done in county parks during the next year, as well as discussed the 2023 annual report from the department. Plans for the coming year include maintenance of the county’s eight campgrounds and roadways within the Clark County Forest, as well as working to battle invasive species and diseases. The board approved the complete plan by the end of the meeting.
In 2025, the Clark County Forestry and Parks Department laid out a few main goals it intends to focus on during the new year. The department’s main goals for 2025 will be to continue to monitor all its programs and events in order to increase efficiency within the department, which will extend to monitoring finances to assess the effectiveness of different programs offered by the department. The department will also begin work to improve its short and long-range maintenance and development plans for Clark County forestland and parks.
This year, the Clark County Forestry Department has laid out several maintenance projects that funds will be used for. Funds have been laid aside to have work done to maintain 46 miles of roadways in the Clark County Forest and add 5 miles of access ways for timber sites, as well as 1 mile of road for new timber sale access. All trails that are used for recreation in county parks, including snowmobile trails, ATV trails, hiking trails, horse trails and mountain bike trails, will also be maintained, along with nearby facilities.
Besides maintaining roads and trails for recreation and timber harvests, the department will also focus on battling invasive species and monitoring timber stands for diseases such as oak wilt. Roughly 10,000 acres of forestland, divided into 267 sites, are planned to be surveyed for invasive plants. Oak wilt will be specifically targeted on 69 sites within the Clark County Forest, and late summer aerial surveys will be used to look for remote pockets of oak wilt that may not be seen from roadways, as well as insect damage to red pine stands. At the county’s eight campgrounds, there will be a focus put on
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monitoring for gypsy moths and emerald ash borers.
Focusing on the individual parks in the county, the Clark County Forestry and Parks Department also highlighted several improvements it has planned. In Russell Memorial Park in the town of Dewhurst, the park is in line to receive shoreline stabilization for Lake Arbutus, access improvements for its campsites and other recreation improvements. At Rock Dam Park in the town of North Foster, shoreline stabilization is planned for Rock Dam Lake, as well as campsite access improvements and electrical upgrades.
At Mead Lake Park in the town of Mead, shoreline stabilization is planned for Mead Lake, as well as maintenance of the blacktop at the park and improvements to electrical sites. At Snyder Park in the town of Hewett, tree planting to continue replacing lost trees from the December 2021 tornado as well as electrical upgrades are planned. In Sherwood Park in the town of Sherwood, general maintenance and campsite access improvements are planned. At Levis Mound, general maintenance is planned, along with an upgrade to the site’s information kiosk. At Greenwood Park, improvements will be made for drainage, the parking lot will receive maintenance and playground equipment in the park will be replaced.
Other projects planned for 2025 by the Clark County Forestry and Parks Department will be to complete the purchase of 80 acres in the town of Seif. The property was noted to be owned by the Nature Conservancy and is a property entirely landlocked within Clark County forestland. The department will also begin the process to plan for repairs for Rock Dam and Mead Lake Dam.
The department will also put a focus on its timber stands and harvests in 2025. The county has an average annual harvest goal of 3,191 acres, and has set that as its minimum harvest goal for the year. However, a total of 5,239 acres may be reached, as there is a backlog of harvest activities on several stands of trees, which include thinning and regeneration harvests.
Due to the backlog on harvests, the department plans to focus on reconnaissance of its timber stands and focus more on species management as the markets and costs associated with maintaining its various timber stands change. Red pine forests are expected to decline in acreage, as there are high costs involved with site preparation, and insect and disease concerns make the trees difficult to maintain. Aspen stands were likewise expected to decline in acreage, as fertile sites would be changed over to oak stands while nutrient poor and wetter sites would be used to plant jack pine.
The department will also be working to evaluate and collect data on its various timber stands to determine what areas need to be thinned, rotated or planted. In the plan, 100 acres of prescribed burns will be conducted this year depending on the weather. Disk trenching will be done on 250 acres, and 200 acres are set aside for scarification for the previous year’s acorn crop. Checks and surveys are planned for 3,311 acres of forestland that are regenerating growth through natural means and 520 acres of forestland are to be surveyed for survivability of planted trees.
