Chimacum Ridge Community Forest is now open

CHIMACUM — The Jefferson Land Trust’s 918-acre Chimacum Ridge Community Forest is now open.

Located at 1717 Center Road in Chimacum, the forest is open seven days a week year-round, from dawn till dusk.

A celebration for the opening took place last Saturday.

“It was an amazing week of celebrations and logistics,” said Sarah Spaeth, the land trust’s (JLT) director of conservation and strategic partnerships. “A lot of people were really blown away by our new community resource. The forest has a life of its own now. Even though the land trust owns it, it’s really a resource for people to enjoy and steward along with us.”

The forest is planned to be managed for a number of uses, including recreation, wildlife habitat, ecological considerations relating to the Chimacum Creek watershed, harvesting, education, traditional tribal practices and bow hunting.

The forest has nine easy to moderate trails, which allow for hiking, biking and horseback riding. The trails include a multi-use trail from the parking lot to the ridge and a forest road loop on top of the ridge.

Foraging small quantities of plant materials, berries, mushrooms and other natural resources for personal consumption or use is allowed.

Informal nature studies are encouraged, a JLT visitors webpage said.

A 0.1-mile wheelchair-accessible trail goes north from the parking lot to a pavilion, which can be scheduled for group use or used informally, if available.

A second motor or assisted wheelchair-accessible trail goes about 150 yards south of the parking lot to a viewpoint of Center Valley, Community Forest Manager Ryen Helzer said.

Spaeth noted that JLT plans to complete a small parking lot on top of the ridge, which would be accessible to the Jefferson Transit Authority’s Dial-A-Ride program, to further extend access to the ridge.

The ridge will be managed as a working forest, meaning annual harvests will take place.

A recent harvest took place to control laminated root rot on 3-acre a portion of the property, Helzer said.

“Over the spring and summer, we had a family from Port Gamble S’Klallam come out to harvest cedar bark from the forest,” Helzer wrote.

Another harvest of 12 cedars was allowed for another traditional cedar bark harvest.

“A group of Chemakum harvested cedar bark from the trees there,” Helzer wrote.

Area tribes will be notified of future harvests for the same purpose, Spaeth said.

Local tribes also will be granted special access to what some refer to as a cranberry bog found on the property, Spaeth said.

The land trust celebrated with partners last Thursday. Spaeth said the event included toasting all of the collaboration required to succeed in bringing the project to a public opening.

Saturday, the public grand opening took place at Finnriver, located only a few minutes north of the forest, on Center Road.

“We ran five shuttles back and forth for basically three hours, getting people to value so that they can experience the trails themselves,” Spaeth said.

The opening was reserved to capacity, with 450 people signing up for the event, Spaeth said. About 250 guests came on the day of the event, according to a land trust web post about the opening.

“Even people that had experienced the trails before were amazed with what has happened in recent months,” Spaeth said. “The new multiuse trail, the new hiking trail, the interpretive displays, people were really impressed.”

Spaeth said the community forest is the biggest project she participated in during her career with the land trust. She was the trust’s executive director at the project’s beginning.

“I’ve been involved since the inception of the project 15 years ago, when we first started conversations with the landowner,” she said. “Saturday’s opening was the culmination of all that work.”

To learn more about visiting the forest, visit saveland.org/visiting-chimacum-ridge-community-forest/.

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Reporter Elijah Sussman can be reached by email at elijah.sussman@peninsuladailynews.com.