Redwood National and State Parks

The Redwood National and State Parks (RNSP) are a complex of one United States national park and three California state parks located along the coast of northern California. The combined RNSP contain Redwood National Park, Del Norte Coast Redwoods State Park, Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park, and Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park. The parks' 139,000 acres (560 km<sup>2</sup>) preserve 45 percent of all remaining old-growth coast redwood forests.

Located in Del Norte and Humboldt counties, the four parks protect the endangered coast redwood (Sequoia sempervirens)—the tallest, among the oldest, and one of the most massive tree species on Earth—which thrives in the humid temperate rainforest. The park region is highly seismically active and prone to tsunamis. The parks preserve 37 miles (60 km) of pristine coastline, indigenous flora, fauna, grassland prairie, cultural resources, waterways, as well as threatened animal species, such as the Chinook salmon, northern spotted owl, and Steller's sea lion.

Redwood forest originally covered more than two million acres (8,100 km<sup>2</sup>) of the California coast, and the region of today's parks largely remained wild until after 1850. The gold rush and attendant timber business unleashed a torrent of activity, adversely affecting the indigenous peoples of the area and supplying lumber to the West Coast. Decades of unrestricted clear-cut logging ensued, followed by ardent conservation efforts. In the 1920s, the Save the Redwoods League helped create Prairie Creek, Del Norte Coast, and Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Parks, among others. After lobbying from the league and the Sierra Club, Congress created Redwood National Park in 1968 and expanded it in 1978. In 1994, the National Park Service (NPS) and the California Department of Parks and Recreation combined Redwood National Park with the three abutting Redwoods State Parks into a single administrative unit. Modern RNSP management seeks to protect and restore the coast redwood forests to their condition before 1850, including by controlled burning.

In recognition of the rare ecosystem and cultural history found in the parks, the United Nations designated them a World Heritage Site in 1980. Local tribes declared an Indigenous Marine Stewardship Area in 2023, protecting the parks region, the coastline, and coastal waters. Park admission is free except for special permits, and visitors may camp, hike, bike, and ride horseback along about of park system trails.

History

Native Americans

thumb|left|upright|A [[Tolowa woman working park maintenance in 1982|alt=A woman in a hard hat near wooden beams]]

Modern-day Native American nations such as the Yurok, Tolowa, Karuk, Chilula, and Wiyot have historical ties to the region, which has had various indigenous occupants for millennia. Describing "a diversity in an area that size that probably has never been equaled anywhere else in the world", historian David Stannard accounts for more than thirty native nations that lived in northwestern California. Scholar Gail L. Jenner estimates that "at least fifteen" tribal groups inhabited the coastline.

The Yurok, Chilula, and Tolowa were the most connected to the current parks' areas. Based on an 1852 census, anthropologist Alfred Kroeber estimated that the Yurok population in that year was around 2,500. Historian Ed Bearss described the Yurok as the most populous in the area, estimating that there were around 55 villages. Until the 1860s, the Chilula lived in the middle region of the Redwood Creek valley in close company with the redwood trees. They primarily settled along Redwood Creek between the coast and Minor Creek, California, and in summer they would range into and camp in the Bald Hills. The Tolowa were located near the Smith River, and on lands that are now part of Jedediah Smith State Park, an area which 21st century excavation found has been inhabited for at least 8,500 years.

Native Americans residing within the park areas relied on redwood trees as a construction material, and some featured the trees in their mythology, including the Chilula, who viewed the trees as gifts from a creator. The tribes harvested coast redwoods and processed them into planks, using them as building material for boats, houses, and small villages. To construct buildings, the planks would be erected side by side in a narrow trench, with the upper portions lashed with willow or hazel and held by notches cut into the supporting roof beams. Redwood boards were used to form a two- or three-pitch roof.

thumb|Reconstructed [[Yurok people|Yurok plankhouse made of redwood boards|alt=Weathered, gray redwood house with modestly pitched roof]]

Arrival of European Americans

Historians believe that the first Europeans to visit land near what is now the parks were members of the Cabrillo expedition led by Bartolomé Ferrer. In 1543, Ferrer's ship made landfall at Cape Mendocino and may have reached waters off Oregon as far north as the 43rd parallel. Hubert Howe Bancroft disagreed, believing that Ferrer's ship did not travel so far north. Explorers including Francis Drake sailed past the foggy, rocky coast, but generally did not set anchor until 1775, when Bruno de Heceta and Juan Francisco de la Bodega y Quadra of Spain spent about ten days at the Yurok village of Tsurai south of the parks. George Vancouver and Francisco de Eliza followed in 1793. American fur trading ships under contract to Russians stopped at Tsurai during the early 19th century.

Prior to Jedediah Smith in 1828, no other explorer of European descent is known to have explored the interior of the Northern California coastal region. Smith and nineteen companions left San Jose, California, and explored what are now called the Trinity, Smith, and Klamath rivers, passing through coast redwood forests and trading with Native American groups. They reached the coast near Requa, parts of which are within the parks' boundaries.

The California Gold Rush of 1848 brought hundreds of thousands of Europeans and Americans to California, and the discovery of gold along the Trinity River in 1850 brought many of them to the region of the parks. This quickly led to conflicts wherein native peoples were displaced, raped, enslaved, and massacred. By 1895, only one third of the Yurok in one group of villages remained; by 1919, virtually all members of the Chilula tribe had either died or been assimilated into other tribes. The Tolowa—whose numbers Bearss estimates at "well under 1,000" by the 1850s—had a population of about 120 in 1910, having been nearly extinguished in massacres by settlers between 1853 and 1855.

Redwood logging followed gold mining, and most mining companies became lumber interests. Redwood has a straight grain, making planks easy to cut. Because redwood can defy the weather and does not warp, it became a valuable commodity. Jenner says a good team of two men could saw through a redwood tree at about a foot per hour with a crosscut saw, their preferred tool until after World War II. Because wheeled vehicles could not travel the landscape, teams of six or twelve oxen transported logs to logging roads. Rivers or railroads took them to the region's lumber mills. After the 1881 invention of the steam donkey and later its successor the bull donkey, the need to fell intervening trees so the donkeys could work spawned the practice called clearcutting. Caterpillar tractors began to compete with manual labor in the late 1920s.

State park preservation

thumb|upright|The [[coast redwood is the tallest tree species on Earth.|alt=Various coast redwood trees from a bottom perspective|left]]

After extensive logging, conservationists and concerned citizens began to seek ways to preserve remaining trees, which they saw being logged at an alarming rate. Stumbling blocks slowed conservation: objections and some innovations came from the logging industry, construction of the Redwood Highway brought roadside attractions and more visitors to the trees, Congress failed to act, and voracious demand for lumber came with the post–World War II construction boom. They receive abundant rain during most of the year, with a peak in winter, a decrease in June and September, and two dry summer months (July and August).

thumb|upright|Fog is persistent during the summer.|alt=Trees in a forest obscured by fog

The parks are part of a temperate rainforest that runs along the western United States coast. The nearby Pacific Ocean has major effects on the climate in the parks. Temperatures near the coast mostly remain between 40 and 60 degrees Fahrenheit (4–15 °C) all year. Redwoods tend to grow in this area of steadily temperate climate, though most grow at least a mile or two (1.5–3 km) from the coast to avoid the saltier air, and they never grow more than from it. In this humid coastal zone, the trees receive moisture from both heavy winter rains and persistent summer fog. The presence and consistency of the summer fog is actually more important to overall health of the trees than the precipitation. This fact is borne out in precipitation totals of around annually, Scientists fear climate change is likely to shift the range in which coast redwoods live to outside protected areas, and many have done research on assisted migration.

Ecology

The Redwood National and State Parks conserve an area which contains the largest contiguous old-growth coast redwood forest as well as habitats for endangered species.

Coast redwood

left|thumb|upright=.8|[[Sequoia sempervirens|alt=The bottom of a big tree with a small trunk veering off]]

Discovered in Redwood National Park in 2006 in an unpublished location, the tallest living tree is the coast redwood tree (Sequoia sempervirens) named Hyperion, at . It is followed by Helios at , and Icarus at , both also in Redwood National Park. For many years thought to be the tallest, one specimen named simply "Tall Tree" in Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park was measured at . "So many people have stood on the base of the tree that the ground is hard packed", said Professor Stephen C. Sillett of Cal Poly Humboldt university in the 1990s. In 2022, after documenting damage caused by visitors to the tallest living tree, NPS announced a penalty for those who approach it of up to a $5,000 fine and six months in jail,

Mature coast redwoods live an average of 500–700 years; a few are documented to be 2,000 years old. About 96 percent of the world's old-growth coast redwood forest has been logged, The parks protect of old-growth forest, almost equally divided between federal and state management. The International Union for Conservation of Nature named the coast redwood an endangered species in 2011.

Other flora

thumb|upright=1.2|[[Fern Canyon in Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park|alt=Canyon with walls covered in ferns and a stream running down the center]]

Coast redwood tends to dominate in places it likes but often can be found together with also-fast-growing coast Douglas-fir trees. Closer to the ocean, red alder grow in place of the salt-water intolerant redwood. The tallest known Sitka spruce grows in the parks. Sitka spruce are plentiful along the coast, better adapted to salty air than other species. Other associated trees are the tanoak, Pacific madrone, bigleaf maple, and California laurel.

Huckleberry and snowberry are part of the forest understory. The California rhododendron and azalea are flowering shrubs common in the parks. Plants such as the sword fern and redwood sorrel are prolific. The ancestors of some of these ferns reach back 325 million years.

Fauna

right|thumb|upright|The [[northern spotted owl (Strix occidentalis caurina) is a threatened species known to exist in the parks.|alt=A Northern spotted owl staring at the camera]]

Various ecosystems exist within the parks—seacoast, river, prairie, and densely forested zones—offering refuge to numerous rare and endangered species. About 66 species of land mammals have been documented, including the black bear, coyote, cougar, bobcat, beaver, river otter, and black-tailed deer. Roosevelt elk are the most readily observed of the large mammals in the park. Different species of bats, such as the big brown bat, and other smaller mammals including minks, martens, red squirrels, northern flying squirrels, shrews, moles, brush rabbit, gophers, and raccoons live in the parks, although small mammals are infrequently seen. The bald eagle, which usually nests near a water source, is listed as a state of California endangered species. The Chinook salmon—historically an essential food for indigenous residents—northern spotted owl, and Steller sea lion are some of the other animal species that are threatened. The tidewater goby is a federally listed endangered species that lives near the Pacific coastline that were extirpated from the parks in 1968 when shoreline alterations affected the water's salinity. The candlefish soon followed in the 1970s. Sea otters were extirpated in the parks at the turn of the 20th century but river otters remain. Brown pelicans and three species of cormorants are mainly found on cliffs along the coast and on seastacks, while sandpipers and three species of gulls inhabit the seacoast and inland areas. Inland, freshwater-dependent birds such as the common merganser, osprey, red-tailed hawk, herons, and jays are a few of the bird species that have been documented. Approximately 280 bird species, or about one third of those found in the US, have been documented within park boundaries.

Reptiles like four species of sea turtle can be found offshore and sometimes on beaches. Amphibians can be found in the parks, which the gopher snake, tailed frog, clouded salamander, and three species of newts call home. Well-known detritivores, the banana slug and the yellow-spotted millipede, inhabit the parks.

Invasive species

Over 200 exotic species live in the RNSP. Of these, 30 have been identified as invasive species, and 10 of the 30 are considered threats to local species and ecosystems. Exotic species currently account for about a quarter of the total flora in the parks. Growing in varying amounts over the parks' different vegetation areas, about one percent of plants in old-growth areas are exotic species, compared to 50 to 75 percent in the Bald Hills prairies. Spotted knapweed and poison hemlock were both under consideration in 2015 for addition to a high-priority watch list maintained by the park system.

Fire

The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CAL FIRE) is responsible for fire management in the redwoods state parks, and NPS manages fire in the national park.

thumb|Forest Service research ecologist with mixed tribal ancestry conducting a cultural burn for tanoak acorns in 2019|alt=A man lighting various small fires in a forest

Because coast redwood bark—in places up to a foot thick—has no resin, the trees are resistant to fire and will regrow after burning. The redwood forest is foggy, humid, not generally susceptible to fire, and lightning strikes among redwoods are rare, meaning that most fires are anthropogenic. A 2003 fire was an exception; a lightning storm started fires in least 274 California locations, including the Canoe Fire in Humboldt Redwoods State Park, which burned from September through October. By about 11 percent, old-growth coast redwoods have the greatest volume of fuels of any forest type.

After they arrived and until white settlers invaded their lands in the 1850s, the Tolowa people intentionally set low-intensity ground fires. Indigenous residents, including the Karuk and Tolowa, used fire to protect tanoak trees and their acorns, a primary food supply. Their fires improved their hunting grounds, reduced pests, and decreased the likelihood of larger fires. There is evidence that medium-intensity surface fire was set regularly in the area, but today, after decades of fire suppression and resulting increased fuel density, maximum-intensity crown fire has taken the place of surface fires when fire occurs. Near the tree's crown, coast redwood bark may be less than one inch thick.

Since its founding in 1905, and especially with its policies of the 1930s, the US Forest Service (USFS) has for the most part defended both human settlements and timber companies against fire using wildfire suppression techniques intended to eliminate fire. Repealed in 1937, the 1850 California Act for the Government and Protection of Indians—for which the state apologized in 2019—provided that "Any person was subject to fine or punishment if they set the prairie on fire, or refused to use proper exertions to extinguish the fire." Recognizing that fire has benefits, the service began in the 1970s to change policy to allow fire to burn. to promote cultural burning in their homeland in the park region. Operating with a new perspective, park managers conduct controlled fires in the grassland areas of the parks—to control invasive species, hold back the spread of Douglas fir, and increase the availability of materials needed by local tribes for basket weaving.

Recreation

The parks have five visitor centers, where general information, maps, and souvenirs are available; some of the centers offer activities during the summer, led by park rangers. There is no entry fee for the RNSP, though some camping areas and park areas require paid passes.

Since the 2019 closure of the DeMartin Redwood Youth Hostel, a low-amenities shared lodging facility near Klamath, California, there are no hotels or motels within the parks' boundaries. About north of San Francisco, the parks are accessible by air, automobile, and public transit. NPS itself offers no lodging but for accommodations, links to each town from north to south along US 101: Brookings, Oregon, and in California, Crescent City, Klamath, Orick, Trinidad, McKinleyville, Arcata, Eureka, Ferndale, and the counties of Del Norte and Humboldt.

thumb|alt=Line of horses with riders in front of forest|[[Equestrianism|Horseback riders entering Redwood National Park]]

The state parks have four frontcountry campgrounds which can be accessed by vehicle and used for a fee; the parks' website suggests making a reservation. These are at Mill Creek campground in Del Norte Coast Redwoods State Park and Jedediah Smith campground in Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park, which together have 231 campsites; the Elk Prairie campground in Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park, which has 75; and the Gold Bluffs Beach campground which has 26. Other nearby parks and recreation areas have additional camping options.

Hiking is the only way to reach the seven backcountry camping areas, the use of which requires a permit. Camping is only allowed in designated sites, except on gravel bars along Redwood Creek that allow for dispersed camping. Proper food storage to minimize encounters with bears is strongly enforced, and hikers and backpackers are required to take out any trash they generate. The NPS subscribes to the seven principles of Leave No Trace.

Almost of hiking trails exist in the parks. Throughout the year, trails are often wet and hikers need to be well prepared for rainy weather and consult information centers for updates on trail conditions. Some temporary footbridges are removed during the rainy season, as they would be destroyed by high streams. Kayaking is permitted, with ranger-led kayak tours offered during the summer. which is the longest undammed river remaining in California. Visitors can fish for salmon and trout in the Smith and Klamath rivers, and the beach areas offer opportunities to catch smelt and perch. A California sport fishing license is required to fish any of the rivers and streams.

Notes

References

Works cited

Books

Journal articles

Tripp is credited for contributions "on behalf of the Karuk Tribe".

Technical reports

External links

of Redwood National Park
of Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park
of Humboldt Redwoods State Park
of Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park
Humboldt Redwoods Project at Cal Poly Humboldt
Inventory of the Redwood National Park Collection, 1926–1980, at Forest History Society