Video of skiing the Trap Dike

When I skied to Avalanche Lake a week ago, the bottom of the Trap Dike in Mount Colden didn’t have much snow. Evidently, there is enough snow higher up to ski the dike and the upper slide. The video below is from Drew Haas’s website Adirondack Backcountry Skiing. The site has a number of other videos worth checking out.

2/20/2012 from ADKBCSKI on Vimeo.

Partnering with Adirondack Almanack

We’re pleased to announce that the Adirondack Explorer has formed a partnership with the Adirondack Almanack. The first sign of the changes to come is a link to the Almanack on the Explorer home page. More substantial changes lie ahead. Following is a news release issued this afternoon.

 Adirondack Explorer and Adirondack Almanack form partnership

The Adirondack Explorer newsmagazine and the online journal Adirondack Almanack have formed a partnership designed to enhance the online presence of both media outlets.

Tom Woodman, the publisher of the Explorer, and John Warren, the founder of the Almanack, signed an agreement today to integrate their online operations. Warren will continue to run the Almanack, which will now fall under the Explorer rubric.

Both organizations will continue to be hosted on their own domains: www.adirondackalmanack.com and www.adirondackexplorer.org.

Founded in 1998, the Explorer is a nonprofit newsmagazine (with offices in Saranac Lake) that focuses on environmental issues, outdoor recreation, natural history, and general news about the Adirondack Park. Warren, who lives in Chestertown, started the Almanack in 2005 and built it into one of the Adirondack Park’s premier websites. The site features the work of more than 20 contributors who write on a wide range of topics, including the arts, history, outdoor recreation, and the environment. The Almanack also posts a daily list of links to regional news.

The partnership will combine the Almanack’s community journalism with the Explorer’s news coverage. The coming months will see the rollout of new mobile applications, redesigns for the websites of both organizations, and an expanded social media presence.

“This is an outstanding opportunity for two organizations with similar missions to collaborate in a unique way at a time when local media is changing dramatically,” Warren said. “Almanack contributors have engaged regular readers and helped expand the dialogue about Adirondack issues. Now we’ll have the administrative support to broaden their reach.”

“The journalists of the Adirondack Explorer and the community voices of the Adirondack Almanack blog site will join to create an expansive electronic meeting place for news and conversations about the Adirondack Park,” said Explorer Publisher Tom Woodman. “We hope this partnership will help bring people together in a kind of digital town square to learn about and discuss issues that shape the future of the Adirondacks—and to share all the ways to enjoy this unique Park.”

 In 2009, Warren received Eleanor Brown Communication Award from the Adirondack Mountain Club. Explorer Editor Phil Brown received the same award the previous year.

DEC to build bridge over Marcy Brook

Sometime this year hikers will have a brand-new bridge for crossing Marcy Brook on their way to Mount Marcy and other destinations in the High Peaks Wilderness.

The state Department of Environmental Conservation plans to build the bridge about a quarter-mile downstream from Marcy Dam. The old bridge at the dam was washed away during Tropical Storm Irene in August.

Marcy Dam pond after Irene. Photo by Carl Heilman II

After Irene, hikers had to rock hop across Marcy Brook at a place known as the Squirrel Crossing. The new bridge will be upstream of the Squirrel Crossing, according to DEC spokesman David Winchell.

Winchell said the log-stringer bridge will be constructed this spring or summer. The $20,000 cost (most of it for labor) will be borne by the state’s Environmental Protection Fund.

Winchell said no decision will be made on whether to rebuild Marcy Dam and/or its bridge until engineers assess the dam’s structural soundness. If DEC decides to build a bridge at Marcy Dam, Winchell added, the new downstream bridge will be dismantled and the materials used elsewhere.

Easily reachable from Adirondak Loj, Marcy Dam is one of the most popular destinations in the High Peaks Wilderness and a stopover on the way to many of the High Peaks. Winchell said DEC needed to install a bridge across the brook as soon as possible.

“It’s a busy crossing, and we need something better than a rock hop,” he said.

 The floods of Irene not only washed away the bridge, but they also damaged the dam, causing most of the dam’s impoundment to drain. The March/April issue of the Explorer contains a debate on whether the dam should be repaired. Carl Heilman, who took the photo to the right, argues for fixing it and restoring the cherished view of a pond nestled among mountains. Tony Goodwin, editor of the Adirondack Mountain Club’s High Peaks guidebook, takes the opposite view, contending that the shallow pond had been filling with silt anyway and would continue to fill in if the dam were fixed.

The strange shape of Senate District 47

The proposed district of State Senator Joseph Griffo.

In North Country Public Radio’s blog the In Box, Brian Mann describes the proposed redistricting of the New York State Senate as a naked power grab by Republicans (click here to read his post).

He writes that the plan “is really designed to do one simple thing: maintain a fragile GOP majority.” He points out that it pits six Democratic incumbents against each other in re-election races. “Meanwhile, not a single Republican lawmaker faces serious disruption or an intra-party battle,” Mann says.

This 1812 cartoon satirizes the redrawing of election districts under Massachusetts Govenor Elbridge Gerry.

 In other words, it appears to be a classic case of gerrymandering.

I’m sure many of you know that the term gerrymander is derived from Elbridge Gerry, the Massachusetts governor in 1812 when that state’s Senate districts were redrawn to favor his party. One of the districts was said to resemble a salamander (though the contemporary cartoon at right depicts it as a dragon).

I looked to see if there are any salamanders in our Senate’s redistricting proposal. Somewhat surprisingly, most of the districts do not appear all that oddly shaped. Evidently, the boundaries alone do not reveal the behind-the-scenes machinations.

One glaring exception seems to be the 47^th Senate District on the western fringe of the Adirondack Park. It stretches 145 miles from south of Utica in central New York to Massena on the Canadian border. At its narrowest point, in the town of New Hartford, the district is less than four miles wide.

Now represented by Joseph Griffo, a Republican from Rome, the proposed district includes eight towns wholly or partially in the Adirondack Park: Clifton, Fine, Croghan, Watson, Greig, Lyonsdale, and Forestport.

Is this an example of Griffomandering? Not really. The proposed district is not that different from Griffo’s current district, which was drawn in 2002. Nor is it radically different from the district drawn in 1992.

Nevertheless, as you might infer from the above map, it has be the oddest-shaped Senate district in the state. It sort of resembles an upside-down prawn from District 9 (the movie). Perhaps it’s been that way since 1812.

Betty Little stands to lose Hamilton County

State Senator Betty Little will no longer represent Hamilton County, one of two counties wholly within the Adirondack Park, under a redistricting plan released today.

Little, a Republican, will continue to represent Adirondack communities in Essex, Franklin, Clinton, Warren and Washington counties—all located in the eastern or northern Adirondacks. She also will pick up six towns in St. Lawrence County, five of which are in the Park. (Essex County is the other county located entirely in the Park.)

Dan MacEntee, Little’s spokesman, said the senator is disappointed to lose Hamilton County, as well as two towns in southern Washington County, but overall she is satisfied with the redistricting proposal.

“Comparatively, when you look across the state, this is a district that changes very little,” MacEntee said.

MacEntee expects that the issues in the St. Lawrence County towns are similar to those in Little’s current district.

The demographics are almost the same. The population of her current district is 299,603 and is 92% white. The population of the proposed district is 293,101 and is 94% white.

Veteran Senator Hugh Farley, a Republican from the Schenectady area, would pick up Hamilton County under the redistricting plan as well as the Adirondack towns of Ohio and Webb (home to Old Forge) in Herkimer County. Even so, it appears Little would still represent the majority of Park residents. 

The map shows Little’s proposed district. I added green dots to the towns she would pick up and red dots to those she would lose.

The plan must be approved by the state legislature to take effect. Governor Andrew Cuomo would have a chance to veto it.

DEC wants to expand bobcat harvest

Map shows proposed changes in regulations for hunting and trapping bobcats. NYSDEC.

The state Department of Environmental Conservation wants to allow more hunting and/or trapping of bobcats in many parts of the state, including the Adirondacks.

In a draft five-year management plan, DEC reports that the state’s bobcat population—now estimated to be five thousand—has been growing, especially in the Southern Tier. Roughly twice the size of housecats, bobcats prey on a variety of species, from small voles to white-tailed deer.

A bobcat. Photo from NYSDEC.

DEC says up to 20 percent of the state’s bobcats (i.e., a thousand animals) could be killed by hunters and trappers each year without hurting the population. In recent years, sportsmen have harvested between four hundred and five hundred a year. Under its proposed plan, DEC estimates that this tally would increase by less than a hundred, still well below the critical threshold.

As indicated by the map above, the trapping season in the Adirondacks and the rest of the North Country would be extended. The season now runs from October 25 to December 10. Under the plan, it would be extended to February 15. The hunting season will not change.

The trapping season in the Adirondacks had been shorter than elsewhere to protect fishers. Since the fisher population has rebounded, the department feels that rationale no longer obtains.

The plan also calls for extending both the hunting and trapping seasons in central Tug Hill to February 15.

In the biggest change, DEC wants to initiate hunting and trapping of bobcats in much of the Southern Tier, where the population has increased dramatically over the past decade. “What began as occasional sightings along the New York/Pennsylvania border has progressed to large numbers of observations, trail camera photos, and incidental captures and releases by trappers,” the proposed plan says. “Over the past five years there have been 332 bobcat observations documented in the harvest expansion area.”

DEC also seeks to allow hunting and trapping of bobcats in the region just north of New York City.

The public has until February 16 to comment on the proposal.

 Click the link below to read the plan (PDF file).

 bobcat plan

APA approves Tupper Lake resort

Tupper Lake resident James Lanthier demonstrates outside the APA in favor of the Adirondack Club and Resort. Photo by Phil Brown.

The Adirondack Park Agency voted 10-1 today to approve the controversial Adirondack Club and Resort, the largest development ever to come before the agency.

Several commissioners said they had concerns about the project—including what they described as the developers’ optimistic sales projections—but they concluded that it fell within the APA’s regulations.

The commissioners agreed with the agency’s staff that the resort would not cause an “undue adverse environmental impact” and expressed hope that it would boost the fortunes of Tupper Lake.

Tupper Lakes hopes the resort will revive its downtown. Photo by Susan Bibeau.

“This brings the opportunity of economic development to Tupper Lake, something that’s badly needed,” said Commissioner William Thomas.

Tupper Lake residents in the audience applauded when the decision was announced, and several thanked the board afterward.

Preserve Associates plans to build a 719-unit resort on 6,200 acres of forestland near the Big Tupper Ski Area. The development will include so-called Great Camps, single-family homes, town houses, a sixty-room hotel, a restaurant, shops, a health spa, and a marina. Preserve Associates also intends to expand and renovate the ski area.

Michael Foxman, one of the principal developers, began his quest for an APA permit eight years ago. At the time, he said, he was told the process would take eight months. Had he known it would take as long as it did, he added, he probably would not have pursued the project.

Foxman still needs to obtain permits from the state Department of Environmental Conservation and Department of Health and work out a financing deal with the Franklin County Industrial Development Agency.

After the APA vote, Foxman said he hopes to break ground in 2013. Preserve Associates plans to begin the development by selling Great Camp lots east of Lake Simond and work their way west toward the ski area. Asked if he has any buyers lined up, Foxman replied, “We have people we have been talking to for five years. Some are still interested, some might not be.”

Richard Booth was the only commissioner to vote against the permit. He called the developers’ sales projections—and thus the benefits to the community—unrealistic. He also faulted Preserve Associates for failing to undertake a comprehensive survey of wildlife on the property. Finally, he contended that the development is not compatible with the agency’s guidelines for Resource Management lands.

Most of the development will occur on lands classified as Resource Management, the strictest of the APA’s zoning categories. The agency’s Land Use and Development Plan defines Resource Management as open-space lands whose “primary uses” include forestry, agriculture, and hunting. However, the plan allows the construction of single-family homes “on substantial acreages or in small clusters.” The APA has never defined “substantial acreages” or “small clusters,” but Booth asserted that the design of the Adirondack Club and Resort, spread over thousands of acres, disturbs Resource Management lands “in a way that I think is not necessary and not acceptable.”

Environmental organizations such as the Adirondack Council and Adirondack Wild pressed Preserve Associates to come up with an alternative design to cluster the development more. Many of the complaints were aimed at the Great Camps, most of which will be built on lots ranging from twenty to a hundred acres. Because the thirty-nine Great Camps will be scattered throughout the tract, critics argue that they will fragment the forest and disturb wildlife habitat.

Preserve Associates stuck to its design, with several modifications, but it did agree to prohibit any further subdivision of the Great Camp lots. In the end, the changes were enough to win the support of the Adirondack Council.

“We didn’t get everything we wanted, but we got enough,” said Brian Houseal, the council’s executive director.

Houseal said the council wanted Preserve Associates to refrain from developing the lands east of Lake Simond, which border the 14,600-acre Follensby Park. The Follensby tract is owned by the Nature Conservancy, which plans to sell it to the state sometime in the next several years.

Adirondack Wild, however, remained fiercely opposed to the project. David Gibson, one of the group’s founders, called the APA vote “the most significantly bad decision they’ve ever made in the [twenty-plus] years I’ve observed this agency.”

Gibson said much of the development should have been moved from Resource Management to lands classified Moderate Intensity Use, a less-stringent zoning category. “There were so many other [design] alternatives with 6,200 acres to get it right,” he said.

Gibson said he did not know if Adirondack Wild would challenge the decision in court.

Another environmental group, Protect the Adirondacks, also opposed the project as designed.

APA writes draft permit for Tupper resort

The Adirondack Club and Resort would be built on forested lands near the Big Tupper Ski Area. Photo by Carl Heilman II.

After six years of public debate, the Adirondack Park Agency’s staff has written a draft permit for the Adirondack Club and Resort in Tupper Lake, finding that the resort would comply with the law if it meets all the conditions of the permit.

The APA board, which is scheduled to vote next Friday, could approve the draft permit, approve it with modifications, or reject it. Among other things, the board must decide whether the project will cause an “undue adverse environmental impact.”

Two environmental activists disagree on whether the project as described in the permit passes the test.

Brian Houseal, executive director of the Adirondack Council, said he is happy with the changes required by the draft permit. “The developer has designed the project within the existing regulations,” he said.

Houseal said he is especially pleased that no further subdivision will be allowed on the land occupied by the so-called Great Camps. As a result, he said, the fragmentation of wildlife habitat will be limited.

“The changes imposed by the APA will probably avoid undue adverse environmental impact,” Houseal said. “Is that a win for the environmental community? Yes.”

But David Gibson of Adirondack Wild contends that the board should reject the permit. Most of the Great Camps will be built on lands classified as Resource Management, where typical uses are forestry, agriculture, and recreation. Residential development is allowed only “on substantial acreages or in small clusters.” Gibson said many of the Great Camps will be built on fifteen- or twenty-acre lots. “It doesn’t meet the criterion for Resource Management,” Gibson said. “Most of the Adirondack Club and Resort could not be defined as being on substantial acreage or in small clusters.”

Gibson also said the developers failed to conduct a thorough study of wildlife on the property. Houseal, however, pointed out that the draft permit now requires the developers to undertake an amphibian study.

Adirondack Wild wants adjudicatory hearings reopened to address wildlife impacts and other issues, but Houseal disagrees.

“It’s time to have a decision here,” Houseal said. “I appreciate Adirondack Wild’s motion to put it back in the hearing, but we need to have a decision.”

Preserve Associates wants to build a 719-unit resort—a mixture of single- and multi-family homes—on some 6,200 acres near the Big Tupper Ski Area. It would be the largest development ever approved by the APA.

Despite writing a draft permit, the APA staff did not make a recommendation to approve or reject the project. APA spokesman Keith McKeever said this was due partly to the complexity of the project. “It’s up to the board to make a decision,” he said.

If the developers win the APA’s go-ahead, they will still need to obtain water-quality permits from the state Department of Environmental Conservation and financing approvals from the Franklin County Industrial Development Agency. Houseal argues that one lesson of the drawn-out process is that permits for future projects should be considered together, not separately.

Click here to download the draft permit and conditions.

Yes, this is a snowy year

In his latest Birdwatch column for the Explorer, John Thaxton said we might see an influx of snowy owls this winter. The man is a soothsayer.

Snowy owls live in the Canadian tundra, but once in a while they migrate south in great numbers in search of food. This is one of those “irrupution” years.

A snowy owl. Photo by Larry Master.

National Public Radio reported last week that snowy owls have been sighted in many states this winter, from Maine to Washington State and as far south as Oklahoma.

Jim McCormac, a biologist with the Ohio Division of Wildlife, told NPR that the owl’s movements are influenced by the lemming populations in the far north. Most likely, he said, “there was a superabundance of lemmings this year up in the Arctic. And there were so many lemmings that the owls in response will lay more eggs, so there’s a lot more young owls. And so there’s not enough food to get through the winter, so a lot of them come south.”

Before Thaxton wrote his column in early December, there already had been three sightings in our region. Larry Master, a Lake Placid birder, said snowy owls are usually seen during irruption years along the edges of the Adirondack Park, including the Champlain Valley. They also may frequent  the St. Lawrence Seaway. “Snowy owls are birds of the open tundra and don’t feel comfortable in woods,” Master said.  “I’ve never seen one in the Tri-Lakes area, although a friend saw one a few years ago on the Whiteface Inn golf course–a one-day wonder.”

Although the irruption is good news for birders, they should be careful not to stress the owls. McCormac noted that when snowies arrive this far south they usually are emaciated and hungry. “Photographers, avid birders, give the birds a lot of distance, don’t disrupt them, cause them to fly, things like that because that’s another peril that they face,” he said.

With their white plumage, snowy owls blend in with the arctic landscape. Given our dearth of snow this winter, they might find it difficult to camouflage themselves in these parts.

For our foul-weather friends

Josh Wilson took this photo of a whiteout in the French Alps.

We’ve seen many photos of the Adirondacks taken on blue-sky days with puffy clouds or during sunsets when the horizon is ablaze with red, orange, and purple. We’ve seen far fewer taken in the middle of a blinding blizzard or horrific rainstorm.

If you have one, you might submit it to Teton Gravity Research’s Gnarliest Weather Photo Contest. The winner and three runner-ups will win some pricey Gore-Tex gear.

TGR, a maker of a maker of ski and surf films, is accepting photos online. The public has a chance to influence the outcome of the contest: the judges will consider only the twenty-five photos that receive the most Facebook “Likes” through February 5.

Skiing in the French Alps. Photo by Josh Wilson.

Josh Wilson, who often shoots for the Explorer, submitted the photo above. He snapped it while on a ski tour in the French Alps in April 2010. Josh and his friends, led by a local guide (“a real bad ass”), had climbed the Col de Aiguille Crochues, descended in a storm, and then climbed the Col du Berard, where the photo was taken. The skier on the right is Matt Young of Lake Placid. The skier in the background is their guide, Yannick Graziani.

 Josh, who lives in Saranac Lake, said the second descent ended in Switzerland. “The ski day consisted of a bus ride, a tram ride, a ski-lift ride, skinning, hiking, skiing, and then taking a train back to where we started,” he said.

The whole tour, which took six hours, was done in a whiteout.

Fortunately, the gang enjoyed some good weather as well, as evidenced by the inset photo.

The photo below shows the Le Massif de Aiguilles Rouges, the scene of the whiteout ski tour. The group climbed almost to the summit of the highest peak on the left and then descended the other side. They climbed again to a ridge behind the large rocky peak on the right side of the photo.

But Josh won’t win any prizes in the Gnarliest Weather Photo Contest for these two photos.

If you’re on Facebook and like the whiteout photo, Click here. Or perhaps you have one of your own to submit.

The top winner will receive a Patagonia Primo jacket and Patagonia Primo pants, both made of Gore-Tex fabric. The three runner-ups will receive a Gore-Tex jacket, hoodie, or gloves, all made by Burton.

Le Massif de Aiguilles Rouges in Chamonix. Photo by Josh Wilson.