Worlds alone can not describe Fall in the GSMNP

The Great Smoky Mountains national park moves millions of visitors a year who come here. I can only imagine what it did for the thousands who lived here before it was a national park.

Though I am as close to living in the Great Smoky Mountains national park that anyone could be based upon how much time I spend in this amazing biosphere, trails that I have hiked on dozens of times continue to move me. The same goes for roads I have driven on in the park hundreds of times.

Sometimes inspiration or enlightenment can come from a wisp of a cloud blowing over a mountain top or being trapped in a valley, the sparkle of sunlight reflecting through a dewdrop on a blade of grass or the various symphonies of sounds in the woods.

The picture above was taken today along the Middle Prong River in the Tremont section of the GSMNP. No enhancements or Photoshop tricks were done to the photo. It is just a living Monet - beauty in the park that is all around us.

Here in the Smoky Mountains the prelude to fall starts with the random sounds of green acorns falling into the leaves on the ground or striking and bouncing off logs from long fallen trees on the forest floor.

Gradually the green acorns falling from the oaks become yellower and then brown as the frequency of the sound increases as more acorns find their way to forest floor.

Squirrels start to spend more time more jumping around of the branches of trees chattering loudly as they stake out their territory and then rustling through the leaves as they are gathering their fill of acorns.

The trees in the Great Smoky Mountains national park deep green leaves - more than 100 species of trees live here - start to gradually lighten and start to randomly turn to red, light green and yellow.

The air here in the Smokies is no longer as humid as it is during the summer and as the day time temperatures become cooler into the 70s and then the 60s and the visibility keeps on improving.

The cicadas are no longer making a racket and the hummingbirds with their loud aerial acrobatics that were here all summer long are all gone.

Even the deer look different as bucks budding antlers with summer velvet give way to larger more fierce rack. Their golden brown coats have now tuned grayish to better blend in with the trunks of the trees in the park and the fawns are much larger now and will soon lose the spots on their coats.

The days are starting to get shorter and the birds that used to start a racket far before the break of dawn can no longer be heard, although the birds that welcome the day are now kind enough to wait until the day has started before they start singing.

At night the air is crisp and cool and the crickets still chatter calling out to one another but the sound is no longer coming in waves of white noise is it did through out the night in summer.

Day by day the pallet of the forest colors is changing. A random red or yellow leaf gives way to branches of wild colors. The leaves colors ever widen in range and increase in brilliance and luminosity as the leaf season continues through mid November.

When walking along the paths or hiking trails in the park you notice the smells in the park are also gradually changing. Just as the best of the blackberries are ending, some of the ferns in the higher elevations are start to turn yellow and then brown perfuming the air along the trail with a sweet smell.

Along some of the old homesteads a few apple trees have managed to survive all these years. Even though they won't win a county fair prize they can be quite delicious when ripe. Especially at the break of dawn the smell of the apples from these trees hangs in the air.

It will still be a few weeks before the first frost here in the Smoky Mountains and we probably won't see any snow in the lower elevations until at least December. The squirrels, fox and coyote that inhabit the Smokies are all getting fluffier and their tails bushier as their winter coats are growing in and the bears are getting outright fat as they gorge themselves in preparation for the winter.

Even along the higher elevations of the park such as at Clingmans Dome, the Appalachian Trail and the Newfound Gap Parking area we still have a few weeks before we can melt the first snowflakes of the year on the tips of our tongues.

Yes the Great Smoky Mountains national park can be quite inspirational to those who are lucky enough to spend time here. Just make a point to get away form the crowds and just take it all in. With 800 square miles of park it is easy to find a quiet spots even in the busiest of days here. Even the most ordinary place in the park is extraordinary if you just look, listen and observe with an open mind.

Fall brings lots of visitors to the Great Smoky Mountains national park to enjoy the autumn colors and along with the increase of visitors there are also more programs that the national park offers to it guests. I strongly recommend taking advantage of as many of these programs you can while they are available.

This Rain is good for the 2008 fall leaf season in the Smokies, but when is the peak leaf season?

The Smoky Mountains are getting much needed rain which may help prolong the 2008 peak leaf season but want be enough to turn dry wells and springs around.

2 years of heavy drought have the entire Smoky Mountains region worried about water with western North Carolina in the deepest trouble.

Hopefully the next few days rain in the Smoky Mountains will give us a deep enough soaking to revive some of the local crops such as corn which is experiencing drought related stress and the local deciduous trees can show off their fall colors when the foliage changes color for more than a quick flame out lasting a few days per tree.

The lack of moisture can actually improve the fall colors which have a very long season the Smoky Mountains given the various elevations, exposure to sunlight and as the fact that all of the more than 110 species of local hardwood and softwood deciduous trees all have a different peak period, color pallet and duration of staying on the trees.

Color has already stared mostly in higher elevations on the North Carolina side especially in the shaded hollows. Temperature, light and moisture are all catalysts which will change speed timing and duration of the color of the trees in the fall season.

The best time to catch the fall season depends on where you are planning to look for the fall foliage. For high country in North Carolina you will start winding down the 3rd and 4th week of October and low elevations in Tennessee the 3rd to 4th week in November the show of colors made by the hardwood leaves mostly flame reds are finishing.

Anytime in October you will find great colors in the Smoky Mountains, you may just have to drive up or down in elevation to find the best spot.

As for the thunderstorms with lightning we will be having in the Smoky Mountains for the next few days, in order to not become a statistic you should follow simple hiking safety guidelines for lightning:

Lighting is dangerous and should be respected. About 350 people a year are seriously injured by lightning in the United and 60 people lose their lives. Falling trees from strong winds associated with storms also claim lives and being in the woods where there are dead and weakened trees further increases your risk.

The best place to be when a thunderstorm rolls in would be indoors but being inside a car is usually safe as well.

Places you want to avoid during a thunderstorm would be:

• On a ridgeline or bald especially if you are the tallest object around
• In water such as a stream, lake or pool.
• Near tall trees. Trees can act as a giant conductor and when lightning hits a tree the sap boils and vaporizes exploding and sending wood splinter far and wide.
• Near wire fences, fire towers, power lines or any other conductor.
• Under rocks that act like an overhang as they can have a spark plug effect killing anyone underneath.

What you should do during a lightning storm:

• Stay as low as possible.
• Ditch the hiking poles and any conductive objects in your hands or on your persons. This includes jackets with metal zippers.
• Crotch low to the ground but have as little contact with the ground possible. Never lay flat on the ground!
• If you are in a group of people, spread out.
• Expect that any low lying areas during and after the storm may experience flash flooding. What looks like a safe place to hide may be a run off area that will fill with water faster than you can get out.

Lighting can strike without warning - often striking on the edges of a storm before there are any raindrops to be felt or when the rain has stopped.

You can tell how far a storm is away by counting the time from the flash to the sound of thunder since sound travels slower than light. For the speed that most people count, there is a 5 count per mile. Lightning safety experts say that you should take precautions and cover when lightning is within 30 seconds of you.

Be prepared as storms can come in fast and unexpectedly. I keep a dry bag normally used for canoeing in my backpack for cameras and electronics as well as Zip loc bags and 2 garbage bags just in case.

Even waterproof backpacks can get so soaked in minutes that everything inside still gets wet. When camping in the colder months all of my clothes are also packed in dry bags as being wet and cold could cause hypothermia. Even in the summer and especially at higher elevations there is always the danger of hypothermia in the Great Smoky Mountains national park.

Black bears are very active in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park

Although there have been no recent attacks by black bear in the Great Smoky Mountains Nations Park (GSMNP), some visitors are pushing their luck given how active the black bear are in this the most active bear season of the year.

The best way to handle yourself when you see a black bear is to stay as far away as possible and never let the bear think that you are a threat to the bear or its cubs which may be close by and out of your sight. You should however act as a threat of you can not get away and are about to be attacked by a bear.

Fall season in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park is usually a very active bear season which is a treat to the Millions of visitors who come to visit the park and hopefully get a glimpse or even get to take a picture or shoot video of the symbolic icon animal of the Smoky Mountains.

In the fall, the black bear in the park are in a race against time trying to gather as much food as possible before they slow down and become inactive for the winter. Black bear in the national park don't hibernate in caves during the winter as for all practical purposes there are no caves in the national park other than a sealed off cave in Cades Cove and 2 caves in the White Oak Sinks area of the park between Tremont and Cades Cove.

Black Bear in the GSMNP instead nest in hollows of trees or in a hollow tree. Bears can most often be seen high up in trees rather than on the ground. The tree in the National Park most favored by the black bear are oak trees both for the acorns they provide as food and for the shelter the older large oak trees provide to the bear.

The black bear in the fall typically eat as many nuts, berries, grasses and forbs and insects and other animals including carrion it can in an attempt to fatten up and can put on as much as 4 - 5 pounds of winter weight a day.

The female black bears will winter pregnant and the size of a litter is often dependent to the volume and quality of food the black bear acquires during the fall active season. Black bears typically have 2 or 3 cubs in a good year and just 1 or no cubs at all after a year with a limited or harder harvest.

This year's drought which has heavily affected the Smoky Mountains and the natural food stock of the black bear so the resident bears are very active in order to find the food that they need. Just don't get between a hungry bear and its food!

One of the most common questions visitors to the National park ask me is "Where can I find the most black bear in the park?" Traveling extensively through the backcountry and developed areas in both the North Carolina and Tennessee sections of the National Park I have found that the best areas of the national park to find a black bear are: The Roaring Fork section of the park by Gatlinburg Tennessee, Cades Cove typically between Sparks Lane and Hyatt Lane in the edge of the woods, backcountry areas between Cosby TN a Big Creek NC, and along the Gatlinburg Bypass on the way to Pigeon Forge. This bypass referred to as the spur will often have bear walking right across the road.

This week I have already counted 22 black bear in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park:

• 8 along the road leading into the Roaring Fork Area before the Ogle Cabin
• 1 on the old Sugarland Trail between Roaring Fork and the Sugarlands
• 2 in the Greenbrier section on trail along the way to campground 32
• 2 in Big Cataloochee NC on the Boogerman trail near the stone walls
• 1 in Big Cataloochee NC in the back field near the old cemetery on the hill.
• 1 in Deep Creek NC Parking area
• 3 in Cades Cove area on the Scott Mountain Trail
• 2 in Cades Cove area on the Gregory Bald longer trail
• 1 in Cades Cove in woods off Hyatt Lane
• 1 in Cosby TN on the Hens Wallow Falls trail at the second fork

Although I am only counting 8 bear on Roaring Fork, the same bear I have seen 9 or 10 times I only counted as 1. I can almost guarantee that if you go to Roaring Fork in the next few days early in the morning or before sunset you will see at least 3 or 4 bear.

Unfortunately many people who are watching or photographing the black bear are not acting wisely chasing the bear up the side of the hill, whistling to get the bears attention or just stopping their car and parking in the middle of the road. All of these are forbidden behavior and illegal and can result in death or serious injury.

Bear jams are so common right now in the Roaring Fork area that often there are now up to 2 officers trying to keep park visitors under control so no one gets attacked by a black bear or hit by a driver paying attention to the bear and not the road.

My favorite is the foolish man pictured here who kept climbing the hill chasing a mother bear with her cubs and taking pictures with a camera phone. He lucky left without being attacked by the momma black bear that had her 2 cubs along for the feast of acorns on the ground and before the National Park enforcement officer arrived. Imagine risking death, dismemberment or arrest to take a poor quality picture with his cellphone that he will probably erase or lose within a year or so. Was it worth it?

The bear are fun to watch but please pay attention to the national park black bear regulations and safety rules!

Smoky Mountains Spring Snow Storm Packs Punch

Downed trees throughout the North Carolina and Tennessee Smoky Mountains cause significant property damage and power outages as the winds roared through the mountains and valleys yesterday.

More than 110,000 lost power - 80,000 in North Carlina alone before midnight and more than 15,000 have already been restored as crews are working around the clock clearing downed trees, replacing broken poles and restringing lines.

Be prepared for continuing high winds and possible freezing in high elevations and when driving watch for fallen branches.

West of Cades Cove Prescribed Burn in National Park will cause trail and parking area closings

The Smoke you will be seeing tomorrow in Cades Cove, Townsend, Happy Valley, Walland and Highway 129 will be from 30 firefighters who will employ both ground and aerial ignition methods to ignite and manage a burn within an established fire containment line in the Great Smoky Mountains national park.

Of course the Smokies weather conditions must be right in order for the park service to ignite and careful burn approximately 1,500 acres of forest west of the Cades Cove Loop Road in Blount County in Stony Ridge and Arbutus Ridge Tennessee.

Due to being crowded out by oak trees and other hardwoods as well as southern pine beetle infestations, yellow pine trees which were the predominate species in Stony Ridge and Arbutus Ridge have been steadily on the decline. By carefully burning some of these areas of the park, openings in the tree canopy will allow more sunlight encouraging pine tree growth.

Expect closures and smoke to affect the following trails and parking areas:

• Rabbit Creek Trail
• Abrams Falls Trail
• Abrams Falls parking area
• Cooper Road Trail
• Wet Bottom Trail
• Elijah Oliver Place Trail

While parts of some of these trails will remain open we strongly urge you to avoid them entirely until the weekend as it may take a few days to be sure that any rouge hot spots as well as any dead snags that can effect hikers on the trails have been taken car of.