Mendocino County’s Montgomery Woods expands with State Parks and Save the Redwoods acquisition, with more to come

By Frank Hartzell | 8 seconds ago

Montgomery Creek runs among giant old growth and smaller trees in this image courtesy of Save the Redwoods League.

MENDOCINO Co., 4/18/24 — California State Parks has added 80 acres of rocky outcroppings, cliffs and redwood forest to its cache of giant old growth redwoods at Montgomery Woods State Natural Reserve, near Ukiah. Another 453 neighboring acres have been acquired by the Save the Redwoods League for sale to the state when money is available, said Adrianna Andreucci, Land Protection Manager for Save the Redwoods League.

In the midst of a spectacular redwood forest, Montgomery Woods contains 18 coast redwood trees taller than 350 ft and four trees taller than 360 feet. Between 1999 and 2004, the grove’s famous Mendocino Tree was considered the tallest tree on earth, until taller trees were found in Humboldt County in 2005. At last reported measure, the Mendocino Tree was just under 370 feet tall.

The new Rocky Ridge additions include the headwaters of Montgomery Creek. An outcropping in the middle of the property has been home to peregrine falcons. From atop the rock, visitors will someday have a panoramic view, including the crowns of those giant Sequoia Sempervirens. Currently there are no trails up to the new acreage, but eventually trails will take park users up to the rocky outcropping in the center and to surrounding forest and riparian areas. The new property comes with some more old growth redwoods, but not as tall as those below, Andreucci said. The altitude is higher and the new area lacks year-round access to water. At its source, Montgomery Creek is often dry in late summer and early fall. But the creek is an important tributary of Big River, and Coho salmon and steelhead have used it historically. State Parks trail development has been slow in recent years, but now the state has put a new emphasis on trails. Mark Ernst has the job of trails and roads supervisor for the Sonoma-Mendocino Coast District. Rocky Ridge is the first land acquisition by California State Parks in the district since 2008, according to a press release from Save the Redwoods League.

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Nearly everyone who goes to Montgomery Woods poses with arms extended as Amy and Betty Lou Hartzell do in this family photo. This gigantic old growth tree is black because it has survived many wildfires. Old growth redwood trees have size and bark that makes them able to survive fires that kill all other trees. Frank Hartzelll/The Mendocino Voice.

Old growth trees are now rare in Mendocino County, although many can be found in neighboring Humboldt County. Two other old growth redwood groves are found in Hendy Woods State Park in Anderson Valley. Another is Noyo River Redwoods, owned by the Mendocino Land Trust and located about four miles west of Willits. Individual trees and small groves are located in a few other places. While there are many other redwood forests in public ownership in Mendocino County, most were sold by timber companies after all the old growth had been cut. Montgomery Woods was different.

In 1945, Robert Orr donated nine acres of valuable old growth trees to the state to start Montgomery Woods, which is located roughly halfway between Comptche and Ukiah on Orr Springs Road. Ever since then, the Save the Redwoods League has been adding land to the park. Save the Redwoods has also been saving old growth redwoods in the region through conservation easements regularly over the past decade, including the adjacent 3,862-acre Weger Ranch, which put its land into a conservation easement through Save the Redwoods League in 2023. While commercial sustainable logging can continue on the Weger Ranch, the 400 old growth redwoods there are off-limits. A conservation easement allows the owners to keep title to the land but they agree to conditions designed to retain its conservation value. There is no public access but the agreement allows scheduled tours, including by school groups, Andreucci said. Save the Redwoods never took title to Rocky Ridge, conveying it from the Weger family to State Parks. The largest grove of old trees that the League protected recently was the Harold Richardson Redwoods Reserve in Sonoma County in 2018. At the time, it was the largest remaining stand of old trees in the range. Save the Redwoods has also protected Tc’ih-Léh-Dûñ (2022), Lost Coast Redwoods (2021).

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A woman looks up at an old growth redwood tree in Montgomery Woods, in this image courtesy of Save the Redwoods League

(Most of the following is from a press release issued by Save the Redwoods League)

Montgomery Woods expansion brings a host of benefits

The acquisition provides an opportunity for California State Parks to expand public access for visitors to the Reserve. The park is also adjacent to a Bureau of Land Management parcel and nearby properties protected by Save the Redwoods League. With Rocky Ridge added, these properties and the Reserve form a protected greenbelt of more than 11,500 acres in the upper reaches of the Big River watershed. Protected wildlife corridors are critical for unimpeded migration and movement potential for endangered or threatened species that inhabit the area.

“The conservation ethic of Save the Redwoods League is ingrained in the DNA of California State Parks,” said Bill Maslach, Sonoma-Mendocino district superintendent for California State Parks. “The League continues to help State Parks evolve and create innovative solutions to the preservation and stewardship of California’s landscapes. We are grateful to the Weger family for bringing their private land into the Montgomery Reserve. This generous contribution assures greater wildlife connectivity and increases public access to a remarkable place in Mendocino County.”

According to books and scientific studies, the Big River wilderness was likely home to the biggest redwoods and the most big trees per mile of anywhere on earth. But when lumbermen settled Mendocino, they launched a cutting campaign that virtually annihilated the existing trees. Not all forests were cut so mercilessly. Montgomery Woods is the best remnant of this lost kingdom. There were about 2 million acres of old growth forest when settlers arrived. In about 170 years, that number has been reduced to about 100,000 acres, according to estimates from several online resources.