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Know Before You Go, vol. 10
News To Use & Helpful Info about YOUR Smokies!
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Get Busy with Your Friends!
Upcoming events & opportunities
 | | Blue skies & green grass are on the way! (Credit- Sam Hobbs) |
You can always stay up to date on the latest events & happenings on the events page of our website
Many thanks to Asheville REI for this great, free educational opportunity. Five Carolina Mountain Club members will discuss the pleasures and challenges of walking all the trails in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. (Read More)
- Hiking 101 Seminars- March 15 & 22, 2011
This is the 2nd year Knoxville's Blue Ridge Mountain Sports has hosted these free informational seminars. Contact Friends of the Smokies Director of Development Sarah Weeks at fotssw@bellsouth.net for all of the details, and get ready for spring hiking!
Join NOC's Great Outpost and the City of Gatlinburg Sat., March 26 as they turn off the lights to celebrate Earth Hour, the world's largest public environmental action. Family activities will take place in the Great Outpost parking lot from 6:00pm-10:00pm, while the store will honor the "lights out" initiative from 8:30pm-9:30pm. Stop by the Friends of the Smokies booth & say "Hi". We'd love to see you! And no matter where you are, we encourage you to enjoy 60 minutes of darkness for Earth Hour.
 | | Inspirational Earth Hour 2011 Official Video |
It's back and benefiting Friends of the Smokies. Don't miss this presentation of the world's most amazing outdoor adventure films. Get your tickets online or stop by Blue Ridge Mountain Sports Bearden or Farragut to purchase now.
 | | 2010/2011 Banff Mountain Film Festival World Tour (Canada/USA) HD |
- Featured Hike with Danny Bernstein- April 2, 2011
For more information, please contact our North Carolina Program Director Holly Demuth at fotshd@bellsouth.net.
On April 2nd from 9:00am to noon Little River Trading Co. & CYCOLOGY BICYCLES will host their 1st Annual Community Day.
The object of this day is to raise donations for and awareness of Friends of the Smokies and other area environmental organizations. Friends of the Smokies will be there to promote our mission of helping to preserve and protect Great Smoky Mountains National Park.
You can help raise money for Friends of the Smokies on April 2nd by shopping at Little River Trading Co. & CYCOLOGY and telling them that you want 10% of your purchase to benefit FRIENDS OF THE SMOKIES!
- Get on the Trail with Friends & Missy- Each Wednesday in April 2011.
Visit our events page for more information about this fantastic Smoky Mountain hiking series that has raised more than $100,000 for Friends of the Smokies.
And more...
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Mountaintop Volunteers
Our national park is recruiting for Clingman's Dome...
(Read more on the Park's website)
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Dynamite Hemlocks?
(Contributed by George Ivey)
 | | Hemlocks growing along streamsides help regulate temperatures for aquatic species. (Credit- Bailey Lombardo) |
It's been nearly a decade since the deadly hemlock woolly adelgid (HWA) first arrived in the Smokies, threatening to kill all of the region's hemlock trees. While one nearby natural area has resorted to taking down their dead hemlocks with dynamite (we're not kidding - read on...), we're proud to say the Smokies has taken a much different approach - with much better results.
Thanks to Friends of the Smokies and our many wonderful donors, including leadership giving by The Aslan Foundation, Fred and Alice Stanback, and Brad and Shelli Stanback, the Smokies now hosts the most robust hemlock forest protection effort in the entire country.
As a donor to Friends, you help hire crews to focus on treating and saving the hemlocks. You have bought vehicles to carry the crews and equipment, as well as holding tanks and high pressure spray-guns to treat infected trees. You helped create the Lindsay Young Beneficial Insects Laboratory at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville to raise predator beetles to release in the park and elsewhere to kill the adelgids.
To date, the park's hemlock crews have hand-treated more than 140,000 trees in nearly 4,000 acres of special hemlock conservation areas. They have treated another 600 acres along roads, campgrounds, and picnic areas with a naturally-based insecticidal soap. Since 2002, the insect lab has provided more than 500,000 predator beetles to release in the park.
Meanwhile, most other federal and state land managers lack the support of groups like Friends of the Smokies. They have stood by and watched the HWA destroy their hemlock trees. One area has even resorted to dynamiting dead hemlocks in order to protect visitors. (If you find that hard to believe, read all about it in this article in the Smoky Mountain News.)
Thankfully, we have more encouraging results to share from the Smokies. Treatments originally expected to last only 2-3 years are showing positive results for as long as 5-10 years. Treatment costs have come down. A new, naturally-based insecticide, dinotefuran, is showing even better effects for the park's tallest hemlocks. Park researchers have recovered live beetles from releases as far back as 2002, providing promise that they will sustain themselves in the wild for the long term. Also, some small (10-30 acre), higher-elevation stands are surviving untreated, because of colder winter temperature fluctuations and rime ice.
This work is far from over! It may take many more years to find the right combination of tools to combat the HWA and allow the hemlocks to regain their former glory. For 2011, Friends of the Smokies expects to provide the park with another $50,000 to sustain these efforts, and we need your support. Please consider a gift to help keep this effort going strong:
http://shop.friendsofthesmokies.org/donations.html
Thank you for being a Friend of the Smokies-and a friend of the hemlocks, too!
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Hype
 | Courtesy of Samuel Hobbs
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Great Smoky Mountains National Park's efforts to improve air quality through the use of innovative transportation technology was featured on a recent episode of PBS's Motor Week. (Click the link to watch a clip on your PC or Mac!)
Want to hike all the trails in the Smokies? Strap on your boots and check out this great article from National Parks Traveler.
The Friends of the Smokies' Trails Forever program is making huge strides in volunteer engagement and positive impact on the trails system in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Recent good news shared by Christine Hoyer, the Park's Volunteer Coordinator for Trails & Facilities, includes the following:
During the 2010 Trails Forever season 401 volunteers contributed 4,863 hours toward trail rehabilitation efforts in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Volunteers, ranging from elementary school students to those retired, participated in 50 workdays held on trails throughout the park.
The 2011 season will run from March through October and offer a variety of Trails Forever opportunities for individuals and groups to get involved in!
We are looking forward a great 2011 season and if you want to be a part of this lasting program for the Smokies check out www.SmokiesTrailsForever.org or contact Christine Hoyer, GRSM Trails & Facilities Volunteer Coordinator (828-497-1949, christine_hoyer@nps.gov) for more information.
Click here to see a graph outlining the dramatic increase in Trails Forever volunteer participation between 2008 and 2010.
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White Nose Syndrome Panel, March 10 in Asheville, NC
Come learn about White Nose Syndrome (WNS) that affects bats and what, if anything, can be done about it. Recently, WNS has been found at two sites in Western North Carolina, the first appearances of the illness in this state. WNS is a disease believed to be caused by the fungus Geomyces destructans . The disease is estimated to have killed over one million bats in the eastern United States between 2006 and 2010. It can kill up to 100 percent of bat colonies during hibernation, and could lead to the extinction of numerous bat species. The fungus and disease are spreading rapidly across North America towards the west and into Canada.
We'll spend the evening discussing why bats are so important to ecosystems, what we know about WNS, how it is being studied in WNC and implications of the disease. Join us for an evening with the experts to learn more about what Gabrielle Graeter, Wildlife Diversity Biologist with NC Wildlife Resources Commission calls "one of the most devastating threats to bat conservation in our time."
What : A panel of experts from state and federal organizations, universities, and non-profits will convene to create conversation around White Nose Syndrome (WNS), how it is being treated at each level of involvement, implications of infestation, and what it means to the rest of us. Audience question & answer to follow panel.
When : Thursday, March 10 6:30-8pm Where : UNC Asheville, Humanities Lecture Hall
Cost : This event is free and open to everyone
Featured Speakers :
· Sue Cameron - Wildlife Biologist, U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service
· Bill Stiver - Wildlife Biologist, Great Smoky Mountains National Park
· Chris Nicolay - Associate Professor of Biology, UNC Asheville
· Dan Henry - Caver, National Speleological Society & Flittermouse Grotto of WNC
· Susan Loeb - Research Ecologist, U.S. Forest Service, Southern Research Station
· Ben Prater - Associate Director, Wild South
· Gabrielle Graeter - Wildlife Diversity Biologist, North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission
Panel moderated by Susan Sachs , Education Coordinator, Appalachian Highlands Science Learning Center, Great Smoky Mountains National Park.
For more information, contact Susan Sachs at Susan_Sachs@nps.gov
Unable to attend? Learn more in the Smokies' podcast at http://www.nps.gov/grsm/photosmultimedia/wns-bat-video.htm
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Friends of Great Smoky Mountains National Park is an independent 501 (c)(3) not-for-profit organization which helps preserve and protect Great Smoky Mountains National Park by raising funds and awareness and providing volunteers for needed projects.
Since 1993, Friends of the Smokies has raised more than $33 million to help support educational programs, historic preservation projects, wildlife protection, and natural and resource conservation in Great Smoky Mountains National Park.
View our 2011 Park Support list on our website.
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