Little White Salmon Biodiversity Reserve
Cold Spring and Highlands Ranch is a biodiversity reserve along the Columbia River Gorge in Skamania County, Washington. Now known as the Little White Salmon Biodiversity Reserve, Hank Patton and his partners are stewards on the reserve and teach sustainable resource management from the crop to the forest here at this beautiful property. This invaluable sustainable farm and experiential learning school gave great inspiration to Tree Steward LLC. While I provided tree care for the property’s, I also lived at and worked Highlands Ranch, tending to the fields, gardens, home improvements and the wood lot. There were many uses for the abundant wood on the reserve. We built rough hewn furniture and tool handles often!
Stewardship responsibilities at the reserve were tree planting pruning, and removals in addition to running the “neighborwood” program. in this program I would teach students and volunteers how to select, cut, split and deliver firewood to the old and infirm. We would also provide firewood to some of our community members in exchange for wild honey, woodfire pizza, and traditional long-bow building classes!
