Legacies of human presence abound across the landscape. From the 1930’s through the 1960’s a small logging camp occupied part of the Finn Rock Reach. It was known as Finn Rock Logging Camp. They lived in 27 cedar cabins and had a small church and school.

When the fire burned away the dense underbrush, it revealed a metallic history of the camp’s inhabitants. Charred car parts, waffle irons, tea kettles, a roller skate, baby stroller parts and more littered the burned site. Volunteers with the McKenzie River Trust spent many days gathering and piling the metal which was loaded onto trucks and hauled to a recycling center.

The forest surrounding the logging camp also shows remnants of human influence – stumps of giant old-growth trees cut a century ago, rusty logging cables, and younger forest established by the randomness of natural seeding as well as regimented tree- planting.

Near where the cabins were, non-native plants, both intentionally introduced like daffodils and unintentional like scotch broom are widespread and problematic, as they crowd out native vegetation reducing the native food web’s ability to thrive.

Today, another human presence influences this landscape. Legions of Trust volunteers have removed tons of rusting metal and pulled thousands of invasive weeds. Their collective actions remove mistakes of the past, aiding the transition to a resilient native forest once again.