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Location: Macon County, NC
USGS Topographic Maps: Alarka, Greens Creek
Alarka Laurel is a high elevation area with a mixed forest community containing Spruce Bog, Montane-Oak Hickory, and Acidic Cove forest. Wild strawberries and grasses line the main road that leads to the top of Alarka Laurel and the Walton Interpretive Trailhead. It includes open area that is ideal for camping. Natural brook trout populate the area's streams.
The Walton Interpretive Trail leads the traveler deep into the forest. There are definite changes in the surroundings as one travels along the trail. Laurel and rhododendron thickets cover the initial stretch, then open into hardwood patches with oak and tulip poplar. Soon the path side turns to ferns and moss-covered logs.
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Approximate size:
2,485 acres
Old growth acreage:
68 acres |
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Fragments of white quartz rock occasionally litter the ground along the path. Many wildflowers also cluster along the way in patches that are mostly labeled. There are trillium patches near the beginning of the trail and fire pink in the last half. About half-way along the trail large trees that look like hemlocks begin to appear. On closer inspection the large "hemlocks" are actually red spruce. Sadly, the same insect that has devastated pine has been infesting the red spruce as well.
The southern pine beetle has caused considerable of damage to this old-growth red-spruce habitat, but young red spruce are growing to replace their elders. A boardwalk leads the traveler into the red spruce bog. With the loss of some of the red spruce the bog has become overgrown with smaller plant species like laurel and rhododendron. It is not possible to see ground level of the bog from the boardwalk. The main road intersects the end of Walton's Trail and leads directly back to the trailhead.
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Unusual Features and Vegetation
* The area is a high-elevation, flat-bottomed, "hanging" valley.
* A red spruce forest occurs in the flat bottom of a side valley, the southernmost natural occurrence of red spruce and in an unusual valley-bottom location below hardwood forest.
* There are many large trees, reported to be virgin, in the area. |
