Cascade Head Rainforest Hike

Overview

The Oregon Coast Trail cobbles together beach hikes, trails over headlands, and highway shoulder walks to afford continuous passage from Clatsop Spit to the California border. Some sections, especially the road walks, are far less prepossessing than others. The Cascade Head section of the trail (Trail #1310) offers six forested miles up and over the headland. A few years ago, several small landslides and a serious windstorm that brought down a number of large trees on one slope forced the Forest Service to abandon the northern 2 ½ miles of the trail. From 2019 - 2021, Trailkeepers of Oregon has been working on resurrecting this section of the Cascade Head Rainforest Trail so that it will again be navigable by the general public. A shorter option (7.4 miles in and out), would be to hike from the Cascade Head South Trailhead to theCascade Head North Trailhead at FR 1861 and turn around there. Much of Cascade Head is part of the Siuslaw National Forest. (The other, more popular, Cascade Head Trail, runs up the grassy ocean side of the headland on Nature Conservancy land – see the Cascade Head Hike.) The headland was scorched by the great Nestucca Fire of the 1840s, but pockets of old growth forest from before that time remain. The Cascade Head Experimental Forest was established in 1934 to study the forest environment here. Later, the Neskowin Crest Research Natural Area (1941) and the Cascade Head Scenic Research Area (1974) were designated. Together these protected sections have become a United Nations Biosphere Reserve, one of only three such reserves in the Pacific Northwest, which protects breeding areas of four endangered species (spotted owl, marbled murrelet, coho salmon, Oregon silverspot butterfly). Researchers here have found some of the highest conifer growth rates for any temperate forest on the planet and a vast diversity of mosses and lichens. Note that all areas of the national forest’s research areas west of Highway 101 are closed between January 1st and July 15th to ensure the best success for

Trail Stats

Photos

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