Displaying items by tag: cumberland plateau
Saving barrens full of life
Tennessee coneflower is seen in Couchville cedar glade, a prime example of cedar glade habitat that is a target of preservationists — such as the land acquired recently in Rutherford County by TennGreen Land Conservancy. The Couchville property is managed by the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation. It is similar in nature to the TennGreen property in Rutherford County, and is part of a nexus of such glades around the Cumberland Plateau. According to TDEC: “Couchville supports one of the largest known and best quality populations of the Tennessee coneflower (Echinacea tennesseensis), which was delisted as a federally endangered species in September 2011. Couchville also provides one of the finest examples of a glade-barrens complex and protects many rare plant species. The glades are distributed where limestone outcropping and shallow soils limit growth of perennial plants and support annual species like leavenworthia, sporobolus, and sedum. The barrens species, that also includes Tennessee coneflower, occur where soils increase and grasses like little bluestem and side oats grama become dominant. The glades and barrens interface forming a complex.” Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation
Cedar glade habitat protected in fast-growing Tennessee county
MURFREESBORO — To close out 2024, TennGreen Land Conservancy and Allen Patton protected 50 acres of globally unique cedar glade habitat in Middle Tennessee’s Rutherford County with a conservation easement.
Called Rockdale Cedar Glades and Woodlands, Patton’s land abuts TennGreen’s Lamar Cedar Glades & Woodlands Conservation Easement, increasing this connected corridor of protected land to an expansive 256 acres. Limestone cedar glades and barrens, which are incredibly diverse but under threat from development and pollution, are found on the protected properties. This additional 50-acre easement is also within the Spring Creek HUC 12 Watershed and the Stones River Upper HUC 12 Watershed, marking it as critical habitat.
(Hellbender Press has previously reported on the special nature and importance of cedar barrens, including one located in Oak Ridge, just on the cusp of the Cumberland Plateau, which is better known for its cedar glades).
Cedar gladecress (Leavenworthia stylosa) during a prescribed burn at Couchville State Natural Area; this wildflower is only found in the Central Basin of Tennessee. TDEC
- land conservation in tennessee
- tenngreen land conservancy
- cedar barren
- cedar barrens in tennessee
- cumberland plateau
- allen patton
- rockdale cedar glades and woodlands
- rutherford county land preservation
- leavenworthia stylosa
- grey bat
- myotis grisescens
- phemeranthus calcaricus
- phlox bifida
- echinacea tennesseensis
- astragalus tennesseensis
- tennessee state wildlife action plan
Aquatic rescuers help laurel dace dodge a drought on Walden Ridge
Tennessee Aquarium VP and Chief Conservation and Education Officer Dr. Anna George, right, and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Conservation Delivery Coordinator Geoff Call collect critically endangered laurel dace from a stream ravaged by a prolonged drought on the Cumberland Plateau. The rescue successfully relocated 105 adults into human care at the Tennessee Aquarium Conservation Institute’s headquarters near downtown Chattanooga. Photos by Doug Strickland/Tennessee Aquarium
Drought prompts emergency rescue of one of America’s most endangered aquatic species
Casey Phillips is a writer for the Tennessee Aquarium.
CHATTANOOGA — Few things trigger louder or more distressing alarm bells among freshwater biologists than watching a waterway dry up during a severe, prolonged drought. That’s especially true when the disappearing stream is home to one of America’s most imperiled fish.
In late July, reports of dramatically withered streams atop Walden Ridge north of Chattanooga spurred an emergency rescue operation to prevent the extinction of the federally endangered laurel dace, which scientists consider to be among the 10 most at-risk fish in North America.
This effort was carried out by representatives from the Tennessee Aquarium, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the University of Georgia’s River Basin Center in coordination with the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency. In all, 105 adult laurel dace were removed from dangerously dry streams and successfully relocated to the Tennessee Aquarium Conservation Institute (TNACI) near downtown Chattanooga.
All but one of the collected fish survived the relocation and are now thriving in temporary human care, where they will remain until conditions in their few native streams are sufficiently improved for them to be returned safely.
This laurel dace (Chrosomus saylori) was among dozens other collected from a stream on Walden Ridge north of Chattanooga to save the fish from drought. In the last 12 years, this minnow’s range has drastically dwindled to just two streams, and scientists consider it one of North America’s 10 most imperiled fish species.
You’re invited to the annual Big South Fork and Obed science meeting
ONEIDA — On March 13, 2024 the National Park Service will host its annual public science meeting at Historic Rugby Visitor Center at 1331 Rugby Parkway, Rugby, Tennessee.
The public is invited to spend the day with scientists who have been conducting research at Obed Wild and Scenic River, Big South Fork National River and Recreation Area, and other areas on the Cumberland Plateau.
A wide range of topics specific to the Upper Cumberland Plateau will be covered during the day, including talks on wild hogs, restoration efforts at cultural landscapes, impacts from hemlock wooly adelgid on native hemlock trees, and other topics.
Another slice of the wild preserved in Cumberlands
Knox News: Nearly 12,000 acres added to Skinner Mountain preserve on the Cumberland Plateau
The Conservation Fund and state wildlife and forestry officials reached a deal to conserve and manage thousands of wild acres in Fentress County.
The expanse was previously held by an out-of-state speculative investment company likely originally tied to timber companies.
The Cumberland Plateau and escarpments have been increasingly recognized for their biodiversity along with the Smokies to the east beyond the Tennessee Valley. The Cumberlands are along a songbird and fowl migration route, and host a niche population of mature timber, mosses, lichens, fungi, mammals and amphibians. Elk were reintroduced a decade ago, and black bears have begun to range across the Cumberlands and their base.
The area is pocked with caves and sinkholes, some containing petroglyphs and other carvings from previous populations.
"On the Cumberland Plateau, the key to maintaining biodiversity is to retain as much natural forest (both managed and unmanaged) as possible," a forestry expert told the News Sentinel's Vincent Gabrielle.
The Foothills Land Conservancy has also helped protect thousands of acres along the plateau and its escarpments in recent years.
Cumberland Trail is nearing the end of its 50-year hike
This is a view from the Cumberland Trail atop Brady Mountain. The complete trail, 50 years in the making, is almost done. Ben Pounds
The Cumberland Trail is nearly complete between Chatty and Cumberland Gap. That’s just the beginning.
Volunteers are putting the finishing touches on Tennessee’s Cumberland Trail, which will run from Signal Mountain near Chattanooga to Tristate Point near Cumberland Gap.
- cumberland trail
- completion
- cumberland plateau
- sequatchie valley
- hiking
- justin p wilson cumberland state park and state scenic trail
- great eastern trail
- tennessee state park
- cumberland trail conference
- tennessee trails association
- ozone falls
- crab orchard mountain
- lone star mountain
- piney river gorge
- hellican peak
Hellbenders falling off Highland Rim of Tennessee

MTSU researchers document hellbender’s accelerating decline in Middle Tennessee
(Author’s note: I was aware of the hellbender before interviewing Brian Miller, but did not know the giant salamanders were present on the Highland Rim of Tennessee. Subsequent reading and interviews with other researchers, including Dr. Bill Sutton at Tennessee State University, Nashville, confirm Miller’s statements that hellbenders are vanishing from large portions of Tennessee, and Missouri. The healthy populations in portions of the Great Smoky Mountains and Cherokee National Forest may be an exception to a general trend toward extirpation and, ultimately, extinction).
Brian Miller has been researching hellbenders for decades. He serves on the faculty of Middle Tennessee State University where he teaches in the biology department and mentors younger researchers, many of whom publish their research.
He has even developed a digital “Guide to the Reptiles and Amphibians of Middle Tennessee.” The guide began more than 30 years ago as a dichotomous key for students in his vertebrate zoology class and now includes hundreds of photographs and exceeds 400 pages.
Dr. Miller researches the hellbenders of the Highland Rim, the upland that surrounds Nashville and the Great Basin. Populations of hellbenders in streams of this region are perhaps Tennessee’s most endangered.
QUESTION: I noticed that you specialize in herpetofauna. Most of the research listed on your faculty page is focused on amphibians, but with some papers on snakes. Can you comment about your research?
ANSWER: You are correct that amphibians are my primary research interest, particularly salamanders. However, I also have strong interests in reptiles, and my students and I have conducted research on various species of snakes and turtles.
When did you become interested in hellbenders?
Hellbenders have been of interest to me since I first encountered them while enrolled in a course on herpetology at the University of Missouri in 1977. I was fortunate that the professor of that course, Dean Metter, was involved with research on hellbenders and I began to assist with his research in 1978, in collaboration with Robert Wilkinson at Southwest Missouri State University in Springfield, Missouri.
Chris Petersen was working on his master’s degree with Dr. Wilkinson at that time and he matriculated to the University of Missouri a couple of years later to start on his Ph.D, which was also with hellbenders. Chris and I spent time in the field gathering data for his Ph.D. project until I moved to Washington State to work on my Ph.D.
I was hired into the biology department at Middle Tennessee State University in 1989 and began working with hellbenders in this state in 1990. At that time, I was able to locate populations in several rivers in Middle Tennessee, including a large population in the Collins River. I decided to concentrate my efforts on this population and one in the Buffalo River.
Of note, the population I worked with in the Collins River was dominated by large adults, whereas the population in the Buffalo River consisted of many age classes, including young individuals.
The Collins River situation was like what I was familiar with in Missouri and Arkansas populations. Unfortunately, by the early 2000s the population I was working with in the Collins River was gone; however, populations remain in the Buffalo River. My research with hellbenders during the past decade has been concentrated in streams in the Western Highland Rim.
Do you work with both subspecies, the Ozark, and the Eastern hellbender?
I worked with both subspecies while a student at the University of Missouri when assisting with projects in the Metter lab, but since I moved to Tennessee, I have worked only with Tennessee populations.
What do you perceive as the greatest threats to hellbender populations?
I am not certain why most populations of hellbenders are in decline rangewide, but suspect that habitat alteration, including sedimentation, and disease are involved in many if not all areas where declines are occurring. Lack of recruitment of young is a common theme of populations that decline.
Big South Fork of Cumberland River rises to highest level in 80 years
Independent Herald: Big South Fork sets record flow and depth rates
Being fire: Volunteers help preserve a classic East Tennessee cedar barren
A volunteer removes invasive plants from an Oak Ridge cedar barren as part of a Tennessee Citizens for Wilderness Planning effort to keep the barren in its natural prarie state. Anna Lawrence/Hellbender Press
Volunteers play the part of fire to maintain the native grasses and wildflowers at an Oak Ridge cedar barren
OAK RIDGE — It’s called a barren, but it’s not barren at all. It’s actually a natural Tennessee prairie, full of intricate, interlocking natural parts, from rocks and soil to plants and insects and animals.
There’s lots of life in these small remaining unique collections of grasses and conifers that are typically known, semi-colloquially, as cedar barrens.
Many of these “barrens” have been buried beneath illegal dumping or asphalt, but remnants they are still tucked away here and there, including a small barren in Oak Ridge owned by the city and recognized by the state as a small natural area.
Preserving our heritage: Foothills Land Conservancy reaches 135,000-acre milestone
A view of some of the land preserved by Foothills Land Conservancy on the Cumberland Plateau. Courtesy Foothills Land Conservancy
Foothills Land Conservancy preserves land and multiple habitats across seven states
Foothills Land Conservancy rang in the new year with the preservation of 250 undeveloped acres along the Little Pigeon River in a rapidly growing area of Sevier County in East Tennessee.
The deal was finalized in late 2020 — a fitting end to the Blount County conservancy’s 35th year.
Foothills Land Conservancy has protected about 135,000 acres in seven states, including 95,000 acres in East Tennessee, since its inception in 1985. For comparison’s sake, that’s nearly a third of the protected land that encompass the 500,000-acre Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Most of that land has been acquired since 2006, when former state Sen. Bill Clabough became executive director.
“We’ve been really growing and expanding,” Clabough said late last year from the conservancy headquarters on the century-old Harris family farm in Rockford.
The farm itself is under a conservation easement, one of several ways the conservancy preserves and protects natural and agricultural lands.
“When you do good work you don’t have to do a lot of advertising,” said Clabough, 69, a likable former country store owner and Wildwood native whose political public service came to an end in 2005 when the moderate Republican incumbent was defeated by a firebrand conservative in the Senate GOP primary.
“It was the best thing that ever happened to me,” Clabough said of his primary defeat.