Posted by: Lea_Marie_C_Paar on 06/04/2014 11:08 AM
Updated by: Lea_Marie_C_Paar on 06/04/2014 11:11 AM
Expires: 01/01/2019 12:00 AM
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Free Seminar This Weekend at Big Trees
Calaveras Big Trees State Park, Ca... A seminar on the Giant Sequoia trees will be held Saturday (June 7) at 10 am. at Jack Knight Hall in the state park. Steve Stocking, who served for 10 years as an interpreter with the National Park Service as serves as a volunteer at Big Trees, will talk about the giant trees which grow only in groves on the Western slope of the Sierra Nevada. He has recently revised his book, "Sequoias of Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Park." Stocking is a botanist, a board member of Calaveras Big Trees Association (CBTA) and is active in the local Native Plant Society...
All CBTA seminars are free to the public, and are offered as part of the non-profit's mission to support educational and interpretive programs at the park. There is a vehicle day-use fee for entry into the park.
This Saturday's program is the third in a series being held in 2014. The first two focused on birds and John Muir's l;legacy, and the final two will be about bats and bees.
The state park was the site of discovery of the giant trees, the largest known living thing on the planet, in 1852. For the next 80 years the area was a major tourist attraction, attracting visitors from all over the world. With the help of donated money the North Grove -- with about 100 giant trees -- became a state park in the 1930s. A lot of the development of the park in that era was done by the Civilian Conservation Corps, a Depression era work program. The hall where the program will be held was built by the CCC workers, and is a classic example of park rustic architecture. The park was later expanded to include more than 6,000 acres, straddling two counties, and including the South Grove with more than 1,000 Sequoia trees.
With the opening of the new Visitor Center and Exhibit Hall last month, park attendance has grown rapidly. In an average year the park draws about 200,000 people to Calaveras County.
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