Clearing the Way
Join the 2025 Backcountry Horsemen Rendezvous for Trail Preservation…
As spaces devoid of mechanized transport, our public wilderness areas are rare places to immerse in the sounds of silence or the cacophonies of nature – wind, birdsong, rustling leaves. Wilderness trails facilitate a safer exploration of thousands of acres of pristine land. Yet trails are easily blocked by downed trees and debris from storms. A dedicated crew of volunteers helps keep them maintained and safe, and their principal transport is mules and horses.
“Wilderness trails cannot be maintained without the use of pack stock because there’s just no way to get out there,” says Larry Shuman, chairman of the 2025 Backcountry Horsemen of California Rendezvous scheduled for April 11-13 at the Rolling Hills Casino Equestrian Center in Corning. “Wilderness areas are designated foot traffic and equine traffic only. No cars, no bikes.”
The event is designed to educate and encourage people to assist our land stewards as budgets for trail maintenance wane. “We’re probably the largest advocate for trails in the United States right now,” says Shuman, noting that the Backcountry Horsemen is a national group founded in Montana in 1972 that now encompasses 33 states.
It’s been well over 10 years since the North State has hosted the Rendezvous in California, and the Shasta-Trinity unit, along with Redwood Unit, Top of the State and High Country Units,
are eager to bring together members from the state’s 19 other units for fellowship and information exchange. “Basically, it’s our outreach to the community,” says Shuman. Members engage as well as the partner organizations that they collaborate with, such as the Forest Service, California Conservation Corps, Fish and Wildlife, and Bureau of Land Management.
The Rendezvous encompasses everything from trail obstacle course challenges to Dutch oven cooking competitions to education clinics and demonstrations. High school and college trail teams will have special packing competitions to help them prepare for big contests at Mule Days in May. There are three style of pack saddles, and competitors will be offered a plethora of tools and equipment to pack efficiently for the trail.
Of particular excitement is the addition of the Marine Corps Mountain Warfare Training Center to the schedule. The team will demonstrate their work with pack mules, though they train to use any pack animal available in remote wilderness areas around the world.
The Shasta-Trinity Unit has been responsible for trail maintenance in the Yolla Bolly, Thousand Lakes and Caribou Wilderness areas, as well as Trinity Alps areas. Chainsaws aren’t allowed in these areas so the horsemen pack in cross cut saws that they are certified by the Forest Service to use. “These trails we have to go in and do all by hand,” says Shuman, noting that pack stock will carry saws, shovels, picks, rock bars and other equipment as well as food and shelter for the horsemen and their animals.
“Packing has kind of become a lost art,” he adds, noting that the California organization has been supplying the Forest Service with interns each year to help them keep up with staffing needs. The Backcountry Horsemen also assist California Conservation Corps projects by hauling gear and supplies for wilderness teams in and out of their remote work locations.
The group has also helped plant 14,000 fingerling fish in the Caribou Wilderness with California Fish and Wildlife. “Most people don’t realize that you can plant fish by horseback,” says Shulman, who notes that survival rates of the fish are about 98 to 99 percent when planted from horseback. “And it’s a lot of fun.”
While education and collaboration are the focus of the rendezvous, many other events may also appeal to the public. An art show and cowboy poetry will be featured, as well as a wild horse auction and vendors, along with group dinners.
For outdoor enthusiasts such as Shuman, joining the Back Country Horsemen was just a “natural course of action” to keep the trails he loves so much available for use. The public, whether horse people or not, are encouraged to rendezvous and see how they do it. •
Backcountry Horsemen of California Rendezvous
April 11-13
Rolling Hills Casino Equestrian Center
www.bchcalifornia.org/rendezvous.html
