Mount Charleston to host volunteer events Saturday

Volunteers from the Las Vegas Valley will celebrate National Public Lands Day Saturday with a pair of improvement projects in the Spring Mountains aimed at reversing damage from last year’s 28,000-acre Carpenter 1 fire.

With permission from the U.S. Forest Service, Friends of Nevada Wilderness will lead a group up the shuttered South Loop Trail to repair some lower sections damaged by the fire.

The popular route to the top of Mount Charleston has been closed to the general public since the fire. Saturday’s restoration work and other similar volunteer activities could help speed the reopening of the trail.

Go Mt. Charleston will lead the other outing, this one a bit lower, down in Kyle Canyon, where volunteers will collect native seeds for use in replanting some of the areas burned last year. The family friendly event will offer participants a chance to learn more about Mojave Desert plants and natural fire ecology.

For more information about Friends of Nevada Wilderness’s trail restoration event, call (702) 515-5417 or email Jose Witt at jose@nevadawilderness.org. For more information about Go Mt. Charleston’s seed collection event, contact Bob Loudon at (702) 515-5441 or bloudon@fs.fed.us.

Friends of Nevada Wilderness also has information about future projects on its website at www.nevadawilderness.org/calendar_of_events.