Social trails inventory for the Schoodic District, 2013 - 2014

Jacobi, Charles; Anderson, Karen; Seymour, Abby; Garfield, Jared

From the executive summary: "Social trails (sometimes called visitor-created trails) and other associated impacts are a continuing management challenge on Mount Desert Island and in parts of the Schoodic District. At Schoodic for example, we have previously inventoried social trails on Little Moose Island and at Ravens Nest, two scenic areas that are largely locally known. In anticipation of increases in use as a result of the new campground and bike paths, we completed a more comprehensive inventory of social trails in 2013 - 2014 to serve as a baseline for detecting change. Because the shoreline is the focus of visitor use activities, we made it the focus of our study for this inventory. We searched the following areas and mapped the social trails we found: - the shoreline (perimeter) of the Schoodic Peninsula along the entire Schoodic Loop Road and around Schoodic Point; - the inland side of the Schoodic Loop Road adjacent to pull-offs and parking areas; - Little Moose, Pond, Schoodic, and Rolling Islands. We mapped 3.57 miles of social trails along the shoreline area of the Schoodic Peninsula, or 18,850 feet. These numbers include informally maintained trails as well as any bare ledge that connected segments of social trails. After removing trail segments labelled “maintained,” the length of social trails including bare ledge was 2.22 miles, or 11,717 feet. Without ledge, there were 2.09 miles or 11,039 feet of social trails. Monitoring of social trails on Little Moose Island in 2013 - 2014 and comparing them to 1996 showed that the length of social trails was cut in half from 2.86 miles to 1.43 miles. We attribute this to management actions taken in 2002, the resilient environment, and excellent visitor compliance with Leave No Trace messaging. We recommend that walk-throughs of these social trails be made annually to assess conditions qualitatively, and respond with management actions such as signs and brush if conditions appear to warrant it. This has been our practice with Little Moose Island. Such actions may include designations of some social trails for informal maintenance as at Little Moose Island. A repeat inventory should be conducted in 2020. We also recommend that digital images with GPS points be taken at a sample of the new sites, including Ravens Nest and Clares Landing, where no such visual record has been made thus far. Repeat images should also be taken at Little Moose Island where photo points were established in 1996."

Social trails inventory for the Schoodic District, 2013 - 2014

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