Tongass National Forest
Courtesy of John Gomes and Alaska ZooSomewhere deep in the heart of the majestic Tongass National Forest, amid the giant, 200' tall, 700-year-old trees, the fierce, fiery-eyed northern goshawk searches through tangled wooded areas in pursuit of prey. The Northern goshawk is one of several hundred species making its home in this rare, remote mixture of mountain peaks, glaciers and rivers.
The Tongass National Forest is located in the panhandle of Alaska, in the southeastern corner. Designated a national forest by Teddy Roosevelt in 1907, the Tongass is the heart of the largest, contiguous temperate forest under public management in the world. A voyager traveling through Alaska's Inside Passage is surrounded by the Tongass National Forest. This waterway goes past tightly knit communities, islands with grizzly bears, and rivers holding precious salmon roe in gravel. A turn to the west shows thousands of islands protecting the mainland from the full fury of the storms moving in from the Gulf of Alaska. The panhandle of Alaska stretches from the southern tip of Prince of Wales Island 500 miles north to the far edge of the Malaspina Glacier west of Yakutat Bay. The 17-million-acre Tongass covers more than 80 percent of this expanse, and is comparable in size to the states of Vermont, New Hampshire and Massachusetts combined.
The Tongass attracts visitors young and old. Boardwalk trails are constructed to decrease the impact on saturated muskegs, a type of bog. Courtesy of USDA Forest Service.It is also home to the unique temperate-rainforest ecosystem. When most people envision a rain forest, they imagine tropical rain forests flush with exotic birds, reptiles and colorful flowers. However, there are, in fact, two different types of rain forests: tropical and temperate. The forests in the Alaskan panhandle are temperate rain forests.
On the forest floor of a temperate rain forest, tangles of tree roots grow over rocks and fallen logs, forming dark, moist caves. Ferns, dwarf dogwood and false lily of the valley thrive while marsh marigold and skunk cabbage grow in nearby wetlands. In the canopy above, western hemlocks push their floppy tops up through the mist while Sitka spruce brave the icy, salt-laden winds along the water's edge. Sub alpine fir, red cedar, yellow cedar and hardwoods such as alder find their own spot in the forest.
This temperate rain forest is a layered environment that includes mosses, lichens and ferns at many levels. Courtesy of USDA Forest Service.Though home to the world's largest temperate rain forest, almost half of the Tongass is covered by ice, water, wetlands and rock. There are 11,000 miles of shoreline where regal mountains rise from the tidewater to overlook a mostly undeveloped and isolated landscape.
Several species of animals and fish share the rainforest with the northern goshawk. Sitka black-tailed deer and bears forage along the shoreline; mountain goats climb along steep, rocky crags above the timberline. The forest is home to numerous other animals such as moose, wolves, beaver, fox and porcupine. Biologists estimate that 1,700 coastal grizzly (brown) bears, the highest density in North America, roam Admiralty Island and share the island with large populations of nesting bald eagles.
People have lived and worked in this water-drenched land for many centuries. For years, the Tlingit and Haida peoples have pulled salmon and herring out of these waters, and gathered the berries and other bounty of the land. Each generation shares its knowledge of the land with the next. The Tsimshian moved from their former home in British Columbia to Annette Island in the late 1800s.
People from all over the world are passionate about the wet and enigmatic Tongass National Forest. Some say they want a sense that wild places remain where wildlife may move about undisturbed. Others defend the need to be able to go to the woods and waters to make their living. With demands from all sides, the Forest Service tries to balance the needs of people whose way of life is based on extracting resources with leaving large stretches of the ecosystem undisturbed for people who want to go to the woods for recreation and inspiration.
Rain forest facts provided by Tongass National Forest.