OUR GEM: Help keep Tubbs healthy
Most of this area used to be covered by wildflowers and grasses, and the rocks were buried below the soil, but people stepping outside of the original trail boundary have caused the plants to die and the soils to erode more quickly. Photo courtesy of Our Gem.
If I asked you how many people use Tubbs Hill each year, what would you guess? A few years ago, the city’s estimate was about 30,000.
The Tubbs Hill Foundation has noticed a marked increase in trail wear in recent years. We work closely with the city of Coeur d’Alene Parks Department, and in 2022 they purchased a trail counter. In the first six months, it recorded over 155,000 counts of people. After a full year, we had over 364,000. In 2024, the number was 387,000.
Why does this matter? Because more feet on the trails means more wear as small amounts of soil are moved with each step. If every visitor stayed on the official trails, our job would simply be to maintain trail surfaces. But that’s not what happens.
People often leave the trail boundary to let another hiker pass, avoid mud or explore off-trail. In decades past, there were few enough people that the plants could tolerate this. But now it’s hundreds of people, every day, going off trail. Plants are only so resilient — with enough footsteps, they die, and we see areas of bare soil that used to be covered with wildflowers and grasses. This looks bad, but more importantly, it means we lose the root structures that hold soil in place. It can then easily wash away with rain into the lake or be carried out on shoes.
During the last Ice Age, the Missoula Floods caused catastrophic flooding where the city now lies. An enormous amount of water cascaded in from the north and swept over Tubbs Hill. The force of the water washed away soil and caused the formation of undercut cliffs on the south side. Over thousands of years, soils have reformed, but not enough time has passed to develop the depth and structure of a typical, resilient soil bed. Some areas have just 1 inch of soil.
This makes it all the more important to keep what we have and to do that, we need plants. And we need you.
Help us keep the forest and plants on Tubbs healthy.
• Use only official trails and stay within the trail boundary, even if it’s muddy.
• When hiking in a group, go single file to pass other hikers and avoid stepping off the trail.
• Respect closed trails (areas with logs and/or branches blocking them). This is an area we are trying to re-naturalize: stay off.
• Remember, there is a leash law. (And while we’re on the topic of dogs, please always bring a bag for waste and take it off the hill with you).
• Educate your friends, family, and children so they can help, too!
How does all of this relate to the lake? Soils and pet waste are pollutants that reach the lake, impacting the chemical balance of the water. As we aim to keep our lake healthy and usable, it’s important to learn the effects of our actions, many of which aren’t so easy to see.
Trail maps can be found at www.tubbshill.org.
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The Our Gem Coeur d’Alene Lake Collaborative is a team of committed and passionate professionals working to preserve lake health and protect water quality by promoting community awareness of local water resources through education, outreach and stewardship. Our Gem includes local experts from the University of Idaho - Idaho Water Resources Research Institute, Coeur d’Alene Tribe, Idaho Department of Environmental Quality, the Basin Environmental Improvement Project Commission, Kootenai Environmental Alliance, Coeur d’Alene Regional Chamber of Commerce and Kootenai County.