I went to the mountains today. I had planned on going and staying a couple of days - but I saw all I needed to see today.

I went to Drews Creeks, West Virginia in search of the new mountaintop removal site in Spring Hollow. Unfortunately for me, I was off by one hollow in my guess-timation. Which normally wouldn’t be a big deal but in this instance it was a major hollow. Basically after I got into the mountains I had about a two and a half hour climb to the summit. Piece of advice - after hibernating for the winter a 2000ft climb nearly straight up is not how you want to start the hiking season.

At any rate - I knew almost immediately I was in the wrong place so after I topped up onto the summit I still had a good hike to cross over to the next ridge. From down in the hollow by the road you could see the clearcut mountain prepped for mining and that is what I wanted a closer look at.

All of the photos in this post are high resolution. Some may be just a little blurred - I was pretty much out of breath by the time I got there.

I titled this post Calling All Imps because as soon as I cleared the treeline it was nothing but death and destruction. I felt like the Imp in the movie Lord Of The Rings. A lot of the downed trees were hickory and some of those over a hundred years old - left to rot or become mining waste, overburden, valley fills. This is my big problem with mountaintop removal coal mining. It’s like a cancer that destroys anything it comes in contact with. Forests, mountains, communities, headwaters, animal populations… and on and on and on.

I’m glad I mentioned animal populations because as I climbed the road in the first photo I actually saw deer tracks in the mud. I was surprised they were that close to the mine site but I wasn’t surprised they were following the road. They had no choice, downed trees lined both sides making it impossible for anything bigger than a ground hog to be able to make it through and they were going down the road away from the site.

I look at all of these downed trees and can’t help but think what a waste it is. I see jobs and income scattered all over the side of this hill (if we have to do this) and three hours before getting here I asked permission from an unemployed resident to cross through his property. I didn’t know the man I was talking to but I did ask him how he felt about the mountaintop removal site. His words - I’d just as soon they go somewhere else. I bet, was my reply.

I have photos of the mountaintop removal site in a place called Clays Branch. What I initially thought was a new site is actually the continuation of one that has been sneaking up on Drews Creek for a while now. Look for a post soon with the new photos.

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It was amazing looking out at distant peaks and seeing more gone than I care to mention. We are definitely changing the face of the Appalachian Mountains. That is something I think about a lot. You can look at nearly any higher altitude photos of the tops of the mountains and see evidence of the old way of strip mining literally everywhere you look. Imagine how much the scenery is going to change if we keep it up. The old strip mining scars will look like nothing more than a scratch in comparison.