Name: Lichens of the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument - Saturday Hike
Start: 2025-02-22T09:00:00-08:00
End: 2025-02-22T15:00:00-08:00
Location: Rite Aid - we will meet here and carpool to the Monument together

Explore the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument while learning about the fascinating life of lichens!
About this Event

We will meet at 9:00 AM at the Rite Aid in Ashland and make our way into the Monument from there. Carpooling is optional.

If there is enough snow on the ground, this will be a snowshoe hike with all gear provided courtesy of the BLM.

We will be focusing on lichens, which are symbiotic organisms composed of up to three different taxonomic kingdoms, consisting of fungi, algae, and/or cyanobacteria. As snow covers and obscures the ground, we will instead be looking upwards into the trees where many lichens abound. That same snow will bring us further from the ground, higher into the trees, where we might be able to observe species that are otherwise not as easily accessible from the forest floor.

Scot Loring, FCSNM Board Member, has been working as a botanist / mycologist throughout Oregon since 1994, conducting various research, inventory, rare species survey, and monitoring projects. He is a consultant for various entities including the Medford District BLM. He led a botanical survey which included the majority of Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument which resulted in the discovery of many previously unknown rare vascular plant, non-vascular plant, and lichen occurrences, and species previously unknown from the Monument. He has discovered species of fungi, lichens, and plants new to science, including two new genera. He is a Pacific Northwest native, and graduated from The Evergreen State College.

This Eventbrite is for the Saturday Hike ONLY. Register for the Friday Night Talk

The Friends of Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument's mission is to support the protection, restoration and conservation of the Monument through service, advocacy and education. Our Hike and Learn programs are designed to introduce the public to different topics and locations within the Monument. Hike and Learns are co-created with local scientists, historians, artists, students, and more.