Saving Whiskeytown's Heirloom Apples After the Carr Fire

The Tower House Historic District at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area holds historic orchard trees that are among the oldest surviving traces of Whiskeytown's pioneer past. Today they are also an important store of heirloom fruit varieties — which is why their near loss in 2018 mattered so much.

Whiskeytown's orchard in the Tower House District dates to pioneer times. Image from the National Park Service's page.

The fire

The Carr Fire started on July 23, 2018, about a mile east of the district. Despite aggressive firefighting, the fire's extreme behavior overwhelmed crews, and about 60% of the orchard trees were lost.

Left: a park employee assesses fire damage to a historic apple tree a month after the Carr Fire. Right: a park employee plants an apple seedling in 2021. Image from the National Park Service's page.

Rescuing the varieties

After the fire, while the surviving historic trees were still alive, park resource staff and a local arborist took scions — cuttings — from them. Working with Humboldt Cider Company and Friends of Redwood Acres, they grafted the scions onto rootstock. The grafts took, and the park planted the young trees back into the historic orchard. Heritage apple varieties that could all have been lost are growing again.

Restoring the landscape

Since the fire, the park has received more than two million dollars in Emergency Stabilization and Burned Area Rehabilitation funds to deal with immediate threats to life and safety and help native plants recover. In 2024, money from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law's Burned Area Rehabilitation program became available to help maintain and restore the district's historic landscape: $78,000 was spent in fiscal year 2024 to treat invasive plants and strengthen native vegetation, protecting the district and its orchards, and another $84,000 is planned for fiscal year 2025.

Goats help control invasive plants and fuels in the Tower House Historic District, paid for with invasive plant and fuels funds. Image from the National Park Service's page.

The orchard today

Keeping up the historic district is not easy, but visitors can again enjoy it and its orchard — with orchard tours, activities for all ages, and an annual Harvest Festival whose most popular attraction is a tasting table, where visitors sample and learn about many varieties of apples and pears.

The apple and pear tasting table at the Harvest Festival. Image from the National Park Service's page.

Sources

• National Park Service, "Heirloom apple variety saved following devastating Carr Fire" (Whiskeytown National Recreation Area): https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/post-carr-fire-whiskeytown-tower-house-district.htm