Winter 2026 Newsletter
From The Director
Dear Friends of HRI,
It is with great pride and enthusiasm that I invite you to peruse the Hemlock Restoration Initiative Winter 2026 Newsletter.
This past fall saw many accomplishments. We were joined by two returning and two new seasonal Forestry Technicians, and welcomed a new AmeriCorps Project Conserve Member in a newly developed role of Stewardship and Naturalist Associate. Starting just after the first anniversary of Hurricane Helene, our fall treatment season included work on a few Hemlock Conservation Areas (HCAs) that received severe damage from the storm’s path and are just now becoming accessible for non-emergent work. These areas included areas heavily impacted by flooding and landslides, such as the game lands surrounding the Green River corridor and the Wilson Creek corridor. Seeing hemlocks in these areas continuing to maintain slopes and hold stream banks together reminds us of how important this work is and motivates us to forge onward.
I’d like to mention a few specific community partner-based projects that took place this past fall–The Chinquapin Mountain community in Glenville and the Sherwood Forest community in Brevard welcomed us to their neighborhood for cost-workshare projects. They recruited many enthusiastic volunteers so we could teach residents methods of hemlock chemical treatment while protecting many of their community hemlocks against hemlock woolly adelgid. We’re grateful for both communities’ continued efforts to protect hemlock health. We worked with HRI volunteers and FIND Outdoors staff to treat two of the sites they manage in Nantahala National Forest: Cliffside Lake Recreation Area & Van Hook Glade Campground. We also had the pleasure of working with the Pisgah SAF chapter to chemically protect hemlocks in the Grandfather Ranger District of Pisgah National Forest. We loved getting to connect and collaborate with fellow professionals while working on a project for hemlock health. Nate Osborne, 2025 Pisgah SAF Chapter Chair, authored a reflective article about the workday, which was published in National Woodlands Magazine.
Alongside our field work, we’ve continued to host educational hikes, presentations, and workshops, as well as maintaining open lines of communication via email and phone for landowners to reach out with hemlock health questions. I’m proud to have a skilled team who cares deeply about the important ecological impact of their work and enjoys sharing their knowledge with others. As a program, we are further fortunate and ever grateful for the support from our professional partners, volunteers (special shoutout to Robert Beadell, this Newsletter’s Volunteer Spotlight!), funders, donors, and other friends of the program. Each of these people help us to grow our impact for hemlock health.
For a quantitative look at our impact, check out 2025: Year In Numbers below.
Moving forward into 2026, we will continue to access, assess, and work to restore HCAs that were impacted by Helene, along with continuing to monitor and maintain the health of those that were not as affected. This work is being made possible in part by two generous grants that we recently received via the NC Forest Service (NCFS). We are extremely grateful to current NCFS Forest Health Branch Head, Jim Moeller, and former Branch Head, Jim Slye, for securing this funding on behalf of HRI.
If you’re looking for ways to make an impact with HRI, take a look at some of our upcoming events at the end of this newsletter or on our events webpage. No matter how you support our work, we’re grateful you’re here, and we’re ready to take on 2026 together.
Sincerely,
Program Director
Hemlock Conservation Area Highlight: Little Fork State Forest
by Brian Heath, North Carolina Forest Service
“A lot of work at Little Fork”
Little Fork State Forest is managed by the N.C. Forest Service (NCFS), covering approximately 1,258 acres in Wilkes County. The forest is located northwest of Wilkesboro in the lower foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountians and was purchased through the Clean Water Management Trust Fund in 2001. Saving a riparian species such as the hemlock is fitting when considering the objectives of how the forest property was purchased. The main water resource and namesake of this site is Little Fork Creek, which feeds into the Kerr Scott Reservior. The forest has roughly six miles of named streams that provide clean and high quality water for aquatic habitat. The majority of the terrain is steep and rugged with the highest elevations on the property reaching around 2,340 feet.
Initial chemical treatments to save hemlocks started here during Fall 2018 and concluded in Spring 2019, treating roughly 30,000 hemlocks. Our program is designed to not only save overstory trees, but to also promote the next generation of hemlocks by treating most of the young trees in the understory. Our hope is that the smaller saplings will grow to look the way hemlocks are supposed to, with branches reaching from the top of the trees down to the creeks. As you might imagine, a single parent tree can produce numerous offspring, with young hemlocks accounting for a large percentage of our numerical accomplishments.
Little Fork Creek flows through the center of Little Fork State Forest and is bordered by a three-mile path providing access to the treatment areas. The logistics of transporting personnel and supplies to and from the treatment area has poses a challenge due to its time consumption. For example, it may take more than a half hour to reach one end of the property from another when utilizing UTV’s.
As with most of the hemlock treatment that is done by the NCFS, the BRIDGE Program is instrumental in the success of the hemlock treatments thus far. The NCFS BRIDGE Program consists of well trained, minimum custody offenders that provide assistance to several programs and services offered by the NCFS.
The NCFS is currently in the process of treating this entire area for the second time while Dr. Greg Wiggins of the Beneficial Insects Laboratory Biological Control Program of the N.C. Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services (NCDA&CS) has been actively managing several sections of this property for hemlock woolly adelgid (HWA) biocontrol. Dr. Wiggins’ goal is to create a field insectary to help build populations of Laricobius beetles for collection and redistribution.
In December 2023, Beneficial Insects Lab staff and NCFS personnel planted 150 eastern hemlock seedlings in two existing canopy gaps. As these trees grow, they will become infested with HWA to support predator populations. In March 2025, L. osakensis eggs were released on 12 naturally grown trees infested with HWA near these sites. Emergence cages were placed under these trees and in Fall 2025, several Laricobius adults were collected. The goal is for these edge trees to maintain low levels of L. osakensis over the next several years. Eventually the beetles can move to the planted hemlocks and continue to increase their population over time.
The NCFS is fortunate to be able to manage such a large area of land where hemlock restoration can occur. Almost 10% of Little Fork State Forest consists of hemlock stands or prime hemlock habitat. This setting provides opportunities for research while also preserving a large number of trees through chemical treatments. Little Fork State Forest is a unique location that will hopefully have a long-term influence on the protection of hemlocks for future generations.
Volunteer spotlight: Robert Beadell
by Ayla Busch, HRI Community Engagement Manager
The Hemlock Restoration Initiative could not do what we do without the help of our hard-working volunteers. Each newsletter we like to highlight the contributions of our volunteers. In this issue we would like to recognize Robert Beadell.
Trading in the ocean for the mountains, Robert and his wife moved to the Brevard area from Florida in 2022. While Robert enjoys the coast, particularly saltwater fishing and diving for lobster, he and his wife settled near Brevard because of the great access to public lands. The trail networks in places like Pisgah National Forest, DuPont State Recreational Forest (DSRF), Headwaters State Forest, and Mountain Bridge Wilderness area really appealed to Robert. Having recently retired, Robert feels like he’s “getting his life back” by spending time hiking, biking, taking his dog on walks, and volunteering for the causes and places he’s most passionate about.
As a volunteer with the Friends of DuPont Forest invasive plant removal crew, Robert learned about hemlock woolly adelgid (HWA) from Jordan Luff, who was the DSRF Management Forester at the time. “Once you learn about a problem, you start seeing it everywhere,” Robert said of HWA. Curious about hemlock protection, Robert found HRI through an internet search and joined us on a volunteer chemical treatment workday in February 2024. While he enjoyed the educational part of the workday, Robert left the event eager to do more, saying, “It was great from a perspective of learning… but I want to help, because I feel like it’s monumental what this small group is trying to achieve. And you guys have achieved a ton. If I have time and effort to throw at it, why not?”
In the past year, Robert has been one of our go-to volunteers whenever we need an extra set of hands. He is eager and energetic, wanting to do all he can to help the hemlocks. In just more than a year, Robert has put in over 57 hours of service to HRI, many of which were long days chemically treating hemlocks in places like DSRF, Green River Game Land, the NC Arboretum, and Nantahala National Forest. Robert also helped us engage festival attendees at the Upper French Broad Riverfest in Rosman, NC last year. He’s a true hemlock health ambassador!
There’s no doubt that Robert has found a passion for hemlocks, but he’s also enjoyed getting to know our HRI team members. “I came for the hemlocks, and stayed for the people,” Robert remarked. He especially enjoyed getting to team up with our crew and other HRI partners (including Rainbow Ecoscience, Appalachian Trail Conservancy, Highlands-Cashiers Land Trust, and Friends of Panthertown) to stem-inject creek-side hemlocks in an environmentally sensitive area of Panthertown Valley in Nantahala National Forest. Robert said of the experience, “Panthertown was the whole thing coming together. Seeing the Carolina hemlocks and the eastern hemlocks that, as far as we know, have never been treated, and then [to use] what seemed like cutting edge equipment… The juxtaposition of trees that have never had any help whatsoever with all this [stem injection equipment]… was pretty cool.”
Aside from his activity as an HRI volunteer and DSRF invasive plant removal crew member, he has also adopted two waterfalls through Waterfall Keepers of NC. Through this program, Robert volunteers to periodically visit two waterfalls, Cove Creek Falls and Whaleback Falls, for litter cleanups and trail condition reports. We know Robert is passionate about maintaining our public natural spaces and not afraid of hard work. Combined with his genuine love for being outside in nature, HWA should know he’s a force to be reckoned with!
If you can relate to Robert’s energy and passion, take his advice – “Come out to an [HRI] event, learn the education, and see if you have the motivation and the means to give a little extra.” Reach out to volunteer@savehemlocksnc.org to learn more about volunteering with HRI.
Regrowth and Returning to nature: wilson creek
by Sarah Gelleny, AmeriCorps Naturalist and Stewardship Associate
Sarah Gelleny is HRI’s AmeriCorps Project Conserve (ACPC) Naturalist and Stewardship Associate for the year, during which she will be conducting hemlock treatments, documenting ecological observations and information, and expanding our creative outputs. She will be focused on hemlock relationships to organisms beyond the hemlock woolly adelgid and how these relationships impact our work. She comes from a background in ecological art, starting in the realm of environmental connection in urban spaces. The past two years she has shifted into looking at art ecology, specifically in the Southern Appalachian region where she is from. She is thrilled to be able to continue growing this aspect of her work through service with HRI, and is excited to further HRI’s ecology-focused mission.
My AmeriCorps Project Conserve term started in October of 2025. I jumped right into the hemlock treatment season with my first overnight treatment trip at Wilson Creek in the Pisgah Game Lands. Wilson Creek’s 23 miles primarily run through Caldwell County two hours northwest from Asheville, just outside of Morganton. This waterway is known for its rocky gorges and rugged terrain. I was excited to tent camp for the first time in a while and get to bond with the team. There were many highlights to this trip: the weather was wonderful, and the creek was serene. There was one experience, however, that particularly stuck with me, and I hope will continue to surge me forward with curiosity into the research and creative aspects of my naturalist role. On the second day of treatment, I got to work with Alicia Walsh, our Forestry Crew Leader. It was midday and we had just reached the top of the slope we were working on. While beginning to head downslope to a different grove, we stopped to treat a few smaller hemlocks. While I was treating these, we noticed something that looked man-made peeking through some shrubs- it was a headstone! All together, we found three intact headstones paired with footstones, and were able to deduce they were from different decades throughout the 1800s – a father, his son, and, we think, the son’s wife. This was a completely unexpected discovery. Near this site there were also areas where the hill had been carved out for what we think was probably a cellar or some other type of structure. We were unable to find any records of these names. However, doing this research once we returned from the trip led me to learn about the area’s history, which, prior to this, I was completely unaware of.
Wilson Creek had historically been used as summer hunting grounds by local Cherokee communities until the mid 1700s when it was turned into a large logging settlement. It became a town with a population of around 800 named “Mortimer” (Tabler, 2021), which explains the name of the campground we were staying at (Mortimer Campground). In 1916, a large wildfire ran through the town, closely followed by a devastating rainfall and subsequent flooding. This disaster took down the logging town, and it was slowly rebuilt, this time into a textile manufacturing town. In 1940 there was another detrimental rainfall and flood that once again destroyed the entire area. After the 1940 flood, Mortimer effectively became a ghost town, and much of land came under USDA Forest Service and North Carolina Wildlife Resource Commission management where it remains as public land today. Conservation efforts in the area date back to 1933 when the Civilian Conservation Corps (the first model of AmeriCorps) was deployed there to work on soil erosion, tree planting, and to begin working on the Blue Ridge Parkway (Tabler, 2021). The lands around Wilson Creek are a great example of how lands regrow after impacts of both human intervention and natural disaster.
I feel very thankful that I get to have a small hand in conserving this area. While walking through its native persimmon groves and crossing the creek, I wouldn’t have thought that the land was once largely cleared for logging, nor a bustling town that now amounted to no more than the few railroads and settlement remnants we passed. Wilson Creek, in all its wilderness, offered continuous discoveries and curiosities for me, and I’m very thankful to have had the privilege to experience it this season. At this site, I also got to treat the largest living hemlock tree I had seen at that point in my life- a 36-inch-diameter eastern hemlock, just on the ridge above the headstones. How many of these events has that tree grown through, how many generations of eyes have seen them? We have always had relationships with our forests, and our forests will always regrow. That hemlock, and all that surrounded it, remind me that there are always things to learn about the lands we inhabit, conserve, and visit.
Sources:
Tabler, Dave. (2021, September 17). North Carolina Ghost Town. Appalachian History. https://www.appalachianhistory.net/2018/08/north-carolina-ghost-town.html?fbclid=IwY2xjawPJDsRleHRuA2FlbQIxMABicmlkETFiSFFISkdNb1FjYjZnQ1U0c3J0YwZhcHBfaWQQMjIyMDM5MTc4ODIwMDg5MgABHufyfcjPamQp9ni9XmfVoEM1YVRdtG-IrGOlS9Qv-Ran_0lt34W-uR9nnCrv_aem_mas_smfcCPSJGKaOvc4thg
Conservation Connection Corner: Joe Standaert
by Olivia Hall, HRI Educational Outreach Manager
This section of our newsletter features the work of people in our region who have gone above and beyond to conserve hemlocks in their own communities. Occasionally, HRI has the privilege of working alongside these hemlock heroes on joint projects, but often, they are people who have taken initiative to address the HWA problem on their own, without having received direct prompting from HRI. It is with honor and deep admiration that we dedicate this Conservation Connection Corner to Joe Standaert.
Joe Standaert and his wife, Mary, bought property in Montreat, North Carolina in 1983. Back then, there wasn’t even a road leading to their property – they had to cross a stream on foot to get to it. On this piece of wild land was an eastern hemlock. They built their home there in 1992, and finally moved permanently in 2006. They had no idea that they would eventually become intimately involved in protecting the trees that surrounded their new home.
Though he spent most of his career working as an I.T. professional, Joe has always had an interest in ecology and nature. Growing up, his family’s house was always full of animals, and his family members were all biology enthusiasts. Both his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees are in the biological sciences. (Fun fact: he and his wife were the first married couple to go to the Yale School of Forestry!) So, when Joe’s neighbor, John Johnson, got to talking to him about the hemlocks and the hemlock woolly adelgid (HWA) in Montreat, Joe didn’t hesitate to join him in getting a grassroots movement initiated to protect the hemlocks in his new home.
One key detail that stands out when talking to Joe is that he is very humble about his involvement with the Montreat hemlocks. When I asked Joe what inspired him to get involved, he simply said, “It needed to be done.” He made sure that other folks got the credit they deserve, too. In the beginning, he said it was John Johnson who went to the Montreat Landcare Committee to campaign for the hemlocks’ protection. Though John moved away years ago, his initiative and passion remain in the people carrying out the work he began–including Joe.
The first phase of treatments in Montreat were a direct result of Joe & John campaigning to the Landcare Committee and their other Montreat neighbors to raise funds to protect their hemlocks. This campaign was a success, and in 2010 & 2011, they were able to contract with Appalachian Arborists to treat over 510 trees. This first phase is what Joe is most proud of, “…initiating the whole education concept and getting people to do something….” and “…seeing it naturally flow into the second and third phase.” This is echoed by those who work with him, who say, “His knowledge and skills have helped us inspect, treat, and geolocate hemlocks. We simply would not have as many thriving hemlocks here without him. He continues to provide a link to past efforts with a view to future sustainable projects.”
2015 began the second phase, led by Joe, John Johnson, and Rusty Frank, during which HRI offered support. With HRI, Buncombe County, Dr. Richard C. McDonald, Montreat College, and community donations, 231 trees were treated in this phase, and biological control Laricobius beetles were released.
The third (and most recent) phase was initiated in 2023 by Joe, again advocating for funds for the surrounding trees that make up their community. Joe’s goal (second to treating more hemlocks) was to pass the baton on to other folks to keep the movement going in years to come. Though it took a while (over a year!), all it took was perseverance until the right people grabbed on. These people were community members Elizabeth Hamilton and Ashley Manson. Though they may have been initially inspired to get involved because of their love of hemlocks, it was Joe who really got them on board. Says Elizabeth, “Joe is an inspiration through his dedication, deeds, and actions with a kind and gentle approach. He’s always got a smile and often a bit of humor.” Finally, thanks to Joe’s campaign and funds from the community, last spring, members of the Montreat community and HRI treated 124 trees. On top of that, Appalachian Tree Care, a local arborist company, donated their services and treated 14 hemlocks via stem injection along the creek that runs through town.
I asked Joe what has been the most challenging about this project, and he humbly responded, “{It} has not been too challenging actually! We campaigned and got it done. Did not have any push back–people care about hemlocks.” No matter how difficult or easy it may have been, thanks to Joe, the hemlocks in Montreat can breathe a sigh of relief. Says Elizabeth, “He has been a constant support and inspiration for several projects to protect hemlocks in the valley. Not just once, but over many years. He’s been involved with several major treatment efforts – both chemical and biological, and educational and funding efforts have been more successful as he connects groups and individuals.”
When I asked him what he would say to someone who feels overwhelmed about starting a project of this magnitude, he said, “Just go for it!” He impressed that between HRI and others, there are a ton of resources and public interest in saving trees and saving hemlocks, so “…market and educate and get the ball rolling and you’d be surprised by how much response you get.”
As Joe said, “Always more areas and more hemlocks to treat!”
July: HRI staff leads a hemlock treatment demonstration at the Chinquapin Mountain community near Glenville.
Upcoming Events
Thursday, March 19th: Spring in the hemlock forest: A spring ephemeral and hemlock hike
Saturday, March 28th: Green River, Green Love, & Good Luck Hemlock Treatment Volunteer Workday
Saturday, April 11th: Montreat Landcare Festival and Arbor Day Celebration at NC Arboretum
Saturday, April 18th: Foothills Conservancy of North Carolina Earth Fest and Hendo Earth Fest.
Saturday, May 2nd: Mills River Day
Sunday, May 3rd: Hemlocks and Birds hike
Saturday, June 13th: Hemlock Treatment Demonstration at Warren Wilson College
Saturday, June 20th: French Broad Riverfest
Learn more about these events on our Events Page.
