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Open to interpretation Mail Tribune / Jim Craven Elizabeth Wasserman of Ashland has written a guide to the interpretive trail at the Denman Wildlife Area north of Medford. In addition to a brief history of the area, the guide gives tidbits on each of its six ecosystems. SOU graduate student creates field guide to trail through Denman Wildlife Area By BILL VARBLE Mail Tribune Elizabeth Wasserman remembers the first time she saw a wrentit in the brush at the Denman Wildlife Area. The nondescript, little (one-half ounce) gray-brown bird with the pink-striped breast was calling pwip pwip pwip pwip pwip. "It was singing," Wasserman says. "I'll never forget. It was singing its little heart out." ODFW office will have Denman field book "The Denman Interpretive Trail: An Ecosystem Journey," written by Elizabeth Wasserman, soon will be available from the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife. An ODFW office is located at the Denman Wildlife Area at 1495 E. Gregory Road. From Medford, take Highway 62 to the Agate Road junction, turning left at the Y. Gregory Road is on the left. This is also where you can obtain a key to the gate on TouVelle Road (where the trailhead is), which has been locked to prevent dumping. To get to the interpretive trail, continue on Agate Road to TouVelle Road on the left. If you don't have a key, park at the intersection of Agate and TouVelle and walk an extra half-mile to the trailhead. The trail also may be accessed from TouVelle State Park at the other end of the wildlife area off Table Rock Road. Wasserman is the author of a new guide to the Denman Interpretive Trail, a .7-mile path leading through parts of the Denman Wildlife Area north of Medford. In less than a mile, the trail passes through six distinct ecosystems. The 47-year-old Ashland resident and former teacher researched and wrote the pamphlet in part to satisfy the requirements for a master's degree in environmental education from Southern Oregon University. The guide soon will be available through the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife. "You can see exotic places on the Discovery Channel," she says. "But this is right there. I see something new every time I go." Most of Denman's 1,920 acres were given to the Oregon Game Commission by the U.S. Army in 1954 after being part of the Camp White training facility in World War II. It was named after Ken Denman, an attorney and conservationist who served 14 years on the commission. An interpretive loop trail starts a bit upriver from TouVelle State Park and promptly winds through and around ponds, chaparral, Agate Desert vernal pools, oak savanna, marsh and the Rogue River. Wasserman's guide is too short to describe each ecosystem in detail, so it focuses on one element of each. In the pond section, for example, it explains food-web interactions between species. The trail is near the site of the Lupton Massacre at the confluence of Little Butte Creek and the Rogue. Here in 1855, white miners and settlers attacked an American Indian camp, killing mostly old people and children and setting off the last round in the "wars" that resulted in the relocation to reservations of the Rogue Valley's original inhabitants. The original trail was created in 1974 by Jim Collins, an ODFW wildlife biologist, in collaboration with the BLM and the Young Adult Conservation Corps, Wasserman says. She's hoping the guide will bring renewed interest in the trail, as it needs some upkeep. ODFW does not have the money for trail maintenance and it relies on volunteers. Wasserman says she used to take students to the trail when she was teaching third and fourth grades at Little Butte School in Eagle Point. "It's an ideal field study area," she says. "The birds are the best part, the most consistent wildlife." The area is home to cavity-nesting birds such as nuthatches, titmice, woodpeckers. "The only trouble was we'd see owls, herons and woodpeckers almost before we were out of the parking lot," Wasserman says. "It would take us 45 minutes to get to the trail." The area is also home to black-tailed deer, vernal pool fairy shrimp and the chaparral mouse. The trail may be accessed from the trailhead on TouVelle Road or from the far end of TouVelle State Park, where a triangle sign marks the boundary. Listen for the squawking of acorn woodpeckers, but don't necessarily expect titmice. They're reclusive. Reach reporter Bill Varble at 776-4478 or e-mail [email protected] Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2001 Mail Tribune, Inc.