To repair tree damage from Hurricane Beryl in July, Montgomery County’s W.G. Jones State Forest is temporarily closed to the public and could remain closed for several weeks.
According to a Facebook post on the W.G. Jones State Forest-Texas A&M Forest Service page, the forest off FM 1488 closed temporarily on Sept. 9.
“This salvage work is essential for removing damaged and hazardous trees while preserving healthy ones,” according to the Texas A&M Forest Service post. “Our goal is to ensure the safety of both visitors and staff in the forest.”
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The forest closed following Hurricane Beryl July 8 and reopened to the public July 22. While the major trails were cleared by the Texas A&M Forest service staff with assistance from the Conroe Fire Department, other trails remain closed due to damage and hazards.
Jaden Kelly, a program specialist with the Texas A&M Forest Service, expects the work to take from two to four weeks.
“This salvage operation will be highly weather dependent, which makes a timeline hard to predict. Most of the damage is limited to road edges and open understory stands within the forest, so a relatively small proportion of trees on the forest have been impacted,” Kelly said. “The purpose of this salvage is predominantly to improve public safety by removing significantly damaged and hazard trees, while also making use of the trees that were blown over/snapped off. These fallen trees make the implementation of proper forest management practices more difficult for our staff to accomplish such as mulching jobs and forest thinning.”
What to know about Jones State Forest
Jones State Forest is an urban 1,722-acre preserve where the area’s native loblolly pine trees, short leaf pines and other trees stand undisturbed — some for the nearly 100 years the park has been in existence. William Goodrich Jones was the founder of the Texas Forestry Association.
Opened and preserved since 1926 by what was previously known as the Forestry Department of Texas A&M University System, but is now known as the Texas A&M Forest Service, the park features two lakes and nearly 15 miles of trails that wind through its towering pine trees.
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The forest is also home to the endangered red-cockaded woodpecker. They are on the federal endangered species list and the Texas Parks and Wildlife’s state endangered list. They need large, mature pine trees that are 60 years and older in which to build cavities for roosting and nesting. The Jones State Forest has the perfect “island” of large pine trees.
To help the population thrive, in 2023, the Texas Society Daughters of the American Revolution partnered with the Texas A&M Forest Service to set up a 100-acre conservation district within the forest.
The forest service asks recreation seekers to visit the W.G. Jones State Forest-Texas A&M Forest Service Facebook page for updates on the forest’s reopening. Email any questions to JonesStateForest@tfs.tamu.edu.
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