This past Monday, June 17th, over 2 dozen people gathered at Indian Kitchen Trailhead to assist with some trail maintenance work.  The rock was stockpiled and needed to be moved out to 3 spots that had been scouted, flagged and laid out the previous Friday. 4 groups were well represented: A good handful from the U.S. Forest Service, 6-7 Youth Conservation Corps, Jennifer from Touch of Nature, 2 (Sam Morales & Chris Drone) from River to River Trail Society and a Bunch led by Cricket Simons, along with their horses and mule, from the Illinois Chapter of Backcountry Horsemen.  The job was to load buckets with about 40 lbs. each of rock, then create a “lane” for the leader to bring the horse(s) through, then each side of the horse get loaded with simultaneously with 2 buckets per bag (1 ‘bag’ on each side of the horse), then led out to the ‘dumping” spot, to be simultaneously released by people at the particular site, then they spread out the rock, while each team was led back in to be loaded again. 

In all, about 14,000 lbs of rock was moved, pretty quickly.  The teams were not going far. We started early, there were no incidents or problems, and the job was completed by about 1130am. Many hands, And Horses, make quick, light work. Planning and preparation are Also essential.