Kenneth Fisher - Interest in Redwoods

Interest in Redwoods

Fisher's ongoing study of redwood ecology, particularly the emerging field of study of redwood canopies appears to have grown from a love which developed in the 1950s while growing up in San Mateo, CA two blocks from Crystal Springs Canyon near ancient redwood logging camps. Fisher even lived in an elaborate two story tree house in McKinleyville, CA for a period of time. The home was outfitted with a phone, wood burning cook stove, skylight, and electricity.

Shortly after graduating college from Humboldt State University Fisher moved his family to Kings Mountain located in Woodside, CA (at the northern end of the Santa Cruz Mountains south of San Francisco, separating the Pacific Ocean from San Francisco Bay and the Santa Clara Valley in the redwoods). This was the same mountain and remote canyons he hiked through in 1967 as a teenager and found what would be his first deserted trapper's cabin.

Fisher is regarded as one of the world's foremost experts on 19th century logging and has documented more than 35 abandoned mill sites in the northern Santa Cruz Mountains. Fisher's personal library has more than 3000 volumes of regional logging history.

Fisher's hobbies include history of Kings Mountain, California, 19th century redwood lumbering history, as well as lumbering history in general and everything about trees. In 1992, Fisher wrote the introduction to the second edition of Sawmills in the Redwoods by Frank M. Stanger. In it, Fisher details his own experiences locating, excavating, and cataloging artifacts from 1890’s era steam-powered sawmills on Kings Mountain in San Mateo County, CA. He also funded publication costs for a "new" edition which was previously out-of-print and is available at the San Mateo County History Museum in Redwood City, CA.

Fisher has thousands of 1800s redwood forest logging artifacts like the removable teeth from an old circular saw blade, oxen shoes and photographs. Items among the thousands of artifacts, double iron shoes from oxen that hauled the logs, old radio batteries, an ebony-handled dinner knife, pulleys, a corner spool that guided cables in Purisima Canyon (part of the Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve), and hundreds of bottles, including an opium bottle. "The bottles help me date the mill sites," he says.

During forest hikes Fisher also found a foot long twisted and melted piece of metal from the passenger plane BCPA Flight 304 that crashed into Kings Mountain, El Corte de Madera Creek Open Space Preserve, in 1953 with 19 passengers on its way to SFO from Honolulu in presumably thick fog.

In 2006, Fisher established the Kenneth L. Fisher Chair in Redwood Forest Ecology for the Department of Biological Sciences at Humboldt State University, currently held by Stephen Sillett, the biologist who's featured, along with Sillett's brother and his wife, in Richard Preston's 2007 book The Wild Trees. "Fisher is particularly drawn to Sillett's pioneering work, amazed at the botanist's discovery of elevated communities of crustaceans, lichens, other organisms, tiny ponds and rich soil deposits high in the trees. The Kenneth L. Fisher Chair in Redwood Forest Ecology is highly involved in the study of redwood trees, especially redwood canopy studies. Fisher's goal in creating the chair was to transform our understanding of trees and forests. It is the world's first endowed chair devoted to a single species.

A grant from Mr. Fisher made it possible for the Save-the-Redwoods League to begin using LiDar (Light Detection And Ranging, also LADAR) to measure redwood heights and measure biodiversity of the California North Coast redwood forest. LiDar is an optical remote sensing technology that can measure the distance to, or other properties of a target by illuminating the target with light, often using pulses from a laser. The League feels this can be useful in reforestation efforts, and also in finding trees that may surpass the Hyperion in height.

Fisher also contributes frequently to historical research for San Mateo County, writing most frequently on King's Mountain redwood logging and settlement history and other historical San Mateo events. Based on his expertise in California Redwoods and Redwood logging history, Fisher provided a peer review of chapters five and six of Coast Redwood: A Natural and Cultural History.

Fisher has also helped launch and fund the Save-the-Redwoods League climate change initiative, which aims to study the impact of climate change on coastal Redwoods. Fisher is the Task Force Co-Chair, for their Redwoods and Climate Change Initiative. Fisher is also matching contributions to the Redwoods and Climate Change Initiative up to $500,000.