Qualla: Spice Run Wilderness https://qualla.com/spice-run-wilderness en-us © 2026 Bendyline Wed, 08 Jul 2026 02:40:06 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/d/n/y/b/spice-run-wilderness-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Spice Run Wilderness https://qualla.com/spice-run-wilderness Spice Run Wilderness: Introduction https://qualla.com/spice-run-wilderness/ Photo credit Ken Thomas, Public domain. To reach Spice Run Wilderness, you have to get wet. The Greenbrier River runs along the western edge of the protected area, and the most common entrance is a ford - a shallow stony stretch where the water comes up to your knees at normal summer levels and a great deal higher when the rain has been heavy. No passenger car can reach the trailheads. The hiking-in alternative requires a long walk through Calvin Price State Forest, and the only road access, on Greenbrier County Route 16, requires high clearance and a willingness to admit that the federal government meant it when it called this place a wilderness.

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Image: Ken Thomas | Public domain

]]> Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/n/y/b/spice-run-wilderness-wp/dnyb-spice-run-wilderness-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Spice Run Wilderness: The Shrub https://qualla.com/spice-run-wilderness/ Photo credit Ken Thomas, Public domain. The wilderness, the creek, and the vanished town are all named for Lindera benzoin, the spicebush or spicewood - a native understory shrub of the Appalachian hardwood forest. Crush a leaf and you get a smell somewhere between allspice and lemon. Indigenous Appalachians used it as...

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Image: Ken Thomas | Public domain

]]> Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/n/y/b/spice-run-wilderness-wp/dnyb-spice-run-wilderness-the-shrub.mp3 0:06 2 full Spice Run Wilderness: The Boomtown That Vanished https://qualla.com/spice-run-wilderness/ Photo credit Ken Thomas, Public domain. In the late 19th century, the Spice Run Lumber Company built a sawmill on the Greenbrier and a logging camp big enough to be called a town. Workers cut red spruce, hemlock, and hardwood from the slopes above the river and floated the logs downstream to the mill. The drives were s...

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Image: Ken Thomas | Public domain

]]> Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/n/y/b/spice-run-wilderness-wp/dnyb-spice-run-wilderness-the-boomtown-that-vanished.mp3 0:06 3 full Spice Run Wilderness: Wilderness, 2009 https://qualla.com/spice-run-wilderness/ Photo credit Ken Thomas, Public domain. In March 2009, President Obama signed the Omnibus Public Lands Management Act, which included the designation of Spice Run Wilderness along with several other newly protected areas in the Monongahela National Forest. The wilderness covers about 6,030 acres of second-growth forest...

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Image: Ken Thomas | Public domain

]]> Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/n/y/b/spice-run-wilderness-wp/dnyb-spice-run-wilderness-wilderness-2009.mp3 0:06 4 full Spice Run Wilderness: The Streams https://qualla.com/spice-run-wilderness/ Photo credit Ken Thomas, Public domain. Three watersheds drain through the wilderness: Spice Run, Davy Run, and Kincaid Run. All three are native brook trout streams, which is to say they are cold, well-shaded, and supporting the original wild fish of the Appalachian highlands - not stocked hatchery fish, but the small...

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Image: Ken Thomas | Public domain

]]> Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/n/y/b/spice-run-wilderness-wp/dnyb-spice-run-wilderness-the-streams.mp3 0:06 5 full Spice Run Wilderness: What's There Now https://qualla.com/spice-run-wilderness/ Photo credit Ken Thomas, Public domain. Federal records list 230 species of birds in or passing through the wilderness, and nine species on the federal sensitive or watch list - including the West Virginia northern flying squirrel, a high-elevation subspecies that depends on red spruce and northern hardwood forests of ...

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Image: Ken Thomas | Public domain

]]> Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/n/y/b/spice-run-wilderness-wp/dnyb-spice-run-wilderness-whats-there-now.mp3 0:06 6 full