Enjoying an urban forest with meandering walking paths or hiking trails is not always a luxury available to city dwellers hoping to briefly escape the fast pace of metropolitan life. Fortunately, the Auburn University at Montgomery campus is home to such an inviting green haven – 250 peaceful acres open to everyone in the community. But the creation of this wonderful woodland didn’t happen overnight.
After I began working at the university in the mid-1980s, colleagues would occasionally speak of trekking across campus during lunch breaks to stroll through the wooded area then commonly referred to as the Pecan Trail (or Grove).
Wedged between the west side of the campus and Bell Road, this area was probably more frequently visited by wildlife back then and, in previous decades, by grazing cattle straying from local farms that once surrounded the area. Over the following years, however, the AUM community began to increasingly appreciate this pristine land as a valuable resource.
Generally known as the AUM Forest today, four miles of primitive walking trails are threaded through an area making up approximately half of the AUM campus. Oliver Creek, which drains local storm water (eventually) into the Alabama River, runs along the east side of the forest.
Former AUM history professor John Fair told me recently that the first use of the area by the university in the 1970s was limited. A crude trail was forged by the occasional jogger, and a primitive building temporarily housed the campus weightlifting club.
“I well remember the formal opening of the trail, which was launched by (former AUM chancellor) Jim Williams on the dirt road just outside of the tennis courts,” recalled Fair. “We jogged at least part of the trail across a primitive bridge over Oliver Creek and into the Pecan Grove just beside the oldest pecan tree in the state.”
He remembers the trail extending through mostly underbrush on uneven terrain, emerging at an unfinished ring road overlooking the interstate, not far from where the State Forensic Lab would be eventually built. That site is now home to AUM’s new Science & Technology Complex that opened earlier this year.
Fair says the thick thorny brush was initially bushhogged, then mowed, but remained challenging to use.
“Keeping the weeds and stubble down was always a problem,” he said. “With the Alabama heat, bugs, and occasional flooding, it was not always a pleasant experience.”
John G. Veres III remembers significant improvements to the trail area in the mid to late 2000s during his tenure as AUM’s chancellor from 2006 to 2016.
“A grant was sought to level the trail, clear brush, and generally render the trail more attractive and more conducive to cross-country running,” Veres told me. “Unfortunately, the terms of the grant would have transferred control of the trail to the U.S. Department of the Interior.”
That arrangement was unacceptable, so the university elected to bear the cost of improvements from discretionary funds. A paved open path was also laid east of the creek and today remains popular with walkers, joggers, and bikers seeking exercise without venturing into the wooded region. Together, says Veres, the primitive and paved paths would “complement one another and provide amenities to students, faculty, and staff members.”
Around this time, the late AUM anthropology professor Terry Winemiller blazed (marked) the existing trails and paths. Today, the multiple color-coded trails make it easy for visitors to navigate specific paths (a trail map is available on the AUM website or at the trailhead behind the tennis courts). The trails follow mostly flat, well-worn dirt paths that are easy to navigate with just a gentle incline or two, adding a bit of variety without being strenuous.
More than just a recreational site, the forest has become a source of research and teaching for AUM’s faculty. Kim Pyszka, who heads the Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Social Work, has studied the history of the area prior to AUM’s founding in 1967. Our biologists also regularly visit the forest.
“The AUM trails now lead directly to the back door of our new science and technology building,” said Chelsea Ward, a biology professor and Head of AUM’s Biology and Environmental Sciences Department. “This allows our students and researchers direct access to the forest, which we use to study the effects of Kudzu and fire, as well as a data source for surveying plants and animals.”
And there is plenty of wildlife lurking in the forest. My colleagues report the presence of deer, foxes, beavers, and coyotes while walking the trails. In fact, over 200 animal species have been catalogued on the iNaturalist website (link: www.inaturalist.org/observations?project_id=aum-biodiversity-survey&taxon_id=1&verifiable=any) as well as a bird database.
AUM’s ‘ForestExplorer’ project is also in the process of tagging forest plants with QR codes to identify species while walking, and the university is developing a Research Institute (RHERI) to use the area as a model to study Alabama’s historical, ecological, and environmental connectivity (link: www.aum.edu/rheri).
As a regular explorer of the AUM Forest over the years, I would have to agree with former Chancellor Veres, who noted, “I enjoyed walking the wooded area myself and found it to be some of the most visually interesting terrains AUM possesses.”
Nick Thomas teaches at Auburn University at Montgomery in Alabama and has written features, columns, and interviews for many newspapers and magazines. His hiking column describes short trails, hikes, and walks from around the country that seniors might enjoy while traveling. See www.ItsAWonderfulHike.com.