Hay flats refuge gets another access point

WASILLA — The Palmer Hay Flats State Game Refuge is literally in the backyard of the burgeoning housing development west of the Glenn-Parks highway interchange, yet many residents have probably never set foot there.

Access to the northeast side of the refuge has been limited, but that changed this week as the nonprofit land conservation organization Great Land Trust and its partners cut the ribbon on the quarter-mile Wasilla Creek Wetlands Trail, an elevated boardwalk that parallels the creek. The boardwalk is part of a larger refuge trails plan in the area that will connect the neighborhoods as well as nearby Machetanz Elementary School.

The trail will be a huge benefit for the school’s nature club, said Machetanz teacher Adrian Bell, one of five instructors who rotate in leading a group of 30 students in outings a couple times a month before school.

Many of the nature club students attended the May 12 ribbon cutting.

“So many of the kids may be outside with sports and other activities, but they don’t always get ‘outside’ to see what is around them,” Bell said. “The boardwalk is going to give them an unlimited amount of things to explore.”

The boardwalk project has been part of a larger fundraising effort for the trust in recent years. In 2014, the trust announced the $1.5 million purchase of some 1,000 acres of private land adjacent to the 29,000-acre refuge. That land was then transferred to the state. The boardwalk project came in at $300,000, said Great Land Trust Mat-Su program director Kim Sollien.

According to a Great Land Trust press release, project contributors included the Rasmuson Foundation, Mat-Su Health Foundation, Mat-Su Trails and Park Foundation, ConocoPhillips and the Student Conservation Association. Crews from the student association helped on the project, Sollien said, which was managed by Mark Gronewald’s Trailwerx.

“The way the boardwalk cuts through the woods, and especially with the see-through grating — it’s like a magic carpet,” Sollien said.

Starting near a newly constructed trailhead off Nelson Road, the boardwalk — a mixture of planks and a Fiberglass grating — starts in thick birch forest and angles away from the road to follow Wasilla Creek. At its terminus, the boardwalk features a 15-by-15-foot viewing platform that offers sweeping views of the refuge.

“I think this time of the year folks walking the trail will hear more than see things,” said Alaska Department Fish and Game lands and refuges program coordinator Joe Meehan. “Once the salmon are in, there will be plenty to see in the creek. Once out on the viewing platform, people will probably see ducks like green-winged teal, pintails and mallards.”

Meehan said the addition of the Great Land Trust-acquired property was an important piece of a larger puzzle of coastal wetlands.

“All these coastal areas around Knik Arm are really important to bird migration,” he said.

Meehan pointed out that while the boardwalk was a great way to get into the refuge, it should also be used as a literal jumping off point.

“We encourage folks to put on the boots and waders to get out there and explore the refuge,” he said. “I told the kids at the ribbon cutting: first, get your parents’ permission, then get out there and get muddy.”

Contact reporter Steven Merritt at 352-2269 or steven.merritt@frontiersman.com