TOPIC: Destruction Of Ginseng

Hello Ginseng_Film & welcome to the forum.

The first article I wrote in this thred is a description of Mountian Top removel in the next county over from me and what a very good gentlemen of the mountians had to do to try and salvage some of the seng that he had worked for years to help populate.That is in Harlan County Ky.A strip Mines can run across the top of the Mountian for miles.There is one above me here in Bell County Ky that they call Bell County Coal that mining company has removed Miles of Mtn Top at least 20 miles around and wide by 200 to 1000 yards from the peak when you add that up it is literaly impossible to replace the amount of damage done by that one company.Thousands of pounds of ginseng,black and blue cohosh,stone root,blood root,star root,etc,and many other edible things such as many different mushrooms,ramps,crows foot,polk salad,bears lettuce etc...After all that they still where not satisfied so they droped below a wood line of 100 to 200 yards and striped another run around the Mtn and destroyed nearly as much again on the run...........

Now you know what the sad part of this is,if they do not mine then thousands loose there lively hood and there homes etc etc,it is the main sorce of income in our area,I have family in the bussiness,I myself just can not bring myself to do it,so I started a different bussiness years ago.You know what else if all the mines close down then my bussiness will fall short as well because I want have customers needing there house reroofed,built etc...It`s impossible..........nothing you can do..

Hey Billy Do u know were State Hwy 186 is at?? comes from Tennessee to the south west part of Middlesboro Ky. Goes right into town... anyway over on that road In ky there's a strip mine out there mining off the top of the MT.. i was out there last week and what i seen was the top of Mt Gone... (prob 3,000 ft mt)but at the bottom of it it look like it was fall time all the leves were gone off of the trees... everything was just about dead... i seen a creek that was runing red like the water was blood...
there just bleeding to Mts. to death up there.. we had a lot of striping around here but not much any more but u can still see
were they have been years and years ago i have found some ginseng around there last year.. but were the put seed back to plant the trees back.. they also but fertilizer down it made big werid looking roots but when i went to go sell them they would not take the roots i found up there...

RedDog

I do know exactly where your talking about that area is often refered to as Tacket Creek Tn: just a few miles past the Ky State line.I have dug in those Mountians before and done pretty good when I went.I did not have any problem at all selling the seng from that area,but I was not realy close to that strip area either.

If you live close enough to seng in that area Reddog then you are not to far from me.I live about 15 miles from where you where senging,I do not seng that area hardly ever,but I know the layout of that Mountian very well and there are some good slopes on the Northern side.

E-mail me I would like to talk to you.

Billy.

My family is from up there on the back side of Tacket Creek place named White oak..that's were are family cemetery is we moved in that place back in 1780s 1790's long long time ago before tn was even a state....your email is not on u'r Personal Info mine is so email somtime...

Oops I need to fix that I will email you.

Hi Billy and RedDog
sorry its taken me a minute to get back to you guys. Thanks for your messages about the mining problem. the places and companies you mentioned will be really helpful as I figure out where to go with this. please feel free to shoot more suggestions my way.
good luck with the hunting!
Ginseng_Film