Rich Mountain Loop Trail

Welcome to Cades Cove. This magnificent valley that you see before you was originally called, Tsiya'hi (Ta-sigh-ya-hee), or ”Place of the otter” by the Cherokee People who first inhabited this area. We know that the Cherokee used this valley for hunting but not for permanent settlements. When white settlers first came to this area, they began calling this place “Cades Cove”. We’re not really sure of the origin of the name “Cades”. Some say that there was a family that lived here early on called Cades; they moved on but left their name behind. Others claim that a Cherokee Chief named Abraham, for whom Abrahm’s creek and falls are named, had a wife the settlers called “Katie”, and over the years Katie’s Cove became Cades Cove.

Although we don’t know the origin of the word “Cades”, we do know why it’s called a cove. The people who settled in East TN were mostly Scotch-Irish in descent, and to them, a valley surrounded by mountains on 3 sides with only one outlet was called a “Cove”. In this case, the only outlet is Abrams Creek to the west. If this valley had been filled with water, it would very much look like a cove along the coast of the Irish Sea.

It was very difficult to clear land yourself, but there was a process that made it easier. First a settler girdled the trees with an axe. Cutting a section all the way around the tree cut off the flow of nutrients. Leaves quickly died and the tree eventually followed suit. Crops were often planted right amongst the dead trees for the first few years. And as the farmer needed, he cut those trees down and used them for firewood. Later on, stumps had to be pulled. This was done with an axe, chain, and a mule. It was a lot of hard work. So much so that many farmers simply burned many of the trees and stumps in their fields.

Now as you look out across this field, realize that by 1850 nearly the entire cove had been cleared of trees. In fact, the land had been cleared halfway up the slope on each side of the cove, about twice as much as you see cleared today. Walk up Rich Mountain trail you’ll find the rock pile remains of an old chimney from one of those farmers who lived way up on the hillside. They used to say you could harvest two crops a year up on those hillsides: a crop of corn and a crop of rocks. You just had to harvest the rocks before you could harvest the corn.

It was hard work living up on those farms, and in the 1850’s a lot of farmers living on those marginal lands left the cove, and the forests started to re-grow in those areas. Until the park was created in the 1930’s, row crops, principally corn and wheat covered the floor of the cove. Other crops were grown in the cove as well - vegetables, a little bit of tobacco, sorghum, but the staple crop for most families was corn.

In 1817, John Oliver was living up in Carter County, TN, which is in the northeast corner of the state. He was working as a collier there, making charcoal for a living. He would travel up into the mountains, chop down trees, cut them into 4 foot lengths, pile them up, bury them with dirt, and light them on fire. A smoldering fire would turn them not into ash, but into charcoal that could be used for forges in the making of iron and by blacksmiths.

John was also raising a young family. He had a wife, Lucrecia Frasier Oliver, known locally as Laurany, and a young daughter, Polly. It was during this time that John decided to strike out on his own - to move to a new place and to begin farming. He and his friend, Joshua Jobe, brought the family from Carter county to what we now know as Cades Cove. Originally he probably had a borrowed wagon, that he used to bring his necessities down to Tuckaleechee cove, which we now call Townsend. He probably had good trails to travel at that time, but there were no roads into Cades Cove. He had to come up and over the mountain that sits behind you, Rich Mountain, by way of an old Cherokee path. It was said that it was so steep goin’ up the mules could hardly make it, and it was so steep comin’ down you needed hobnails in your britches to keep from slidin’ all the way to the bottom. When they reached the crest of the mountain, Laurany got a view that you might get if you drive out by way of Rich Mountain road today. She saw, not a pastoral setting like you see today, but a forested valley, except for the west end, which was largely swamplands. Its said that Laurany didn’t want to be anywhere near “them swamps, full of their vermin and pestilence”. So up to the east end of the cove the Olivers came.

What you see here is not their original cabin however. John built a small lean-to that first year. They came late in the year and so they needed to set something up just to get them through the winter and to begin clearing the land. If you walk up Rich Mountain trail just a short distance you’ll see a flat rock sticking out on the right side of the trail. The descendants of the Oliver’s believe that this was the front step of the original John Oliver cabin. The cabin we see today was built after John and his family had become well-established members of this growing community.

Laurany said, later on in life, that if it hadn’t been for the Cherokee, they would probably never have survived that first winter. Joshua Jobe had left the family as winter settled into the cove. There hadn’t been a lot of time to put any food by. The Cherokee, seeming to be aware of that, stopped by leaving presents of dried pumpkin on their porch.

The Olivers were likely illegal settlers. The Olivers say they were here in 1818, and this was still Cherokee land at that time. It wasn’t until 1819, when the Calhoun Treaty was signed, that this land became open for settlement. This was not an uncommon practice of land speculators - entice a young family, like the Olivers, to move into an area, which would put pressure on the Cherokee and get them to relinquish their land. When Jobe returned the next spring, Laurany was ready to go back to Carter County. Jobe offered her a milk cow to stay, and so, the Olivers remained in the valley the rest of their lives. They had children who had children. Oliver descendants remained here until 1945.

Geologically speaking, Cades Cove is a “Fenster”. Which comes from the German word for “window”. And it really is. Should you stand atop the mountains surrounding the cove, you would be looking through older rock to see younger rock. The cove floor is underlain by limestone, which is younger than the sandstone mountains that surround it on both sides.

Millions of years ago, when the continent of Pangaea was coming together, the continent we now call Africa crashed into the continent we now call North America. The mountains that you see to the south of the cove used to sit roughly 15 miles to the southeast. During that collision, they rode the Great Smoky Mountains Fault line up and over a shallow sea that sat at this location. That would have completely covered this valley with mountains. The rock that formed the center of this valley, was a rock called Phyllite. You may have noticed cliffs of shiny rock as you drove into the Cove today. That is exposed Phyllite. Phyllite is a very soft, easily eroded rock, and over the millions of years that this valley has existed, the phyllite has slowly eroded away, again exposing the young limestone sitting underneath the older sandstone that now make up the Smokies crest to the south, and Rich Mountain to the north.

Rain and snow continue to erode the valley and have created another unique feature: caves. Stop by Gregory Cave to learn more about the geology of the cove.

At birth, in January or February, a cub may weigh but half a pound. It will find its way to the mother’s nipple, and begin suckling. Bear milk is up to 30% fat. Compare that to a cow’s milk that is only 3% fat. Feeding on this rich milk, the cub will gain 5 to 10 pounds in the next few months. In April or May, the sow will emerge from her den with her new cubs.

Bears prefer to den high in trees where large cavities are available. The average height of a den in the Smokies is 80 feet. The first experience a cub has in the outside world can be descending an 80 foot tree. Bears are great climbers. But bears can also den on the ground. These dens are often in thickets of briers, which offer some protection from other animals.

Mother and cubs will forage together for a year and a half. They are inseparable during this time. But eventually, the desire to mate again will come to the sow. She must get rid of her yearlings. The sow has taught her yearlings to climb trees whenever danger threatens. She will bark or huff at them and up the nearest tree they will go. She might run off to draw the danger away, so the yearlings have learned to wait in the tree until she returns. The sow uses this training to rid herself of her offspring. She will send them up a tree and then leave, never to return.

After hours or maybe even a day, the yearlings will realize they have been abandoned, climb down from the tree, and begin a life on their own. Most yearlings will not survive the next year. Those that do survive will mature at age 3 and could live into their teens or early twenties. The oldest known bear in the Smokies was a sow that lived 26 years.

Bears are omnivores, but 75% of their diet is herbaceous. They feed on grasses, leaves and shoots in the spring, berries in the summer, and hickory, beech, and acorns in the fall. Acorns are so important to bear survival, that bear researchers survey the fall acorn crop to predict cub production for the next year.

Besides plant material, bears love insects, not so much for the honey as you may have heard, but in the fall, bears will dig up hornet and yellow jacket nests to eat the larvae. These are rich in protein and so, a valuable food source. Of course, they may indulge in a bit of honey at the same time, but it’s the larvae they are really after. The insects are not going to take the raid of their nest kindly and will sting the bear many times. Its heavy fur protects all but the bear’s eyes, mouth, and very sensitive nose. When the bear can take the stinging no longer, it will simply walk away. Should you be unlucky enough to be hiking the same trail as a bear, you may come upon a recently disturbed nest. This is not a happy event, as the bees or wasps will treat you as if you were the bear.

There is a saying in the Smokies, “a fed bear is a dead bear.” A bear behaving naturally may live a long life never interacting with any of the 9 to 10 million visitors who come each year to the park. Black bears have an incredibly acute sense of smell, perhaps 100 times better than a human’s. So bears must be able to smell cooking food from quite a distance. Then why aren’t bears always in campgrounds and picnic areas? Although the smell of food might attract a bear, their instinct tells them to stay away from humans. But occasionally, a bear will lose its fear of humans and cause problems in picnic areas or campgrounds. It usually starts at night when the picnic area is closed. A hungry bear will enter the area and feed on scraps or trash left behind. The reward of food will eventually cause the bear to take more