The California Tahoe Conservancy began posting property tags this week to help better identify its lands.

The bright 4 x 6 inch signs featuring the Conservancy logo will be placed on trees on 1,000 lots in South Lake Tahoe and Meyers this fall and winter. The Conservancy will employ a phased approach to sign all 4,700 properties throughout the California side of the basin in the upcoming years.

In addition to signing properties, the Conservancy conducts year-round inspection, maintenance, and restoration projects on its urban lots. This year more than 2,415 properties were inspected, 63,000 square feet of disturbed area restored, and 33 restoration projects completed.

The Conservancy encourages neighbors to notify them at 530.542.5580 or via email at info@tahoe.ca.gov about any issues on these lands.

By Outside

Over the past few years, we’ve seen a sea change in terms of people’s attitudes, perception, and behavior about recreating in avalanche-prone terrain, especially skiing in the backcountry.

There are more of us out there than ever before, using increasingly fancy and sophisticated gear. But despite these advances, and a shift in how and what avalanche safety professionals teach, we’re not collectively making better decisions out there. Backcountry ski gear manufacturers, ski resorts, and avalanche forecasters and educators are acutely aware of the issue — and have just recently started taking industry-wide initiatives to help people make smarter choices in avalanche-prone terrain.

Here, we take a look at how the surge in popularity of backcountry users has altered the landscape, how to safely navigate slide-prone mountains, the tools and skills required to dig out someone buried by an avalanche, the advent of avalanche airbags, the human factors that can affect people’s judgement in the field, whether or not you should be concerned about inbounds avalanches at ski resorts, the tools professionals use to manage the snowpack, and a potentially game-changing new piece of avalanche safety gear.

The information we’ve gathered here is by no means everything you need to know to be an educated, safety-minded, and well-equipped backcountry user, but it’s a good place to start.

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The Turkey Trot Fun Run will be Nov. 22 at 10am.

Runners-walkers will start at Bijou Community Park in South Lake Tahoe. Participants are encouraged to dress in Thanksgiving attire. Prizes will be given for best costume and most ridiculous costume.

There is a 5K and a kids fun run.

For more information and to register, go online.

The Nevada Division of State Parks is seeking grant pre-applications in anticipation of the 2015 federal funding of the Recreational Trails Program. Nevada could potentially receive $1.1 million in grant funds.

Submittal of a pre-application is recommended, but not required.

Grants may be awarded to counties, municipalities, state and federal agencies, private organizations, nonprofits and Native American tribal governments for the purpose of providing outdoor recreational trail activities. Because funding through this program is limited, allocation of these funds will be competitively determined by the Ad-Hoc Recreation Trails Program Committee.

Go online to review the manual and determine eligibility. Pre-applications may also be downloaded. They are due Nov. 30. Questions should be directed to Jenny Scanland at 775.684.2787 or jscanland@parks.nv.gov.

Free public firewood gathering will again be available at the Wrights Lake Recreation Area on the Eldorado National Forest to this weekend.

The area was hit by a severe wind storm almost a year ago, causing more than 200 trees to fall. As part of the clean-up effort, the Forest Service has scheduled a series of woodcutting events which allow people to cut and gather firewood in an area normally closed to fuel wood cutting. The gate will be open Nov. 8-9 rom 9am-4pm. Free non-commercial use permits will be issued on site.

The following rules will be in effect during the event:

• Permit is for personal use only. No commercial wood gathering for resale will be allowed.
• No early entry will be allowed.
• Public not involved in the wood gathering will need to park outside the gate in the overflow parking area.
• Wood cutters must remain on existing paved roads, pull-outs and spurs, and must not block roads, gates or closure barriers.
• Only newly wind downed logs will be permitted for cutting. Older weathered logs must be left on site.
• Woodcutters must check out and exit the gate prior to 4pm each day.
• Members of the public not honoring these rules will be asked to leave.

By Bob Parks, Outside

It’s not a stretch to call Truckee’s Jeremy Jones the greatest snowboarder of all time.

The pro rider has made a career of bringing backcountry snowboarding to the mainstream. His expeditions and innovations —including the designs he helped create for his company, Jeremy Jones Snowboards — stem from his drive to explore winter in meaningful and often insanely demanding ways.

In 2007, Jones founded Protect Our Winters, a nonprofit that works to reduce the effects of climate change and draw attention to the snowy places we’re in danger of losing.

The newest film of his human-powered snowboard trilogy, “Higher”, dropped in October.

The day we caught up with him to talk about his favorite places to ride and his favorite gear, gusts of wind bludgeoned his phone. We pictured him hanging from a cliff with one hand while calmly giving an interview with the other.

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Mt. Rose and Boreal will be the first Lake Tahoe area ski resorts to open. Lifts will start running Nov. 7.

Both have been making snow, but also got enough out of last weekend’s storm to start the season. Mt. Rose received 5 inches of freshies in last weekend’s storm. The resort plans to be open Nov. 7-9, 10am-3pm. Lift tickets will be available at the main lodge for $10.

Boreal, which is celebrating its 50th season, received 10 inches of snow.

Other resorts have since fired up their snowmaking guns. With temperatures being below freezing overnight, ski areas are able to regularly make snow. Much of last season was all about skiing on manmade snow.

Opening dates:

• Nov. 21: Heavenly Mountain Resort, Northstar

• Nov. 22: Kirkwood Mountain Resort

• Nov. 26: Squaw Valley

• Dec. 12: Alpine Meadows.

Other resorts will open as conditions allow.

— Lake Tahoe News staff report

The U.S. Forest Service Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit will continue prescribed fire operations in the Pioneer Trail and Slaughterhouse Canyon areas on Nov. 4.

Fifty acres of hand piles off Pioneer will be burned and 22 acres of hand piles in the canyon.

Smoke from prescribed fire operations is normal and may continue for several days after an ignition depending on the project size.

Before prescribed fire operations are conducted, Forest Service staff post road signs around areas affected by prescribed fire, send email notifications and update the local fire information line at 530.543.2600, ext. 6. To receive prescribed fire notifications, send an email to pa_ltbmu@fs.fed.us.

Boundary Peak at 13,140 feet is Nevada’s highest point. Photo/Michelle Slaton/U.S. Forest Service

By Henry Brean, Las Vegas Review-Journal

If beauty played a role in deciding Nevada’s highest point, Wheeler Peak, crown jewel of Great Basin National Park at the eastern edge of the state, would be the winner hands down.

Instead, geography and topography have conspired to give us Boundary Peak on the state’s opposite border — a nondescript, scree-covered bump at the end of California that rises, nevertheless, about 77 feet higher than picturesque Wheeler.

By some estimates, 13,140-foot Boundary is barely even a peak. A website for climbers called summitpost.org describes it is as “part of a twin peak with Montgomery Peak,” which is 301 feet higher and just across the border in California. If you keep going south from there, you’ll come to even taller Mount Dubois (13,559) and taller still White Mountain Peak (14,246), also completely in California.

“Boundary Peak is at the Northern end of the White Mountains,” writes summitpost.org, “and would not be climbed much except for the fact it is the highest point in Nevada, although it is not the highest peak in the area.”

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CalFire’s Nevada-Yuba-Placer and Amador-El Dorado units have lifted the suspension of residential burning within state responsibility areas effective 8am Nov. 3.

While cooler temperatures have helped to diminish the threat of wildfire, residents are asked to use caution while conducting debris burns. Residents must follow burning requirements and maintain control of their fire at all times. Property owners may be held liable if a fire escapes their control and/or burns the property of a neighbor.

To reduce your risk of causing a wildland fire, review the requirements listed below to safely burn your debris piles:
• Only dry, natural, vegetative material such as leaves, pine needles and tree trimmings that originated on the property may be burned. Burning household garbage is not allowed.
• Piles will be no larger than 4 feet in diameter.
• Provide clearance around the pile that is 10 feet in diameter by removing all material that will burn, down to bare mineral soil.
• Have a water source on hand such as a charged garden hose or a minimum of a 5 gallon backpack, pump type water extinguisher.
• Responsible adult needs to be in attendance at all times.
• Never burn on windy days.
• Only burn on permissive burn days.
Contact your nearest CalFire station and/or local fire department to acquire the proper permit.

Fore more info, call 530.621.5842.