cooper crest. hp5+@800. rodinal. olympia. june 16.

This is Cooper Point Road in Olympia, Washington. I walked along the road last Monday around 6 p.m.

While there are many homes in the area, the forest along the road has many places deemed critical habitat because of the streams that run off from the area’s aquifers.

Not all the areas are protected. Cooper Crest was one of those areas. Until July 2022, Cooper Crest was home to a thriving urban forest containing mature Douglas Firs and Bigleaf Maples, adjacent to a city park sharing the same name. Situated at in the headwaters of Green Cove Creek, Cooper Crest tributaries originated in this forest, fed by groundwater from perched aquifers. The forest ecosystem at Cooper Crest provided clean water to the fish-bearing river habitat of Green Cove Creek, connecting salmon to Eld Inlet (https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/aeb4037039b24c5f923a68b73f77b074).

In June 2022, the landowner applied to the Board of Natural Resources and received permission to clear-cut 25 acres of his land. OlyEcosystems tried to stop the work by attempting to purchase the property before the job was done. They failed, but they were able to buy the property afterward and have been working for the past several years to restore the habitat (https://www.thurstontalk.com/2022/10/06/olympia-coalition-for-ecosystems-preservation-proudly-begins-restoration-of-cooper-crest-to-protect-critical-properties-in-olympia/).

These images were created with the Nikon F100, the 58mm Voitlander Nokton F1.4, and the Nikon 28mm F2.8D Lens. The film was pushed one stop but developed normally in Rodinal (1:25) for 6 minutes @20C, agitating 10 seconds every minute. The negatives were scanned with the PrimeFilmXEs using Silverfast.