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Lompico Headwaters

A Legendary Forest

The redwood forest known as the Lompico Headwaters spans both acreage and legend in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Not only are the Lompico redwoods said to be the site of Grateful Dead’s Jerry Garcia’s legendary loss of the end of his middle finger in 1951, it also became the site of the world’s first official preserved forest to offset carbon in 2008. The Lompico Headwaters’ 425-acres of forest, which naturally capture and transform massive amounts of carbon each year, were slated for logging before Sempervirens Fund preserved the forest in 2006.

Now permanently protected, Sempervirens Fund’s Lompico Headwaters are being restored with the help of volunteers so the forest and creek continues to benefit people and wildlife for generations to come.

Jerry Garcia and the Lompico Redwoods

Long before its preservation, Sempervirens Fund heard rumors that the Grateful Dead had “jammed” somewhere on the Lompico Headwaters property back in the day. Although there is no evidence the Grateful Dead ever played Lompico, the truth of the rumor is far stranger.

Garcia’s family owned a house in Lompico. While vacationing in the redwoods in 1951, Garcia’s older brother Clifford accidentally lopped his 4-year-old brother’s right-middle finger off at the knuckle while chopping wood. Even more macabre is the fact that the finger of the boy who would grow up to find international fame as a psychedelic icon and Hall of Fame guitarist…was never found. Time in the Lompico redwoods quite literally shaped Jerry Garcia.

Since then, 60% of the Lompico Headwaters’ 425-acre forest was slated to be cut down until Sempervirens Fund preserved the land and made it the site of another legendary occurrence—the Lompico Forest Carbon Project.

Lompico Headwaters Jerry Garcia Missing Finger

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