A Lost Public Garden

There's a planting in the field at Turning Basin Park, across the street from the canoe livery. It looks like a curved hedge, but if you take a closer look, there's a sign buried in the foliage.

A butterfly garden was planted there years back, and a lovely sign erected to commemorate the effort. It was a good idea, a nice gesture, and then everyone went their separate ways.

A decade ago, helping WaterWatch with annual workdays at Turning Basin Park--part of Princeton University's freshmen bonding activities before the semester began--I noticed the forsaken garden and spent some time cutting down the woody growth that was starting to shade out the flowers. Each time it took no more than a half hour of skilled attention to discourage the weeds enough to keep the garden blooming for another year.

But WaterWatch passed into history, and with it my annual prompt to volunteer some care for this garden. Up grew the mulberry trees,

and the catalpas,

the wineberry,

and the vine that will eventually claim all of Princeton, porcelainberry.

Gone are the butterfly-attracting flowers, as Turning Basin has returned to the default landscape of mowed grass, trees, and whatever. Shall we fault the planters of this garden who didn't follow up? Kids grow up and girlscout troops come and go. Maybe fault the lack of government budget for anything beyond unskilled, custodial maintenance of our public landscapes? Let's just say that love moved on.

WaterWatch vs. Garlic Mustard

Cherry trees, planted back when the canal area was a cultivated entryway into Princeton University, add ornament to the towpath next to Turning Basin Park. Last year, the university student group Water Watch cleared out the invasive Tree of Heavens that were starting to shade out the cherries. Neither the cherries nor the Tree of Heaven are native, but the former is ornamental and non-invasive.

This spring, led by Laura Burke, some fifty students took to the water in canoes and cleaned the canal of water-borne litter.

A few of us stayed on land, clearing garlic mustard from the slope.

Because garlic mustard is a biennial, there were actually two generations of the plant present. We pulled only the second year plants, which were just starting to send up their flowering stalks. The smaller ones are first year plants, which we left because they won't flower this year. Many of them will die anyway, from overcrowding, before they reach the flowering stage next year.

If no plants are allowed to make new seed, eventually the seedbank is exhausted and the embankment will be clear of the weed. This is called "picking your spots", because the task of removing garlic mustard from all of Princeton would be overwhelming. It's also a way to learn new things through the conversations we have, in this case about backpacking the Camino de Santiago in Spain, and the challenges of prescribed burning in the Everglades.

Princeton Freshmen Take On Ailanthus

There's a bench at Turning Basin Park in Princeton, located strategically on a bluff overlooking the canal. Nice view, except that the canal could not be seen due to a wall of Tree of Heaven sprouts that had grown up in front of the bench.

This past Friday, the view of the canal was restored, thanks to a workday organized by Princeton WaterWatch and Butler College. While a couple picnicked on the bench, 25 Princeton University freshmen came down to the canal and cleared the Tree of Heaven (Ailanthus) from the slope between Turning Basin Park and the canal. I gave them an introductory spiel about the role of Friends of Princeton Open Space in town and the value of doing habitat restoration.

Though most had arrived with little knowledge of plants, they soon found themselves vigorously taking on Princeton's most invasive tree. While clearing the view for the one bench, they found another that had disappeared completely beneath the swarming invasive growth (on the left in the photo). A highly invasive vine, Porcelain Berry, was also cut along the slope. Any resprouts next year should be considerably weaker, since cutting them this time of year will cheat their roots of any nutrients the leaves and stems would have sent down in preparation for winter.



The view of the canal restored (the couple were comically oblivious to our efforts), the students then treated themselves to canoe rides. All in all a fun and rewarding afternoon.