Friday, May 28, 2010

PHS Students Study Fish at Mountain Lakes

Thanks to Tim Anderson, Princeton High School science teacher, who sent me these photos of his May 25 visit to Mountain Lakes with his students to study the lakes before they get drained this July as part of the upcoming dam restoration.

Tim has often used Mountain Lakes as a study area for his classes. This year, they sampled "fish, plankton, etc." In two seines of 80 feet of shoreline, they caught "a 22" large mouth bass (see below), hundreds of bluegill and pumpkinseed sunfish, one green sunfish, white suckers, golden shiners, and one 14" bullhead catfish."

22 inch largemouth bass. This may be the big one fishermen have told me they've seen in the lower lake.


Determining fish age

My understanding is that the fish will be rescued from the lakes during draining, and transported to Carnegie Lake. Though the lakes will be restocked after the restoration is complete, I've been told that it will take some years for fish populations to recover.

I had wondered whether there might be something genetically special about the fish in the lake, since the dams have effectively isolated them from the rest of the watershed for the past 110 years. But I was unable to find anyone who thought it worth looking into.

In any case, it's good to have some information about what lives in the lakes, before they get remade.


Tuesday, May 25, 2010

New Trail in Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve

Thanks to the hard work of volunteers, and some serendipity, one of the prettiest spots in Princeton's Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve is now accessible by trail. Walk up to the end of the long paved driveway leading from 57 Mountain Avenue to Mountain Lakes House. Just past the house, veer right into the woods on the new trail. It will take you past tall red oaks, then down into a small valley I've started calling Frog Hollow.


On May 23rd, the trail's stream crossing was given an extraordinary facelift by 18 volunteers--8 from the Friends of Princeton Open Space and 10 from the NJ Trail Association. The NJTA group was led by Alan Hershey.

Hikers and joggers in Mountain Lakes will have noticed great improvements in all the preserve's trails over the past couple years. Much of this has come about through the leadership of FOPOS board members Ted Thomas and Clark Lennon, who are out almost daily in the park, working on their own or with additional volunteers on periodic workdays. As can be seen from the size of the rocks used, this is probably the most ambitious and elegant project to date.

The element of serendipity came in the form of the recent windstorm, which blew so many pine trees down across the old trail to Witherspoon Woods that a new one had to be built. The new trail goes through far more interesting terrain.

Awards Given for Bridge Concept and Installation

This from Wendy Mager, president of Friends of Princeton Open Space:

On May 24th, the Princeton Township Committee specially recognized Helmut Schwab, Robert von Zumbusch and the Friends of Princeton Open Space at its meeting for their contributions to the creation of the Stony Brook footbridge near Jasna Polana/the Hun School
, and for developing the concept of a loop trail around Princeton.

Helmut came in for special commendation as the person without whom it would not have ever happened
and for his long years of work on the project, and Robert for his help as a member of the Historic Preservation Commission in working out those aspects of the project.

Robert Kiser, the Township Engineer, received an award from the NJ Engineers
Society for this project. A lot is also owed to Anthony Soriano, another member of the Engineering Department, who starting when he was an intern successfully put together grant applications that provided 80% of the total funding.

Friday, May 14, 2010

Open Space Happenings This Weekend


SUNDAY, MAY 16, 11am to 1pm
Garlic Mustard Pulling at Mountain Lakes
--Recent rains and a sunny forecast will make for a good day to pull this aromatic and edible, but highly invasive species in one of the lovelier spots in Mountain Lakes Preserve. It's shown in the photo growing out of cracks in a patio. Pulling now, before the seedpods open, will make for fewer weeds next year. Kids can help out with this sort of work. Meet at Mountain Lakes House (end of long driveway at 57 Mountain Ave).

BIRD WALKS AT ROGERS REFUGE
The Washington Crossing Audubon Society is sponsoring two walks by Lou Beck and Mark Witmer this Saturday and Sunday at 8am. Rogers Refuge is a prime spot to see migratory warblers. More info at
http://www.washingtoncrossingaudubon.org/pages/fldtrips/fldtrips.htm#start
Directions: From Princeton take Alexander Street toward Route 1. At the bend before the canal turn right on West Drive. Go a short distance on West Drive and park near the entrance to the Rogers Wildlife Refuge.

FRIDAY, MAY 14, 3-6, SATURDAY, 2-5
Native plant sale at D&R Greenway
. Lots of native species to buy, most of which have been grown from locally collected seeds. Drive out Rosedale Rd to the headquarters at Preservation Place.

www.princetonnaturenotes.org -- A writeup on the recent American Chestnut talk hosted by Friends of Princeton Open Space, and a post on sedges (sedges have edges).

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Native Plant Sale at D&R Greenway

Friday, May 14, 3-6 and and Saturday 2-5, D&R Greenway will have a native plant sale. Most of the plants are grown from seed collected from local natural populations of the species. For more information, including a plant list, go to www.drgreenway.org.

Among other sources of native plants, Bowman's Hill Wildflower Preserve (www.bhwp.org), just across the Delaware River, has a long-standing tradition, and Pinelands Nursery down in Columbus, NJ has both wholesale and retail components. Both of these have plants available throughout the season. Check the websites for details.

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Fringed Sedge

I'm not one to cultivate obscure tastes, but an interest in plants has led, after a few decades, to sedges, which most people have never heard of. A sedge can easily be dismissed as a green blob, vaguely grasslike--some sort of rank growth where the mowing crews haven't reached. But taking a closer look can be rewarding.

What sedge flowers lack in color they make up for in architecture. Sedges have edges, which is to say that if you follow a stem down to its base, you will find that it is triangular, in the same way a mint's stem is square, or a rush's stem is round.


Here's some of the architecture of one of my favorites, fringed sedge (Carex crinita), whose seeds are assembled in finger-like rows hanging gracefully from the tip of the stems. Like most sedges, this one likes wet ground, and if there's some sun, all the better. While having some grace and beauty, fringed sedge is also a very tough plant, and is often used to advantage in wetland restorations.

Saturday, May 08, 2010

Notes from Chestnut Talk at Mountain Lakes

Sandy Anaganostakis of the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station came to town with 20 American chestnut trees with bred resistance to the devastating disease, chestnut blight. The trees have since been planted by volunteers, led by Bill Sachs, in local parks and preserves. For those who missed the talk Sandy gave at Mountain Lakes House during her visit, here are some notes:

Sandy has been studying American chestnut blight since 1968--a passion that shows no sign of flagging. While devoting her life to bringing back the American chestnut as a timber tree, she loves all types of chestnuts--American, Japanese, Chinese, European, and the closely related chinquapins.

She began by taking us back 13,000 years, to the end of the last ice age, when the American chestnut was likely limited to a small area in what is now Tennessee. As the glaciers receded, the chestnut spread across the east.

American chestnut was the perfect timber tree. It grew straight and tall, and was highly resistant to rot. It was the main wood used for telephone poles and fencing in the east. Chestnut was the quickest to regrow after a virgin forest was cut down. Shading out other species, it became the dominant tree in second growth forests.

The first imported disease affecting American chestnuts was not chestnut blight but something called Ink disease, which hitchhiked over from Portugal on cork trees around 1824. It's a deadly disease, but can't survive the colder winters of the northern U.S.

Chestnut blight likely came to this continent around 1876, when Japanese chestnuts began being imported. It spread quickly through the eastern U.S. In Connecticut, Sandy's home state, it spread statewide in just four years, from 1908 to 1912. The blight essentially stripped American forests of the chestnut tree, but did not kill the roots. The species literally "went underground", sending up shoots that would grow for some years before being infected by the fungus. One can still find this sort of sprouting in the woods.

The disease later spread to Europe, arriving in Italy in 1938. In 1951, a European scientist discovered that some chestnuts in Italy were showing a different reaction to fungus, exhibiting swollen cankers. Trees with this sort of canker were able to grow despite the presence of the blight.

When Sandy heard about this less virulent strain in 1973, she contacted the scientist and helped identify the virus that was causing the reduced virulence. This was a particularly important discovery because the virus can be applied to American chestnuts to reduce the impact of the blight fungus.

Sandy's approach to reintroducing the American chestnut is not to plant whole forests with resistant varieties, but instead to preserve the genetic diversity by planting a few specimens with bred resistance into an area where there are remnant populations of the pure native species. By treating the non-resistant pure natives with the virus that reduces the disease's virulence, a mix of bred and pure species can survive and cross-pollinate.

I asked about the potential for identifying the gene in asian chestnut species that makes them resistant to the fungus, and then inserting that gene into American chestnuts. She said researchers have found three genes associated with resistance, which makes genetic modification more difficult. It's her experience that the traditional method of breeding resistance is actually faster than doing genetic modification in the lab, and will yield better results. The added benefit is that she gets to work outside, rather than in a lab.

As if the introduced diseases were not enough of a handicap on the American chestnut, someone smuggled plant material into the U.S. in 1974 that included an exotic insect called the chestnut gall wasp. The wasp spread through Georgia, got accidentally transported to Cleveland, Ohio, and is now heading towards the northeast from those two directions. Though there are parasites that prey on the wasp, Sandy is worried about its potential impact on efforts to restore the American chestnut to the eastern forest.

The fungus that causes chestnut blight infects oaks and eucalyptus as well.

Bill Sachs tells me the chestnuts we can buy for eating come mostly from Italy. The American chestnut is smaller but sweeter. Sandy mentioned the "Sleeping Giant" variety that makes particularly good nuts for eating, and is partly American.

Wednesday, May 05, 2010

Stony Brook Garden Club Chestnut Project

Here's another project in Princeton to bring back the American Chestnut. Thanks to Debra Costa for the information.

From Debra:
"I am heading our Stony Brook Garden Club project in our effort to help with restoring the American chestnut tree. All GCA clubs have an initiative to do some kind of civic tree project as a celebration of the 100th anniversary of the Garden Club of America - for 2013. We planted about 50 seeds on Sunday in Greenway Meadows Park.

The seeds were provided by Sara Fitzsimmons from Penn State University. She is involved in their research project of backcrossing toward the goal of a disease resistant tree. They are in their 6th generation of backcrossing. She heads and visits volunteer orchards connected with the project at Penn State.

At Sara's recommendation, we planted pure American seeds (not blight resistant) because of the need to maintain/provide a biodiverse germ pool of seeds for their back-crossing project. In time, with success of this "orchard" we can transition to blight resistant trees as they become more available."



Monday, May 03, 2010

American Chestnut Talk this Thursday, 7pm

A reminder about the talk this coming Thursday, hosted by Friends of Princeton Open Space at Mountain Lakes House, about efforts to bring back the great American Chestnut tree. The talk is free, and refreshments will be served beginning at 6:30.

Below is some detailed background information, provided by Bill Sachs, who lives in Princeton and edits the Northern Nutgrowers Association newsletter.

Abstract. Native chestnut trees have suffered from two
disastrous imported diseases and are now threatened by an
imported insect pest. The Agricultural Experiment Station in
Connecticut has been working on these problems since they were
first discovered, using biological control measures and breeding
trees for resistance. Breeding and selection of resistant timber
trees is a long process, but significant progress has been made.
Hybrid trees are being planted in the forests of Connecticut, with
biocontrol used to keep native trees alive. The next generation of
trees will have all the local adaptability of the native population
with resistance genes from our timber hybrids.

Sandra Anaganostakis is an Agricultural Scientist in the
Department of Plant Pathology and Ecology at The Connecticut
Agricultural Experiment Station in New Haven, Connecticut.
She received her Bachelor’s degree in 1961 from the University
of California at Riverside, and her Master’s degree in botany
from the University of Texas at Austin. She joined the staff of The Connecticut Agricultural
Experiment Station in the Department of Genetics in 1966, and later completed her Doctor of
Agronomy degree at Justus-Liebig University in Giessen, West Germany in 1985.
Sandra has worked on the genetics of various fungi, including those that cause corn smut
disease and Dutch elm disease. She has been working on chestnut blight disease (caused by
Cryphonectria parasitica) since 1968. After completing basic studies with the fungus she
imported Hypovirulent (virus containing) strains from France (1972) and demonstrated that they could be used in the United States for biological control of the disease. She has worked on the ecology of the blight fungus and its control by hypovirulence, and studies of virulence in the
fungus and resistance in the trees. She continues the Experiment Station project on chestnut tree breeding to produce better timber and orchard trees, and is the International Registrar for cultivars of Castanea for the International Society of Horticultural Science. Her current research has expanded to include canker diseases of butternut trees in Connecticut.

Directions. The Mountain Lakes House is located in the Mountain Lakes Nature Preserve at the
end of a half-mile driveway at 57 Mountain Avenue in Princeton Township. For detailed travel
directions, please consult http://www.mountainlakeshouse.org.

Friday, April 30, 2010

The Welcoming Tree

Kid's are naturally drawn to trees, but most adults worry when a kid actually climbs one. There's a danger of slipping, losing grip, falling. Maybe the wear and tear on the bark will hurt the tree. And besides, trees look neater if they're trimmed up. So even trees that once were climbable end up responding to a child's yearning with a haughty stare.

One day a few weeks ago, we happened upon an exception, at Princeton University housing off of 206, and my daughter instantly responded to the call of all those wonderful low, welcoming limbs.

This white pine is like no other I've ever seen, dwarfing the two story house behind it, too big to squeeze into a photo from 100 paces.

Its nine trunks rise in parallel, each one big enough to be an impressive tree in its own right. This tree is not so much climbed as entered--so as to find oneself surrounded by a forest of one tree's making.

I wondered at how it possibly could have taken its shape. The main stem has long since been cut, leaving what looks like the turret of a castle. Perhaps I give too much credit to think that there was someone--fifty, seventy five years ago--with the vision to let the low lateral branches curve upwards to make a forest of a tree. There was genius here, in this courtyard, whether of intent or serendipity.

Arbor Day is being celebrated today. I suspect it dates back to a time when farm fields dominated the landscape and trees were scarce. Now trees are numerous, but I wonder if kids will grow up to be advocates for trees if they can only experience them from a safe distance. There's lots of talk of planting trees, but who is growing and tending the welcoming trees of tomorrow?

Monday, April 26, 2010

Earthday Weekend Volunteers at Little Brook Garden

Cool, wet weather did not deter hardy Little Brook volunteers from their appointed grounds yesterday, as the courtyard garden got a working over. Here was one of the photo ops, as the pond lining got pulled out and cleaned.

The fearless leader of Little Brook gardening this year is Alexandra Bar-Cohen, on the left in the green t-shirt.

Surrounding the pond is a circle of Jerusalem artichokes, which is a deceptive common name for the native sunflower Helianthus tuberosa. The 8 foot high plants produce dazzling flowers and abundant tubers that can be peeled and eaten raw, made into french fries, or maybe even used as a water chestnut substitute in Chinese cooking (haven't tried that yet). The plants actually benefit from harvesting, which prevents overcrowding of the next year's growth.

Meanwhile, out along the nature trail, Little Brook science teacher Martha Kirby and I planted some native wildflowers donated by the Friends of Princeton Open Space. One of the many trees that fell in the winter storm conveniently opened up a wet sunny area where we planted tall meadow rue, wild senna, fringed sedge and a native clematis called Virgin's Bower. The blue tags are a convenient way to mark and label the new plants.

Most of these plants were grown from seed collected along the canal--the goal being to expand the local range of native wildflowers that were previously limited to one or two locations in Princeton.

Back in the courtyard, my daughter Anna demonstrated the proper straw-dropping technique. In order to make a better border around the "RazzleDazzle" raspberry patch for the mowing crews to cut around, we layed down cardboard to suppress the grass, then covered it up with straw. It's a great way to slowly shrink your lawn.

In the background, the Community Park Elementary science teacher John Emmons tended to an herb garden.

I was impressed by this new "garden pal" compost bin, made of pallets, including some fine hinge work for the front door.

Update: According to Diane Landis of Sustainable Princeton:
"The compost bin is the first of many the Sustainable Princeton residents working group hope to build at schools and for residents. The pallets were leftover from the school construction and were donated to the SP working group by Valley Road School. The hinges etc...cost around $10 and an instruction booklet was created to show how to build the pallets. The project aptly named Build a Bin will go to Johnson Park Elementary School next!"

Friday, April 23, 2010

Bee Flies

It looked a bit like a bee, a bit like a fly, hovering over spring flowers while it sipped nectar with its long proboscis. I gave google a list of features--fly hovering long proboscis--searched through the answers offered, and decided I had seen a "bee fly," specifically Bombylius major.

The bee fly was hard to photograph, but can be seen somewhat blurrily hovering over a spring beauty flower in this photo.

From Wikipedia: "The large bee fly, Bombylius major, is a bee mimic. The eggs are flicked by the adult female toward the entrance of the underground nests of solitary bees and wasps. After hatching, the larvae find their way into the nests to feed on the grubs."

The photo is borrowed from a website that provides thousands of images to help identify various critters: http://www.cirrusimage.com

Monday, April 19, 2010

Sustainable Jazz Trio at Whole Earth Center Saturday

Come hear the Sustainable Jazz Ensemble perform this Saturday, April 24, at the Whole Earth Center, which is celebrating its birthday down Nassau Street from Communiversity. We'll be playing music I composed since moving to Princeton seven years ago, with titles like Greening the Blues, Fresh Paint (composed while breathing latex fumes in a freshly painted room), and Cheery in Theory (which would make a good title for a book on overly aggressive ornamental plants that look great in the garden until they start taking over).

Phil Orr's on piano, Jerry D'Anna's on bass, and I'll be playing saxophone. From 2:30 to 3pm, we'll be joined by teenage congueros Ian Mertz and Nick Cosaboom, and my daughter Anna on clarinet, for some latin numbers. After that, from 3-5, the trio will play on its own.

The Bent Spoon will be serving samples of its ice cream through the afternoon.
The Whole Earth Center is at 360 Nassau St. in Princeton. I've posted the full schedule for the three day festival, which begins this Thursday at 11am and is being called WECstock, at www.princetonprimer.org.

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Climate Change Takes The Stage At McCarter Theatre

Having called the McCarter Theatre a few weeks ago to tell them about this wonderful idea I had for a play on climate change (they were kind, but not given to diving into collaborations with local dreamers), I was surprised and gratified to later discover that a play on climate change has been in the works since last fall and will be performed free of charge this coming Saturday, April 17, at 2pm and 7:30, at McCarter's Berlind Theatre. A more pressing, and generally deprioritized, issue is hard to imagine. I saw a preview performance at D&R Greenway last week, and was impressed with the acting and songwriting.

The play is being sponsored by the Princeton Environmental Institute and the Lewis Center for the Arts. Though free, reservations are required, at 258-2787. More info can be found at this link.

Monday, April 12, 2010

The American Chestnut Returns To Princeton


There's an extraordinary story to tell about the American chestnut. Most of us have never seen one, but they were once a dominant tree in the eastern forest.

Next month, Friends of Princeton Open Space will host a talk on the return of the great American Chestnut to the landscape.
Sandra Anagnostakis, of the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station, will describe her decades-long work to bring the native chestnut back from near extinction. The talk will be at Mountain Lakes House on Thursday, May 6, at 7pm.

Through a collaborative effort with Bill Sachs, local expert on nut-bearing trees who is spearheading a number of local projects, Sandra will also be bringing twenty native American Chestnut seedlings for planting in local parks and preserves. Once a main constituent of the eastern forest, the American chestnut was nearly wiped out by chestnut blight fungus, which was introduced into the U.S. in the early 1900s via either lumber or chestnut trees imported from Asia.

To give a sense of what was lost, here's a passage from Wikipedia: "Mature trees often grew straight and branch-free for 50 feet (sometimes up to one hundred feet), could grow to be 200 feet tall with a trunk diameter of 14 feet at a few feet above ground level. For three centuries most barns and homes east of the Mississippi were made from American Chestnut."

The exotic fungus, which kills the above-ground portion of the tree but not the root, caused this most important of eastern American trees to literally "go underground." Surviving roots still send up sprouts, which survive until they reach nut-bearing age, at which point the fungus again intervenes. Though the chestnut was nearly wiped out by 1950, the rot-resistant, fallen trunks of the trees were still a common site when I was working in the Massachusetts woods in the mid-70s.

The trees Sandra will be bringing are 15/16th American, 1/16th Japanese.
Her experimental work to restore the American chestnut to the Connecticut landscape uses a combination of disease-resistant hybrid seedlings and inoculation of existing native sprouts with the virus that transforms the blight pathogen to a less virulent form.

One blight-resistant American chestnut, developed by another breeder, was planted some years ago at D&R Greenway by local arborist Bob Wells.

It's worth noting that the devastation caused by the unregulated international trade in plants and lumber, of which chestnuts and elms are two particularly dramatic examples, continues unabated. In Princeton, we will over the next decade likely witness a dieoff approaching the scale of the chestnut and elm dieoffs of the 20th century, as the emerald ash borer, which hitch-hiked to Michigan from Asia in wooden packing crates, continues its spread eastward.
There will, in other words, be a lot of gaps in the canopy for the chestnut to claim, if its return is successful.


Wednesday, April 07, 2010

A Thread, a Path, and a Winding Road

Over spring break, we drove to Durham, NC to drop off a car and see friends. On the way, we traveled through the Shenandoah Valley, to which I was lured by the melody and lyrics of a song. There, I hoped to look out across the valley, to give the kids the experience of climbing a mountain of whatever size, to hike to a waterfall and visit one of the caverns.

We arrived at the north end of the national park's Skyline Drive with only two hours of daylight left, and rain predicted for the following day. My teenager, in particular, couldn't have been less interested in a scenic drive along the mountain ridge. As we approached the mountains, the only tenuous thread of interest buried in her impressive stream of protest was a lone tree she had noticed from afar, a tiny speck of distinction standing out on an otherwise evenly wooded mountainside. We headed up the winding road, stopped at the first overlook, and much to our surprise found ourselves looking at the tree, rising from a field of blooming spicebush. We drank in the view, quenching our souls with the valley's immensity. At least, that's how I experienced it. But I did notice a spark of interest beginning to kindle in the next generation.
With the sun angling downward, we stopped at Compton Gap to climb a section of the Appalachian Trail to the top of a small mountain. There is nothing like a rockstrewn hillside to turn two unenthused daughters into eager explorers. They beat me to the top, stalked a strange bird--most likely a ruffed grouse--and led me far enough off trail to hear the croak of a raven rising from a chasm.

Farther down the road, we stopped again to see the valley in moonlight, and heard the "peent!" of woodcocks resting between mating flights. Though the interpretive signage told of the forest mending from a previous era when settlers cleared farm fields on the hillsides, the woodcocks wouldn't have a stage for their aerial acrobatics if not for the clearings now kept open for the roadside views.

The next day, the Skyline was socked in with fog. We toured Luray Caverns, headed south to Monticello, then on to our destination. The waterfalls will have to wait. "Oh Shenandoah" means many things to many people. For me, it's two daughters following a path together, and a healing view into infinity.

Friday, April 02, 2010

A Talk and a Nature Walk at FOPOS's Upcoming Annual Meeting

Come to beautiful Mountain Lakes in Princeton on April 18 to learn about preservation efforts in the pinelands at the annual meeting of the Friends of Princeton Open Space (FOPOS). After an update on FOPOS's accomplishments in Princeton over the past year, the executive director of the Pinelands Preservation Alliance, Carleton Montgomery, will give a talk entitled Saving theNew Jersey Pinelands: Success Against All Odds, or the Road to Ruin that's Paved with Good Intentions?"

Following the talk, refreshments will be served, and I will lead a nature walk around Mountain Lakes. Sure to come up are changes wrought by the recent windstorm, and all the work soon to begin to restore the dams and dredge the lakes.

The event begins at 3pm. It's free, but please RSVP by April 13--phone 609-921-2772.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

The Pinelands Preservation Alliance is a private, non-profit organization dedicated to saving New Jersey’s Pine Barrens, a 1.1 million-acre treasure in the midst of the nation’s most densely populated state and the largest surviving open space on the Eastern Seaboard between Maine and Florida.

Mountain Lakes House is located at 57 Mountain Ave., Princeton.


Carleton Montgomery has been executive director of the Pinelands Preservation Alliance since 1998. An attorney by training, he practiced law at Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson in its Washington, D.C. office for nearly 12 years, the last four years as a partner in the firm’s litigation practice. Since joining the Alliance, Carleton has worked with his colleagues to strengthen both its advocacy and its education initiatives, with the goal of ensuring the New Jersey Pine Barrens ecosystem will survive, and its regional conservation and sustainable development will succeed, in the nation’s most crowded state. Carleton has a B.A. from Harvard University and an M. Phil. from University College London, both in philosophy, and a J.D. from Harvard Law School.


About Friends of Princeton Open Space

Founded in 1969 to preserve open space in the face of rapid development, Friends of Princeton Open Space (FOPOS) is a non-profit organization that has helped to establish over 1,000 acres of parkland and a network of interconnecting trails that nearly circles Princeton. Through the contributions of hundreds of people in the community, FOPOS has helped to raise $3.6 million for the purchase and acquisition of easements on properties that might have been bulldozed for development. Mountain Lakes, Coventry Farm, the Institute for Advanced Studies Lands, the Woodfield Reservation, and Tusculum are among the properties in Princeton preserved with the assistance of FOPOS. For additional information see: www.fopos.org.


Friday, March 26, 2010

The Lasting Legacy of School Gardens

In school gardens, there is destiny. Peter McCrohan, whose family goes back many generations in Princeton, told me an interesting story yesterday. Not long ago, he went to his 40th class reunion at Princeton High School, and was surprised by how many of his classmates had gone into agriculture and other plant-related pursuits. Turned out they were able to track their interest in plants back to Miss Compton, who taught 1st through 5th grades at Nassau Elementary. Where now there is a university parking lot, there once was a schoolyard that included garden plots in which the kids grew radishes, peanuts and many other vegetables.

My lifelong interest in plants owes much to a 3 X 8 foot garden plot I planted in our backyard while in high school. The plot was divided up into squares into which I planted seeds of radishes, carrots, peas, cucumbers... Since I had never seen any of these plants growing before, each new leaf was a revelation. That garden's long gone, but its legacy remains.

The raised beds in the photo were built and installed at Princeton High School last November as part of a project initiated by PHS teacher Matt Wilkinson (center), with a great deal of help from Karla Cook and many, many other volunteers.

Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Westerly Church Group Restoring Habitat

Thanks to Rob Olszewski (right) of Westerly Road Church and a hardy group of teens who came to Mountain Lakes to help remove invasive species from the preserve on March 21. Andrew Thornton (on the left) helped me supervise.

As we worked, using loppers to cut exotic honeysuckle shrubs and multiflora rose growing beneath a grove of walnut trees, some of the kids mistook the word "lopper" for "Whopper". Turned out they were all in the midst of a 30 hour fast, in order to better understand the plight of the more than 1 billion people worldwide who don't have enough to eat. The weekend event was part of a national effort by World Vision to raise awareness and funds to reduce world hunger.

After a couple hours of productive work, we hiked over to Mountain Lakes House, to see the lakes, the native plants that have overwintered in the greenhouse, and a new trail built around the many trees felled by the recent windstorm. The kids showed a great work ethic and interest in the restoration efforts at the preserve.

Monday, March 22, 2010

Restoring a Woods at Little Brook Elementary

Someone forgot to take photos of a March 18 workday after school at Little Brook Elementary, during which Martha Kirby, the school's science teacher, parents and kids began restoring habitat along the nature trail. The only visual that made it into my camera is of this "live stake" of elderberry planted next to Little Brook's little brook.

The school's woodlot is a spectacular mess after the storm. One parent cleared trails with a chain saw while the rest of us cut back invasive multiflora rose and honeysuckle. As is common in Princeton's woodlots, most of the trees are (or were, given the storm's devastation) native, but the shrub and herbaceous layers are nearly all exotic. Only a few native spicebush can be found, along with some black raspberries, and the one native elderberry bush, from which we cut two-foot long stems that will sprout roots and leaves if pushed deep into wet ground.

Two hours later, the trails were mostly cleared and the balance of vegetation was shifted a few degrees in the native direction.

Monday, March 15, 2010

Pines Fall By the Hundreds at Mountain Lakes

The March 13 wind storm packed a one-two punch. Heavy rain softened the ground, then gusty winds swept through, creating a scene more like the aftermath of dozens of miniature tornadoes. Two pine tree plantations, one on county property near the Mountain Lakes House, the other at Community Park North, underwent a radical thinning, as trees fell like dominoes.

I counted roughly 100 trees down in this one patch alone near Mountain Lakes House. One activity I hope to do with my daughter is walk the length of one of these fallen pines, counting the whorls of branches. Each whorl equals one year. A rough count came to fifty years, which would put their planting around 1960.



The narrow grove of pines was particularly vulnerable, poised at the edge of this Tusculum meadow. The wind swept across this field and hit the trees with full force.

The damage is not all negative. Some fallen black locusts may prove useful for bridge building, since their wood is so rot resistant. The pine forest, though pleasing to walk through, was in many ways a sterile, artificial woods--trees planted in rows with nothing growing beneath them other than exotic garlic mustard and thousands of ash seedlings.

All the new openings in the woods throughout Princeton will power new growth at ground level, hopefully of native species that previously had few sunny places to grow.

A Landmark Tree is Gone

High schoolers on lunch break will have to seek elsewhere for shade. The grounds of the Princeton High School lost a venerable landmark recently (my teenage daughter thinks it was cut down before the windstorm hit two days ago).

The rings were surprisingly easy to count--75. That puts its planting date around 1935, during the Great Depression, a time when much of Princeton was open farmland.

Across Moore Street, a similarly sized tree was pushed over by the wind, leaving a four foot deep hole where the roots had been. The house looked in pretty good shape, all things considered, but I imagine the roof of an SUV is harder to touch up with a few new shingles.

Another house, on Murray Ave, also sustained a direct hit from a very big tree, but apparently suffered even less damage. The multiple trunks must have spread out the impact, and landed on the house in such a way that not even a window was broken.

More often, the story was of near misses. This spruce, guided on a precision route by happenstance, only grazed the gutter of the house, and fell through the fence in such a way that only the gate needs to be replaced.

Monday, March 08, 2010

Pedestrian Bridge Installed Over Stony Brook

The missing link is missing no longer. A pedestrian bridge was recently installed across the Stony Brook near 206, just behind the Hun School, filling in a key gap in a trail planned to eventually completely encircle Princeton.

Having attended some of the Friends of Princeton Open Space meetings where Helmut Schwab and others gave updates on their efforts to realize a circum-Princeton trail, I can attest to the extraordinary passion and persistence needed to make such dreams a reality.

Helmut's history of the effort, copied below, provides insight into the quiet heroics of community volunteers, without which most of Princeton's greenspace and trails would not exist. Funding for the bridge was primarily through a $500,000 grant from the Army Corps of Engineers.

(Photo and text from Helmut:) Late in 1993, when I was an active member of the Friends of Princeton Open Space, our work on preserving the Institute Lands appeared successful. We now had a string of wonderful open spaces in our community – Mountain Lakes, Community Park North, the Petoranello Gardens, the not-yet protected Coventry Farm, the later Greenway Meadows Park, some land along the Stony Brook – but nobody knew quite where – the soon expected Institute Lands, and the very long Tow Path leading around the south of our communities. All were disconnected from each other.

Furthermore, the State of New Jersey actively supported “transportation enhancements” away from road traffic. A new Loop Trail around Princeton with a bridge connection would allow for bicycle and pedestrian greenway access of downtown facilities – Township Hall, Community Park North sports fields, and several schools – to the inhabitants of the Western sections of town.

Other communities in the country pursued the idea of greenways – possibly along old railway tracks. We realized that we had a short abandoned piece of the former trolley tracks leading past Elm Court to a former Stony Brook bridge.

We therefore formed a Princeton Greenways Committee with the members: Ronald Berlin, Karen Cotton, Elizabeth Hutter, Helmut Schwab (chair), Edward Thomas, Robert von Zumbusch. After Helmut Schwab retired from the FOPOS Board, Ted Thomas assumed the active management of all trail activities, including lots of trail improvements.

Each committee member assumed the responsibility to explore one sector of the Princetons for the possibility to establish greenway connections – walking or biking trails remote from traffic and along vegetative corridors.

Our work culminated in our FOPOS committee report of April, 1995: "Linking Princeton Open Spaces". A trail map for Princeton was drawn, accepted in the Master Plan, and still valid – including new trail additions.

Ron Berlin had been responsible for scouting out detail opportunities in the south-west sector, which he summarized on page 37 of that report. This includes the words "The Loop Greenway follows the course of Stony Brook until crossing to the west bank of the brook over a future foot bridge, (where) it reaches the Jasna Polana property".

This led to the production of the brochure "The Missing Link" in 1997 and a massive fund-raising effort in the late 90ies, mainly seeking grants with the help of political support (see the brochure "Transportation Enhancements" done by DOT under Governor Whitman).

At one point, Prof. Billington of PU had his students produce three model designs for the needed bridge to close the Missing Link!

We produced a wonderful video demonstrating the need to resolve the Missing Link!! (Wendy Mager was the speaker). Some copies of that video are still around.

In 2001, Bob Kiser's Township Engineering Department produced the excellent brochure "Stony Brook Bridge".

As the grant money came in, the detail feasibility and environmental studies began.

This led to the need for "handicapped access" -- which required switch-backs in the otherwise steep trail approach to the bridge. It took another couple of year to acquire the Clemow property to provide room for the needed trail switch-backs.

The environmental studies were done by late 2009. By that time, all the delays and inflation let the grant funds appear inadequate. But then the financial downturn set in. To our surprise, our now issued request for quotes by bridge construction companies brought surprisingly lower prices, within our means!

Bridge construction could now start swiftly in early 2010!

Helmut Schwab

Sunday, March 07, 2010

Woodcock Camouflage

I was startled by a woodcock a few days ago, when it flew up just a few feet away from me. It flew only twenty feet, though, before disappearing into the leafy background of the forest floor. I stopped what I was doing and stalked the bird, my point-and-shoot camera ready but hardly up to the task of capturing my prey.

The scarcity of birds on this website has a lot to do with their being equipped with wings and legs. The best that can be said about my aging Canon Powershot is that it represents nature as it's experienced in the field.

So it's time to test your visual acuity in a game of Find the Woodcock in the Leaves.

There was a nice piece on NPR three years ago about the woodcock's mating flight, which can be witnessed in fields around Princeton at dusk this time of year. The meadows at Tusculum, which adjoins Mountain Lakes, might be a good bet.

Mending Optimism, Mending Nature

It's a time of sleeping promise at Mountain Lakes Preserve. I'm not up on plant medicines, but if one's optimism is being beaten down by the world, flower buds on a spicebush can be a salve. Those buds tell of flowers to come, and also lipid-rich berries that will help birds get where they need to go this coming fall.

The abundance of buds on this stem owes to the direct sunlight this particular shrub gets during the summer, next to a sewer right of way that's kept clear of trees. The productivity of a nature preserve must be judged not only by its trees, but also by whether enough sunlight is getting through to sustain healthy shrub and herbaceous layers closer to the ground.

One participant in our nature walk last week pointed out that spicebush can be identified in winter by using a scratch and sniff test. Scratch the stem and smell the spicy aroma.
The many spicebushes in the preserve serve as historians, always ready to tell their story to anyone with the relevant reading skills. Each of the two shrubs in the photo have a single large stem surrounded by many smaller ones. The large stems predate the explosion in the deer population that peaked about ten years ago.

During those years when deer numbers were very high, the deer were so desperate for food that they would eat new spicebush sprouts to the ground each winter. Only the old stems, tall enough to be out of reach, allowed the spicebush to survive. Since the township began bringing deer numbers back into ecological balance, new sprouts have been able to grow to maturity, producing berries needed by wildlife.

Once new stems grow tall, a shrub will often allow its old stem to die, its function as a lifeline through hard times done. Counting the growth rings of one of the younger stems would likely reveal when browsing pressure began to drop.

During yesterday's walk, we stopped to help out one of the few native hazelnuts in the preserve. Andrew (left) is cutting exotic Photinia shrubs while Annarie and Clark cut Japanese honeysuckle and Asian bittersweet vines off the hazelnut. We left one vine growing--a native grape that bears large, delicious grapes in the fall.

Though some might be skeptical, it is enormously satisfying to do invasive plant control in the winter, while nature is asleep. We function in the woods much like dreams do in the sleeping mind, relieving stress so that when nature awakes in the spring it finds itself mended.

I used to follow the rule that one should bend down and cut stems of invasive shrubs to the ground, but as I get older, that rule becomes a very attractive one to break. The freshly cut stems are treated with a dab of glyphosate to prevent regrowth.

Foundation plantings in town may feature crocuses just starting to bloom, but out in low-lying woods, it's skunk cabbage that has sent up its hooded flower.

Thursday, March 04, 2010

Variations on an Icicle, in 3 Parts

It's not every day that stalactites grow in a town park. If any toddlers toddled in to the deep snow in Potts Park recently, they might have taken a liking to these mass-produced icicles underneath a picnic table.

My summer fountain, which runs whenever there's a rain, turned into a frozen waterfall as snow slowly melted from the roof.

The third variation is the standard version of an icicle, whose reflection is visible on the window in the upper right corner of the photo.

Patterns In Carnegie Lake Ice

Walking over the Harrison Street bridge one day in late January, before the big snows, I happened to look down and noticed that Carnegie Lake had become one giant horizontal, black and white stained glass window.

I hadn't kept track of the weather, so can't begin to speculate on what forces might have formed such elaborate patterns.



This closeup gives the best comparison to stained glass patterns, including a shape that could be taken for a flower in the upper left.

White Pines Get a Natural Pruning

The weight of recent snows took a heavy toll on the branches of white pines, which could be seen scattered on the ground all over town. Though some pines that grow further south, such as loblolly and shortleaf pines, are self-pruning, white pines only get pruned by people or ice and snow.

The scars of ice and snowstorms present and past can be found by looking up the trunk.

Looks like some kids decided the fallen branches would make a neat little shelter at Quarry Park in the borough, though closer inspection suggests that not all the branches fell naturally. It's nice that some stubs were left--useful for (resiny) climbing.

White pines can be identified by their clusters of five needles (other common species have two or three per cluster), and also the way their branches come out in whorls along the trunk. One whorl is produced each year. Count the whorls and you have the age of the tree.

Mona Lisa and the Pixelation of Nature

Back in my twenties, when my argument with the world was about the very foundations of our culture, I often thought of nature as a work of art (the Mona Lisa always came to mind) that was being defaced by freeways and other human impositions on the landscape.

It was surprising to hear people speak of nature as chaotic. They saw plants springing up helter skelter in the woods, while I saw a sophisticated order, with each species adapted to a particular niche. Red maples, for instance, weren't just growing anywhere in the woods. They were typically in low wet areas, turning floodplains into a haze of red in the early spring, while sugar maples thrived on higher ground. Soil, sunlight, water, slope--all helped determine what would be found growing where. The order and synchrony were there to be found by anyone with the patience to learn and observe.

I recently found this sequence of photos in the hallway at the Princeton University's Friends Center. Listed in the credits are J. Alex Halderman and others at the Center for Information Technology Policy.

Though the purpose of the sequence is to show how computer data lingers for seconds or minutes after a computer is turned off--something called "memory remanence"--it accurately portrays the status of landscapes as their natural order and ecological balance is slowly undermined by development, invasive species introduction, heavy deer browsing pressure and any number of other impacts. Habitat restoration is in some ways like art restoration, removing the accumulated glaze of exotic species so that the hidden remnants of a pre-existing balance can rebound.

With time, some of the original colors will come back into view. At Mountain Lakes, this will be seen early this spring as spicebush gives a soft yellow hue to areas where it was formerly being eaten to the ground or shaded out by exotic shrubs.

There is, too, an analogy with digital photography. The sparse understory of most any woods appears pixelated these days to anyone with a memory of the rich, diverse array of wildflowers that once carpeted the ground. Though the woods still appears green, the patterns of a healthy order have sometimes faded beyond recognition.