Newsletters

May 2013 - Brayton Point, Brook Trout, Shagbark Hickory

 WELCOME TO GREEN FUTURES !

MAY, 2013

 

“Rivers and the inhabitants of the watery elements are made for wise men to contemplate and for fools to pass by without consideration.” 

- Izaak Walton

 

“In this world a man must either be anvil or hammer.”

- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

 

 

BRAYTON POINT POWER – Going, Going, Gon………? 

The Coalition for Clean Air South Coast held a community forum, this past Thursday, on the future of the largest and dirtiest coal-fired power plant in New England. 

With the continuing demise of coal-fired power across the country, Brayton Point’s days appear numbered. 

What can Somerset residents do now to ensure that their town will remain economically viable and have a bright and healthy future?

We were pleased to see so many concerned Somerset residents …along with some folks from neighboring communities …at this recent forum. Most appeared eager to get involved in planning for a greener future for their town.

For more info and/or to get involved email savesomerset@gmail.com

 

Concerned Somerset residents listen to Conservation Law Foundation Attorney Shanna Cleveland talk about trends in the electrical generating business.

 

The Somerset meeting hall was packed for the Coalition for Clean Air South Coast Forum on the future of Brayton Point Power and Somerset.

 

BIORESERVE FAUNA OF THE MONTH – BROOK TROUT (Salvelinus fontinalis)

 Photo credit: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

 

The brook trout is one beautiful fish found in beautiful places. Brook trout have a long, narrow body with a white or silvery colored belly and a green vermiculation patterns on the back. Along their sides are red spots. Some of these red spots are superimposed over light blue spots. Their dorsal and anal fins do not contain spines and their pelvic fins are white along the leading edge. The tail or caudal fin is broad making the brook trout a powerful swimmer. Patterns are accentuated and colors intensify during the fall spawning season.

Brook trout are classified as char and are in the Salmonidea family. Char, trout and salmon all have a fleshy adipose fin just to the rear of their dorsal fin. Char, trout and salmon are very similar, but char have vomerine teeth (teeth on the roof of the mouth) only in the front. Char also have smaller, finer scales than trout and salmon.

The brook trout is found in cold, clear well-oxygenated brooks, streams and rivers. They do best in water temperatures from 40 to 55 degrees F. They do not survive for very long in water temperatures above 70 degrees. Book trout have been widely stocked in cold, deep-water ponds and lakes.

Brook trout found in coastal streams will travel up and down the stream depending on the season and out into the stream’s saltwater estuary and occasionally even out into the ocean. Such brook trout are called “salters.”

Locally, salter brook trout can still be found in a limited number of streams in the Buzzards Bay watershed. The best known of these are the salters that reside in Red Brook at The Trustees of Reservations’ Lyman Reserve in Wareham, Massachusetts.

There are remnant brook trout populations in the tiny upper reaches of some of the tributaries that enter the Taunton River. Past water quality issues and rampant development have apparently eliminated salters from the lower estuarine section of the Taunton. 

At one time, salters were found in Rattlesnake Brook in the Southeastern Massachusetts Bioreserve (SMB). Although the anadromous salters have been eliminated, there are still brook trout in the SMB’s Rattlesnake Brook. These hatchery raised brook trout are stocked annually by the Division of Fisheries and Wildlife. 

Planned removal of an old dam at tidewater and restoration of Rattlesnake Brook will, hopefully, return a viable population of wild salter brook trout to the SMB and the Taunton River.

Brook trout are major predators in their brook environment. For most of the day they stay hidden in deeper pools, under downed trees and brush piles and in holes along undercut banks. Under cover of shadows, during early morning and evening, brook trout position themselves in shallower water at the head of pools or below riffles waiting for insects, crayfish and other aquatic creatures to drift within range. They are aggressive feeders and will consume whatever available prey they can fit in their mouths.

As summer transitions into autumn brook trout colors intensify in preparation for spawning. Spawning takes place in October and November.  Males develop a kype, a hook on their lower jaw, which they use in dominance displays during spawning activity. Spawning occurs over gravelly spring-fed areas. The female brook trout use their tails to brush aside gravel to create a spawning depression, called a redd, where they will lay their eggs. Males hover nearby ready to rush in and fertilize the eggs as they are laid. The female then uses her tail to brush gravel over her eggs. The eggs hatch after two to three months, depending on water temperature, and the fry wriggle up from their gravel bed to feed on stream plankton. Brook trout fry grow rapidly and reach maturity in two years. 

In the small streams where brook trout are found they usually do not have to worry about being gobbled-up larger fish since they are the largest predatory fish in such habitat and so are at the top of the piscivorous food chain. Many other animals, however, delight in a meal of fresh brook trout. A partial list of enthusiastic brook trout eaters includes river otters, minks, raccoons, kingfishers, herons, gulls, ospreys, water snakes, snapping turtles and humans.

 

BIORESERVE FLORA OF THE MONTH – Shagbark Hickory (Carya ovata)

You’ll know this tree when you see it. 

The shagbark hickory is an impressive forest tree. In the Southeastern Massachusetts Bioreserve (SMB) there are three small stands of shagbark hickory trees. One reason for the paucity of shagbarks in the SMB is due to the thin, sand/gravel soils that predominate in much of the forest. Shagbark hickory grows best in rich, well-drained forest soils under full sun. 

Another reason shargbarks are not more common in the SMB is because our SMB forest has been logged so many times, over the past three hundred years, that most of the shagbarks have been logged out.  Although shagbark will stump-sprout and root-sprout after being cut down, new shagbark sprouts grow very slowly and are usually end up being outcompeted by neighboring oaks and pines.

There is a huge demand for hickory lumber. The wood is dense, hard, tough and elastic. The elasticity makes hickory the ideal wood for tool handles, sporting and athletic equipment and hard-wood flooring.  President Andrew Jackson was nicknamed Old Hickory by the men under his command during the War of 1812 because they said Jackson was as strong, tough and unyielding as old hickory. 

Hickory wood also makes excellent charcoal and green or moist hickory wood chips are used to smoke meat and fish.

The shagbark hickory can reach 130 feet in height and 40 feet in circumference. The bark color is silvery-grey and is smooth on young trees. Shagbark hickories, upon reaching nut-bearing age, develop rough, shaggy bark that hangs in long strips …appears to be peeling off the tree …from the trunk and larger branches. Many biologists believe this bark structure evolved to make it difficult for tree climbing forest critters to easily climb the trees and devour all the shagbark’s nuts.

Shagbark flowers are monoecious (male and female flowers on the same tree) borne in catkin form (drooping, cylindrical flower clusters) and appear in May after the leaves pop out. nuts are contained in an oval husk that, when ripe, splits into four sections and releases the nut.

Shagbark leaves are 1 to 2 feet long and pinnate (having leaflets, usually 5 to 7, on either side of the leaf stem) and light green in color. Fall shagbark leaves turn a bright yellow. 

The range of the shagbark hickory is from southern Maine west to southern Quebec, Ontario, Michigan and Wisconsin. From Wisconsin south to far eastern Texas and northwest Louisiana and from there across the northern counties of Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina and then north along the east slope of the Appalachians to New England.

The pecan, Carya illinoinensis, is also a hickory and closely related to our shagbarks. It is native to the forests in the Ohio and Mississippi River valleys and bears the tasty pecan nuts of commerce. Although shagbark nuts are smaller, their nut-meats are sweeter and more flavorful and make a superior “pecan” pie. 

The bark of the shagbark hickory can be used to make syrup that is good on pancakes, breakfast cereal, ice cream. It can be used in any way that one would use maple syrup. To make hickory syrup the bark is toasted, steeped in water to extract hickory flavor and sugar, or another sweetener, is added.

Few animals attack shagbark leaves, bark and wood. Many animals feed on the hickory’s nuts. In the SMB red squirrels, grey squirrels, flying squirrels, striped chipmunks, white-footed mice, red-backed voles, raccoons, wild turkeys, ruffed grouse, blue jays and many other forest mammals and birds eagerly search out and devour shagbark hickory nuts.

 

WE HAVE A WNNER – Finally!!!

There were not many entries in our Reading "Sign" (traces left of an animal’s presence) Contest. Actually, over the 3 months the contest ran, we only received one entry! Seems obvious to us that our readers aren't spending enough time out in their natural environment. Nature Deficit Disorder is apparently epidemic!

Congratulations to F. S. of Providence, Rhode Island.

Here's the email we received from our winner:

Dear Green Futures Sir/Madam,

That is the weirdest grossest contest I have ever seen. However I do enjoy your newsletter.

Please accept my contest entry.

F. S.

F. S., with 5 correct answers wins not only the last copy of "A River and Its City" ...but also a large bag of delicious Raisinets.

If you would like to see the contest photos and clues you can find them at the end of our March Newsletter here:http://www.greenfutures.org/?content=6dJmSI2fykkoMPCN

 

MAY – You don’t want to miss it!

Watch for woodland babies!

May and October in New England are magical months, sunny days and blue skies. Tree buds are popping open; spring ephemerals are blooming in sunny glades; thrushes, vireos, flycatchers, orioles and warblers are returning to their summer homes; mourning cloak and spring azure butterflies are flying along forest trails and woodland babies are poking their fuzzy heads out of hollow tree dens and hillside burrows. 

Take an impromptu hike in a local woodland or click on our Calendar for organized May activities and other things to do during this great time of the year.

 

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