Newsletters

January 2013-Logging in SMB, Chicken Mushroom, Mound Ant

WELCOME TO GREEN FUTURES !
JANUARY, 2013

“Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is a force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.”

-George Washington

“What good is the warmth of summer, without the cold winter to give it sweetness.”

-John Steinbeck

HAPPY HOLIDAYS FROM HESS –

No wreath this year, no lights, no flag. Even the artificial hydrangeas in the pot at the base of the flagpole are dead.

December 2010 - Hess/Weaver’s Cove LNG celebrates Christmas in Fall River by nailing a $50.00 wreath to their poorly designed and cheaply made sign. You’d think a company that has spent millions trying to force their ill-conceived, dangerous project on a community …that wants nothing to do with them …would have made a greater effort. This visual tells all one needs to know about Hess/Weaver’s Cove.

December 2011- Hess puts up “FOR SALE” banner after 9 year battle to site ill-conceived LNG terminal in an urban neighborhood. Guess they’re not celebrating Christmas this year.

December 2012 – Christmas at Weaver’s Cove. While taking the above photo we’re pretty sure we heard a “bah humbug” coming from the nearby Hess/Weaver’s Office.

BIORESERVE THREAT OF THE MONTH – Illegal ORV/ATVs destroy brook and valley.

RED ALERT– Your comments needed!

MA DCR’s Bureau of Forest Fire Control and Forestry (BFFC&F) endangers biodiversity and ignores the mission of the Southeastern Massachusetts Bioreserve (SMB).

The BFFC&F is proposing two commercial logging operations in the Freetown State Forest section of the Southeastern Massachusetts Bioreserve (SMB).

Green Futures IS NOT opposed to timber cutting in the SMB if the intent of the logging is to increase species diversity within the Bioreserve. For that to occur however, surveys must be done to determine which species will logging an intended area encourage and which species will it discourage or harm. Where are endangered, threatened and species of special concern living in the SMB and what can responsible logging due to encourage their survival?

From what we already know about the area and from what we have seen we vehemently oppose the commercial logging of what the BFFC&F is calling “Co-Peace Stand 1 (S1) Copicut and Haskell Path” until a complete inventory is done of the flora and fauna of that area and what species will logging encourage or discourage from living and breeding there. In addition, S1 is also within 100’ of Rattlesnake Brook, a perennial coldwater brook trout stream flowing through a beautiful wooded valley. The valley hillsides and brook have been severely damaged by illegal off-road vehicle vandalism. This area must be restored before any logging is allowed.

The BFFC&F will be taking public comments relative to this proposed commercial logging project, “S1, Copicut Road and Haskell Path.”

We are asking that you write a few short sentences on why logging the SMB is a bad idea unless surveys are first done to determine which species will benefit from the logging and which will not.

Also, most importantly, NO COMMERCIAL LOGGING ON S1, IN THE FREETOWN STATE FOREST SECTION OF THE SMB, until the egregious erosion problems are eliminated and the land and brook restored to their former pristine condition.

Egregious erosion of hillside and damage to brook where DCR wants to allow commercial logging of pine trees apparently to cover up damaged land.

DCR’s deadline for submission of comments is JANUARY 11, 2013. Please write your comments now, before you forget. Please also get your family and friends to submit comments.

Write your own comment or use some of what follows in your comment letters.

Here’s a 1 sentence “sample” comment from one of our members:

Dear Director of Forest Stewardship,

I oppose commercial logging anywhere in the Southeastern Massachusetts Bioreserve including the Freetown State Forest, until a comprehensive plan is in place that enhances, not detracts, from the mission of the Bioreserve and DCR repairs the damage that was allowed to occur on Stand 1 in the vicinity of Rattlesnake Brook.

Yours truly,

John Doe

Here’s a 4 paragraph “sample” comment from one of our members:

Dear Director of Forest Stewardship,

I oppose any commercial timber cutting in the Freetown State Forest section of the Southeastern Massachusetts Bioreserve until a complete survey is done of which species will benefit and which will be harmed by commercial logging in this bioreserve area.

As you know, the Southeastern Massachusetts Bioreserve is in a different category and is not your average forest or park. Biodiversity must come first. The Bioreserve’s mission statement demands it.

In addition to species inventory and benefits/detriments of logging in the Bioreserve, please specifically remove Stand 1 (S1) from consideration for logging until the severely eroded land in that area is repaired and Rattlesnake Brook is restored.

The Southeastern Massachusetts Bioreserve is a unique and special public open space parcel. It must be “managed” carefully for species diversity. Being a special place, it must be “managed” in a special way.

Sincerely,

John Doe, Jr.

TO SUBMIT COMMENTS: Email - Timber/Comments@State.ma.us

PHONE – 617-626-1461

Mail – MA Department of Conservation and Recreation

Director of Forest Stewardship

251 Causeway Street, Suite 600

Boston, MA 02114

BIORESERVE FLORA OF THE MONTH – Chicken Mushroom (Laetiporus sulphureus)

The Chicken mushroom, known by some as the sulphur shelf, is a brightly colored shelf or bracket fungus that grows from hardwood trees.

The yellow, orange, red and white overlapping shelves, usually protruding from a tree trunk or large branch, are also sometimes found on old tree stumps and occasionally seemingly growing from the ground, but actually growing from tree roots. These spore producing shelves are the fruiting body of the chicken mushroom fungus whose vegetative parts, mycelium, are deep within the tree slowly devouring its host’s heartwood.

The shelves start as fleshy buttons growing out from the bark or wood of the infected tree. When fruiting from buried tree roots these shelves often take the shape of a rosette. In these shelves form the reproductive spores that drop from pores that cover the sulphur yellow to white undersurface of the mushroom. As they fall, the tiny, light-weight spores are dispersed by the wind.

In our area the chicken mushroom is very common and it is found throughout North America. In the Southeastern Massachusetts Bioreserve (SMB) it is found most frequently on diseased or dead oaks although it may also be found, occasionally, on other hardwood species.

The chicken mushroom fruits from spring through fall, but is most commonly found in late summer and early fall after heavy rains.

When young and tender the chicken mushroom is much sought after by local mushroom hunters. When temperature and moisture are right for this mushroom to fruit it appears in abundance, can be easily gathered in quantity and is very versatile in the kitchen.

The chicken mushroom is one of our most spectacularly colored mushrooms. Watch for it in area woodlands and neighborhood parks.

Young chicken mushroom growing from oak trunk.

Chicken mushroom fruiting in a “rosette” pattern from old oak stump.

BIORESERVE FAUNA OF THE MONTH – Allegheny Mound Ant (Formica exsectoides)

When you were a little kid and closer to the ground did you ever watch a battle between red ants and black ants? When outdoors playing did you ever inadvertently stand or sit next to a red ant mound? …OUCH!

From Nova Scotia to Georgia and from Michigan and the Upper Midwest south to Kentucky the Allegheny mound ant is the “red” mound building species you likely encountered.

Although commonly called “red” ants, Allegheny mound ants are actually reddish-orange on the head and thorax and black on the abdomen. Worker ants are about a quarter-inch long, queens a half-inch in length.

These ants build large mounds in which to live and raise their young. These mounds serve as solar collectors providing warmth necessary for egg incubation. Worker ants kill nearby trees and shrubs with injections of formic acid to prevent any shading of their mound.

Mounds are usually located in areas of dry, sandy, nutrient poor soil. As the ants construct their tunnels and chambers they bring up particles of sand and gravel piling them up higher and higher. A thriving Allegheny mound ant colony may have a mound four feet high and four feet underground.

Allegheny mound ants are alert and they post sentries to sound the alarm if their mound is threatened. A large mound contains thousands of aggressive workers ready to lay down their lives in defense of their mound. They are quick to bite and their mandibles will lock on even if their head is separated from their body. The stinging sensation one feels from the bite is due to the formic acid injected at the bite site.

Unlike most ants, Allegheny mound ants can have more than one queen. Young mated queens may stay in their home mound or they may leave to start their own colony. New mounds often have tunnels connecting them to the original mound.

Allegheny mound ants eat small arthropods and insects, including other ants. They also protect and tend aphids and eat the sweet secretions the aphids produce.

A number of spider species and large predatory insects will catch an Allegheny mound ant away from its mound and devour it. Some insect eating birds, especially flickers, enjoy an ant meal. In the SMB striped skunks are known to raid a mound for the eggs and ant larvae until the biting stings of the angry worker ants drive them away.

If out hiking within the range of the Allegheny mound ant watch for their large, obvious mounds. They are a marvel of insect engineering.

An Allegheny mound ant

Allegheny mound ant mounds. Notice no trees or shrubs nearby.

SUBDIVIDING LAND, A DANGEROUS PRECEDENT – Update.

Davis and Riley have filed a new appeal for a variance with Fall River’s Zoning Board of Appeals. To review the issue, go here: http://www.greenfutures.org/?content=CcHsvXazWqFHrURW

Here is the latest from the, Notice of Public Hearing, Fall River Zoning Board of Appeals.

SARAH E. DAVIS & MARTIN R. RILEY

1679 Copicut Road, Lot W-36-4

Variance request to construct an addition to the existing single family dwelling waiving dimensional requirements in a Single Family Residence District [R-80]. Lot size 96,196 +/- s.f.

What they should have requested originally. Hopefully Davis and Riley, as well as the others living on Copicut and Watuppa watershed lands, will be good stewards of that beautiful area in which they make their homes.

To preserve water quality in surface water reservoir(s) that supply a community’s drinking water the watershed surrounding that source must be protected. If not, and development occurs, water quality soon deteriorates from both point and non-point pollutants. The only recourse, once that occurs, is to spend millions for expensive water treatment facilities and the trained staff to man them.

Seems like the proverbial “no-brainer” …yet many communities fail to protect the watersheds that supply their drinking water until it is too late. Locally, Tiverton, Rhode Island, has for years complained about the deteriorating water quality in Stafford Pond yet has done little to protect the pond’s watershed.

There are a number of private inholdings and residences in Fall River’s Watuppa watershed …some right on the shore of the pond. A small percentage of the fees Fall River collects for water service should go into an account earmarked for acquisition of those watershed homes and parcels as they become available.

Most large cities with surface water supply watersheds have active watershed land acquisition programs funded by dedicated water revenue. Providence, Rhode Island, has a watershed land acquisition program, enacted by the Rhode Island State Legislature in 1989, that generates approximately $2.2 million annually for the purpose of acquiring land to protect their water supply.

WINTER IS HERE – Enjoy

Some folks stay indoors all winter. Others escape …or wish they could …to Florida, Arizona, some Caribbean island or other warm spot.

Come on, you live in New England! We’re really fortunate to have 4 wonderfully varied seasons. In comparison with earlier residents of this part of the world, we’ve never had it so good when it comes to winter clothing that can keep us warm, dry and active in any weather.

Stay active and engaged in the environment around you and winter will zip right by. For some winter things to do, “Google” around and check out area nature centers, land trusts, preserves, public parks and forests. Here are a few:

Dartmouth Natural Resource Trust – http://dnrt.org/

Taunton River Watershed Alliance - http://savethetaunton.org/

Massachusetts Audubon Society - http://www.massaudubon.org/

Blue Hills Trailside Museum - http://www.massaudubon.org/Nature_Connection/Sanctuaries/Blue_Hills/index.php

Audubon Society of Rhode Island - http://www.asri.org/

The Trustees of Reservations - http://www.thetrustees.org/

Westport River Watershed Alliance - http://westportwatershed.org/

Wildlands Trust - http://www.wildlandstrust.org/

Tiverton Land Trust - http://www.wildlandstrust.org/

Sakonnet Preservation Association - http://sakonnetpreservation.org/

Sippican Lands Trust - http://sippicanlandstrust.org/

Fairhaven and Acushnet Land Preservation Trust - http://falpt.org/blog/