Newsletters
June 2016 - LNG, Black Birch, Spotted Sandpiper
WELCOME TO GREEN FUTURES !
JUNE, 2016
“The one process now going on that will take millions of years to correct is the loss of genetic and species diversity by the destruction of natural habitats. This is the folly our descendants are least likely to forgive us.”
-E. O. Wilson
“You will find something more in woods than in books. Trees and stones will teach you that which you can never learn from masters.”
-Saint Bernard of Clairvaux
ITEMS OUR READERS MUST HAVE FOUND INTERESTING BECAUSE THEY EMAILED THEM IN - We hope you find them interesting too.
Dysfunctional Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation just burned a small area in the Freetown State Forest, part of the Southeastern Massachusetts Bioreserve, despite the fact they have yet to create a forest biodiversity management plan for the property. Read what Physicians for Social Responsibility has to say about “controlled” burns.
More reasons why burning our forests may not be a good idea.http://www.santafenewmexican.com/opinion/my_view/reader-view-deforestation-a-crime-of-the-highest-order/article_65ac2bd8-2ee6-5c21-9245-3f87046065f8.html
Dysfunctional Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation planning to do another bad thing. http://www.recorder.com/News/Local/Environmental-group-decries-proposed-state-forest-cutting-plan-1631126
MA AG Maura Healey defends Article 97 of Massachusetts Constitution.
http://www.recorder.com/News/Local/AG-defends-Article-97-in-Berkshire-pipeline-case-1462253
Fracking bad. http://commondreams.org/news/2016/04/15/dems-debate-fossil-fuels-new-report-shows-fracking-worse-thought
This stuff is bad too. http://tx.usgs.gov/sealcoat.html
A new national park in Maine? http://bangordailynews.com/2016/04/27/opinion/contributors/its-the-ideal-time-to-say-yes-to-a-new-national-park-in-maine/
If not a new Maine national park, a national monument.http://www.pressherald.com/2016/04/27/maine-voices-national-monument-proposal-a-historic-opportunity-for-katahdin-region/
Fall River's fat and happy, but polluted, get to spend summer on the Vineyard.https://vineyardgazette.com/news/2016/04/29/polluted-pristine-quahaug-relay-gives-mollusks-new-life
7 Kids win climate change lawsuit. http://ecowatch.com/2016/04/29/climate-lawsuit-washington/
Leaders in recycling. http://www.wsj.com/articles/taiwan-the-worlds-geniuses-of-garbage-disposal-1463519134
Portugal runs for four days straight on renewable energy alone.http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/may/18/portugal-runs-for-four-days-straight-on-renewable-energy-alone
LOCAL GAS PAINS – 6.8 billion cubic feet of it – Too much gas all in one place.
Acushnet is the site selected by Eversource Energy, formerly NSTAR, for too much gas near too many people. Part of the $3 billion natural gas-pipeline project called Access Northeast.
The two humongous LNG storage tanks would be located on Peckham Road in an area zoned “residential.” These new tanks, would more than double the power company's current total capacity in the tri-state area they serve.
Eversource also intends to expand the existing Spectra pipeline through southern Bristol County to bring fracked gas from the mid-west to Acushnet where it will be liquefied and stored.
South Coast Neighbors United (SCNU) is an all-volunteer citizens group opposed to the building of the two massive LNG tanks and liquefaction plant as well as a 3 mile increased capacity pipeline proposed by Spectra Energy in Freetown, MA.
SCNU holds informational meetings and lobbies local and state political leaders to oppose the project and also goes door to door canvasing Acushnet, Freetown and the north end of New Bedford (Sassaquin neighborhood).
SCNU has a Facebook page and a web site, scnu.us. Check them out.
DCR NEGLIGENCE ALLOWS A MASSACHUSETTS “SPECIES OF SPECIAL CONCERN” TO BE DESTROYED – RIP Hartford Fern
Hartford fern formerly in the Southeastern Massachusetts Bioreserve.
A look at the fern's palmate fronds.
Very disappointed, as usual, in our Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR). They just don't care.
We receive frequent requests from the major state environmental organizations asking us to lobby state legislators for increased funding for DCR and the other state environmental regulatory agencies. More funding the other agencies surely need, but what DCR needs more than increased funding is proper management. It is absolutely wrong for DCR to be spending millions on new projects and dubious activities, such as commercial timber harvesting that taxpayers subsidize, when DCR doesn't maintain what they have and refuses to repair damage caused by their negligence.
As we mentioned in a recent “Activity Alert” we organized a walk, 5/14/16, to view a colony of our state's official wild flower, the Mayflower, aka trailing arbutus (Epigaea repens). It is no longer there. It, along with a neighboring colony of Hartford Fern, aka Climbing Fern (Lygodium palmatum), the only colony of the fern in the Southeastern Massachusetts Bioreserve, have been destroyed by our dysfunctional DCR. Destroyed by illegal ...and legal dirt bike activity allowed, but not responsibly managed by DCR.
Other states that haven't banned the activity from public land entirely match dirt bike/OHV use to the available management and enforcement capacity (funding and staff) available. Not DCR. Management to them means not addressing, ignoring the problem.
Hartford fern is a "Species of Special Concern" here in Massachusetts and is the logo of the Massachusetts Natural Heritage and Endangered Species Program (NHESP). You can read about this fern here: http://www.mass.gov/eea/docs/dfg/nhesp/species-and-conservation/nhfacts/lygodium-palmatum.pdf (Note the NHESP logo in the upper left corner.)
For years we have been telling DCR that the dirt bike activity parking lot and trails were in the wrong location. That the dirt bike trail should be moved away from wetlands, steep hills and rare species and sensitive ecosystems. Could dirt bike riding in the Freetown State Forest section of the Southeastern Massachusetts Bioreserve be conducted responsibly and sustainably? Perhaps, but we'll never find out with a dysfunctional state agency that refuses to follow its own mission statement “TO PROTECT, PROMOTE AND ENHANCE OUR COMMON WEALTH OF NATURAL, CULTURAL AND RECREATIONAL RESOURCES.”
The Hartford fern was our Bioreserve Flora of the Month, November, 2011. Here's what we had to say about it:
The Hartford fern, also known as the climbing fern, looks like no fern you’ve ever seen.
The Hartford fern is our only native fern species that grows as a vine. Often mistaken for a species of ivy, a close look shows that those are fronds growing from the vines …not leaves.
Hand-shaped pairs of fronds grow along the vine. The terminal end of each vine bears the more delicately-divided fertile leaflets that bear the fern’s spores.
The Hartford fern is an endangered or threatened species in most of its historical range. In Massachusetts it is listed by the Massachusetts Natural Heritage and Endangered Species Program (NHESP) as a “Species of Special Concern.” The logo of the NHESP is this fern.
Hartford fern populations are rare and localized. To thrive, the Hartford fern requires an extremely moist, very acidic, sandy soil with a sparse pine-oak forest and an understory that allows plenty of sunlight to reach the forest floor. There are only 34 sites where this fern can be found in Massachusetts.
Colonies of Hartford ferns can be found from New England down the Appalachian Mountain range and east to the Atlantic coastal plain.
Along with prince’s pine, ground pine and Polypody fern the Hartford fern is evergreen and was gathered commercially for Christmas wreaths and decorations during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The first American plant protection laws were passed in Connecticut to save this species from commercial exploitation back in 1869.
There is one small colony of this fern in The Southeastern Massachusetts Bioreserve. It is losing ground due to maturing forest canopy and dirt bike abuse. Active management should be implemented to save this unique species.
Mayflower, our state flower.
BIORESERVE FAUNA OF THE MONTH – Spotted Sandpiper (Actitis macularius)
There can be so many species of sandpipers and sandpiper-look-alike shorebirds along the New England coast it can be confusing at times to tell one species from another. Many are similar in size and many have seasonal plumage pattern and color changes that further muddle identification …but not the spotted sandpiper!
Although a spotted sandpiper may fly by the salty coast during migration, for the most part this sandpiper shuns our Atlantic beaches and instead frolics alone along the shores of brooks, rivers, lakes and ponds often in heavily forested areas where other sandpipers wouldn't think of going.
The spotted sandpiper is a small sandpiper often seen foraging about the waterline bobbing its tail up and down and teeter-tottering along, darting here and there to grab insects and other invertebrate prey. When startled they spring into the air often piping out a few peeps of surprise as they stiffly fly away low over the water to a more secluded shore area.
Spotted sandpipers have a yellowish colored bill shorter than the length of their head. Body color is light brown. The head is brown with a white stripe above the eye. The breast and underparts are white heavily spotted with brown during the breeding season. In flight there is a white stripe down the wing and white spots that show along the edges when the tail is fully spread. Legs and feet are pale greenish- yellow turning brighter yellow during breeding season.
Spotted sandpipers occur across North and South America. In the spring the female selects a territory along a brook, river, pond or lake shore. Females are larger than males and attract a mate by spreading their feathers and dancing about bobbing up and down. The nest is a scrape on the ground, usually hidden in vegetation well back from the waterline and lined with breast feathers and grass. After mating the female lays four eggs and the male incubates them. Once hatched both the male and female keep watch and feed the chicks. Some female spotted sandpipers are polyandrous and mate with more than one male, each male left, in turn, to incubate the eggs and raise the chicks without the hen's assistance although she may assist in helping raise the brood of the last male she mates with that breeding season.
Within three weeks of hatching the chicks are fledged, independent, ready to migrate south to spend the winter.
Spotted Sandpiper - Photo- Jan Malik, Wikimedia Commons
BIORESERVE FLORA OF THE MONTH – Black Birch (Betula lenta)
The black birch, like our May Newsletter's “Flora of the Month” yellow birch, is named for the color of its bark.
Black birch grows best in a cool environment on well drained, moist, acidic soils along streams, in ravines and on the cool slopes of mountain hollows.
Black birch can reach 80 feet in height and 2 feet in diameter, but most seen in area woodlands today are considerably shorter. Unlike the shaggy bark of yellow birch, the bark of black birch is smooth with an overall horizontal pattern of lighter lenticels (bark pores). On old, fully mature trees the bark sometimes wrinkles forming irregular vertical fissures and plates.
Like the yellow birch the sap and inner bark, cambium layer, of the black birch contain wintergreen and are tapped for oil of wintergreen and to make birch syrup.
Leaves are alternate, simple, 2 to 4 inch long ovals, 2 to 3 inches wide with serrated edges and darkgreen in color. Wood is lighter than yellow birch, fine grained and has similar uses such as in cabinetry and flooring.
Birch flowers are catkins. Catkins are slim, cylindrical, drooping cluster of tiny unisexual flowers with inconspicuous petals. Birch catkins are wind pollinated.
After pollination female catkins develop into inch-long cones and mature over the summer releasing numerous tiny winged-seeds (samaras) in the fall.
Black birch has a more restricted range than yellow birch. It is found from southern Maine and southern Ontario south down the Appalachian Mountains to northern Georgia and extreme northeastern Alabama.
Many forest birds, from chickadees to wild turkeys, eat birch seeds as do voles and mice. Ruffed grouse feed on the winter buds and catkins. Deer, rabbits and hares browse the leaves and twigs. Beavers eat the bark. A large number of butterfly and moth caterpillars and other insects eat the foliage.
A number of birch fungal diseases also attack black birch often stunting the tree's growth or leaving large cankers where the tree has been successful in containing the disease.
Like other birch species, in early spring before wildflowers are blooming, newly arriving ruby throat hummingbirds will follow yellow belly sapsuckers and other woodpeckers to feed on the sap dripping from recent sapsucker/woodpecker holes.
Vertical cracks in the bark of the black birch
Black birch leaves
June 20, 6:34 P.M. EDT - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=guKoNCQFAFk
Make up your own summertime outdoor activities and/or click here for our Calendar.
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