News Native Plant Sale Benefits Boys & Girls Club
All proceeds from the sale benefited the Boys & Girls Club. Club members helped prepare for the sale as part of an Earth Day event at New Beginnings the month before. Nearly 500 individual plants were potted to prepare for the plant sale. New Beginnings Celebrates Earth Day
In addition to cleaning and prepping the area for the growing season, Boys and Girls Club members helped pot nearly 500 native plants to sell in a native plant sale at New Beginnings. The Weed War Continues... Activities at New Beginnings this season have mainly aimed to halt the further spread of invasive plant species to make room for the native ones. While there are many species of non-native plants in the area, a select few are considered to be extremely invasive and were targeted during 2008.
These species include Japanese honey suckle (Lonicera japonica) mile-a-minute weed (Polygonum perfoliatum), tree-of-heaven (Ailanthus altissima), garlic mustard (Alliaria petiolata), multiflora rose ( In early spring 2009, honeysuckle vines were cut and sprayed to prevent crowding out young trees. In April, garlic mustard was pulled constantly until it began to flower. To prevent seeds from forming, garlic mustard plants will be cut as they began to flower, decreasing the chance of seed formation and preventing the plant from having the energy to re-bloom. In May 2008, tree-of-heaven plants were cut, or chopped down, and herbicide was applied to each individual stump to kill the roots. During the summer, mile-a-minute was controlled by pulling in most cases. In areas where it was growing heavily, small amounts of herbicide were used to weaken and kill the plant to prevent seeding. Finally, in the later part of the summer into fall, Japanese stilt grass was pulled before it went to seed. Doing so right before the leaves dropped from the trees provided natural "mulch" that should reduce germination in the spring. Invasive plants will continue to be monitored, controlled and removed at New Beginnings to increase the overall biodiversity. It is important to be consistent as pulling weeds can disturb the soil and can allow for more weeds to sprout from seed. Weeds were bagged immediately and removed to be properly disposed of off site. New Species List! This is a list of NEW species found at New Beginnings. While these species may have been spotted before by visitors, they are now being officially documented and added to the growing list of wildlife habitat. Reptiles/Amphibians: Common snapping turtle (Chelydra serpentina) Pickerel frog (Rana palustris) Birds: Wild turkey (Meleagris gallopavo) Insects: Eastern-tailed blue (Everes comyntas) Invasive plant removal This is ongoing. Please contact WHC for details if you are interested in volunteering. |
