Ecological Preserve

Winterberry holly (Ilex verticillata) After being planted almost a decade ago, the grove of native shrubs planted along the riparian zone of Buell Brook has finally become well established. A number of the shrubs experienced a major growth spurt this past year and some are well over head high. These shrubs were planted as part of several student projects in the Natural Resource Management course taught at SEBS. The objective was to stabilize the riparian zone along Buell Brook and…

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Please Observe the message on these signs. The EcoPreserve Deer Management Program has started. A group of carefully vetted bowhunters are permitted to hunt of the EcoPreserve to help us keep the deer population in check. An overpopulation of deer can lead to a severe impact on the overall health of the forest. Rutgers is working with the NJ Division of Fish & Wildlife and neighboring municipalities on a regional deer management plan. Some of the venison harvested from the…

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Carmela Buono SEBS ‘2016 is now a graduate student at SUNY Binghamton. She is using the RU EcoPreserve as a study site for her research on ants’ role in seed dispersal. Below is a short write-up of her work. Fig 1. Ant of genus Aphaenogaster                               Fig 2. Experimental ant box “Most contemporary North American eastern deciduous forests are “secondary” or previously cleared for agriculture, that have…

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The EcoPreserve received a 1-2 punch of blowdowns. Back in late July there was a localized downburst that heavily affected the Blue and Yellow trails. Just when that got cleaned up, Isaias came through.  Luckily the Land Steward team of Katie Russell and Emelie Einhorn (and yours truly) have been on the job.  So bear with us as we continue to clean up after these storms.  Unfortunately, we lost some mature oaks, maples, basswood and sassafras.