May-apples are blooming again in the EcoPreserve. These are the first may-apple blooms I’ve seen in my 9 years as director. The deer management program has helped lower the browsing pressure, allowing these and other wildflowers to rebound.
Brushfire
May 8, 2018. Local emergency services were called out to put out a small brushfire smoldering off the Red Trail. Please be careful with matches and cigarette butts.
Clearing Blowdown
April 22, 2018. Members of the Wildlife Club out clearing cedar trees felled during the March snowstorms
Tree Planting
To get an early jump on Earth Week and Arbor Day, student volunteers from the RU Outdoors Club and Ecology department came out to plant trees in the RU EcoPreserve. Bare root sapling “whips” of flowering dogwood, black gum and persimmon were planted in several gaps opened up by Superstorm Sandy back in 2012. Since then the gaps have been invaded by a thick ground cover of stiltgrass and mutliflora rose. The students removed some of the competing vegetation and…