You can measure progress in a lot of different ways. One way we’re measuring the progress of cleaning up the Tioga River’s Abandoned Mine Drainage is the colors of survey ribbon on the Coal Creek property. The design for the Active Treatment Plant (ATP) for the Tioga River clean-up is underway and you can see signs of the design process in pink, orange, and blue tied to tree branches and pinned to the ground.
With the help and support of our members and the Susquehanna River Basin Commission, we purchased the Coal Creek property in May 2022 to ensure construction access to the largest discharge in the watershed (on a neighboring property). Last week, in January 2023, I spent a little time on the property before a meeting in Blossburg.
The surveyors have been hard at work. There were different colors of ribbon marking roads, paths, and flow paths. I have no idea what they were actually surveying and working through, and that’s okay. I was just super excited to see the ribbon and all the colors of ribbon.
To me, this is the next step. There are people on the ground gathering information and plotting out aspects of the ideas and concepts being considered. Progress!
The engineering firm is on schedule for wrapping up the design work this fall. The Susquehanna River Basin Commission estimates construction of the plant should start next year and cleaner water should be flowing into the Tioga River in two years.
Thank you to all the members and partners that are making this project a reality!
The sunset as I was walking out had similar shades to the survey ribbon!
I like hikes during the winter months when so many of our green plants turn brown and yucky. Why? Because of the outstanding plants I can find out there that don’t turn brown and yucky…like Yucca flaccida! This plant with the common names of Adam’s Needle and Weak-leaf Yucca and Beargrass was originally classified in the Lily Family (long, floppy leaves), then the Agave Family (long, spine-tipped leaves). Finally, it has been placed in a sub-family (Agavoideae) of the Asparagus Family. What a family history it has! And, it is still green now and photosynthesizing on sunny days. Some references consider it a perennial, evergreen shrub that is native to the North American continent, from Ontario southward and distributed throughout the Appalachian Mountains from North Carolina to Alabama and into Central America and the Caribbean region. Ethnobotanists think its naturalization in such a wide area took place before the Europeans came here. Native people could have traded for it and planted it near their villages for its useful fibers and roots.
Yucca plant with flower stalk remaining
Adam’s Needle has spear-shaped leaves with long, straight threads or filaments on their edges. And then, there’s the sharp, pointed needle at the end of each leaf, waiting to poke the unsuspecting human or animal that backs into it. There are a bunch of other yuccas whose armament is bigger and stands up and out straighter that Yucca flaccida AKA Floppy Yucca. Its stems spread underground creating small colonies and seem to grow better where the soil is dry and sandy. I look for this plant near old homestead sites and places where locals tell me Native American villages once stood. This type of Yucca is pretty hardy, but it does not like too much wind or winter wet which can kill the very center of it.
Look at Yucca leaves to find the needles and the threads
I still haven’t found out why it’s called Beargrass. They don’t eat it – even deer won’t eat it! Its roots contain toxic saponins, that when pounded and mixed with cold water, create soapy lather for bathing and laundry. Biologists believe the plant developed saponins as a defense against soil microbes and browsing animals. Yucca leaves soaked in water and pounded to separate the long fibers can then be twisted together to make ropes.
Look for this plant again in the summertime when it has a three to eight foot tall flower stalk filled with creamy white, bell-shaped blooms. You may be lucky to find some small white moths that seem to blend with the color of the flowers. They are White Yucca Moths that pollinate the flowers. According to the U.S. Forest Service web site, Yucca and Yucca Moths are so interdependent that one cannot live without the other. As the natural range of the Yucca plants expanded, so did that of the Yucca Moths who desperately need to lay their eggs in the flowers’ ovaries. These plants have amazing stories. Not yucky, at all!
Earlier this week, Sara and volunteers helped Chesapeake Conservancy and Merill W. Linn Land and Waterways Conservancy collect live stakes for the Live Stake Collaborative. The Live Stake Collaborative consists of a group of partner organizations including Chesapeake Conservancy, Merill W. Linn Land and Waterways Conservancy, the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, Susquehanna University, and Bucknell University who collect live stakes in the fall and winter that are then provided to the partners for restorations projects the following year.
Live stakes are branch cuttings from wetland tree and shrub species that can be planted into the ground alongside streams. They root readily and eventually grow into viable and successful trees. As they grow into trees these live stake plantings help to stabilize the streambanks to stop sediment from eroding into the waterways as well as filter nutrients and other pollution from upslope runoff. They also provide food and shade to the water and the organisms that live there, such macroinvertebrates or fish. Live stakes are especially great because the methods are very simple and super low cost.
Not all trees and shrubs are suitable for use as live stakes. Some of the more common species with high survival rates include Eastern Sycamore, Quaking Aspen, Pussy Willow, Black Willow, Silky Willow, Speckled Alder, Smooth Alder, Buttonbush, Silky Dogwood, Gray Dogwood, Red Osier Dogwood, Winterberry, Ninebark, and Elderberry.
Silky Dogwood stem removed from source plant
The same Silky Dogwood with small branches and stems removed, ready to be cut to length
The collection of live stakes occurs during late fall to early spring while the trees and shrubs are dormant. Loppers or pruning shears are used to cut straight stems, removing no more than 30% of the source plant to allow it to regenerate, and waiting several years until that plant is harvested again.
The smaller branches and twigs are removed, then stakes measuring 10-36” in length and ½- 1 ½” diameter are cut, several live stakes can be taken from one individual stem.
Teams work to cut an angle to indicate the bottom end, then cut the top straight at bucket height
The bottom of the live stakes are cut at an angle to make it easy to determine the orientation when planting, the top end is cut flush.
Groups of 20 live stakes are laid out to be painted according to the color coding system.
Stakes are then separated into groups of 20 of the same species, the tops are spray painted according to a color code for each species, and the groups bundled together with rubber bands.
The painted live stakes are put in groups of 20 then rubber banded together. This makes it easier to pull out for projects the following year.
The stakes are placed into a large garbage bag, as much air removed as possible and moistened rice hulls are added to provide moisture while the sealed, and labeled bags are kept just above freezing until they are needed for planting the following year.
Bundles are placed into large bags with moistened rice hulls to help provide moisture. As much air as possible is removed from the bags, which are then sealed, labeled, and stored just above freezing until they are ready to be planted.
The design work for the Active Treatment Plan (ATP) to address Abandoned Mine Drainage (AMD) on Coal Creek, Morris Run, and Fall Brook is moving along. If things go reasonably smoothly, the ATP will be constructed and online in 2025.
2025 sounds far away…until you realized November is half over and it’s almost 2023.
Tyler’s t-shirt, celebrating the Conservation District’s 75th anniversary, was very appropriate for the day’s activity.
Since that plant will be up and running before we know it NPC staff met with Blossburg Borough’s manager, staff from Trout Unlimited, and staff from the Tioga County Conservation District to discuss sites for possible fish habitat structures.
The Tioga River currently doesn’t have much if any habitat for fish. That doesn’t really matter right now since the water can’t support fish populations. But, the ATP will clean up the water so it could support fish. So, what can we do to create habitat in the Tioga River to give fish a helping hand (or should it be helping fin??)?
Trout Unlimited has grant funding now that allows their staff to make site visits, assess a site, and if needed and appropriate, develop a design for fish habitat structures to address erosion. The funding is focused on sediment reduction in the Chesapeake Bay.
We looked at 3 sites and 1 fit within the scope of Trout Unlimited’s program. The design is being developed now. The design will allow us to pull together the necessary funding so the project can be implemented around the same time that the ATP goes online.
Another site can use some help too, but a slightly different type than we were discussing with Trout Unlimited. NPC and the Tioga County Conservation District will have further conversations and work with Blossburg Borough on that one.
One of the things NPC is proud of is the way NPC members don’t just conserve land. There’s support and interest and action to improve the land too.
For the past two years, the NPC blog has informed folks about an intriguing homework assignment given by Dr. Chris Martine, Professor of Plant Genetics and Research, to his students at Bucknell University. They are required to count and record the number of different plants and plant parts used to prepare their annual Thanksgiving feast. The results of this social media campaign are publicized using Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. What a great idea! In a small and personal way, the students and other people taking part in this by creating food for each other, are made more aware of the number and variety of plants they depend upon to accomplish the task. Then, perhaps, every time they cook something and eat it, they will be mindful of the great treasure we have in plants of all kinds. One hopes that public interest plus the knowledge and awareness gained from such as exercise will help us be more careful guardians of the natural world around us – its unique ecosystems and biodiversity and the connectivity of everything and everyone. It must be looked after for life now and the generations to come.
My root veggies (L to R) radishes, rutabaga, turnips, parsnips, carrots
We have to respect what marvelous survivors plants are to have overcome the challenges they met in order to thrive on dry land. Although the oldest fossil remains of land plants are 420 million years old, scientists have found evidence that pond scum first made landfall almost a 100 million years earlier. Think of the many adaptations plants have evolved over time just to be able to absorb water and minerals from dirt. We can’t do that. They have done it for us when we ingest them. They anchor themselves and stand upright, spread out sunlight collectors in order to make their food (and ours) and then store it for lean times. The fleshy, starch-filled roots developed by plants, did not go unnoticed by the early humans who began growing crops between 10,000 and 7,000 B.C. Some of their crops had roots like bulbs, or corms, or rhizomes or tubers or tap roots – many that could be stored for later use.
Taproot tips have smaller rootlets and hairs for better uptake of minerals and water
My learning curve was straight up when I began researching roots, in general. I have just recently added several that I consider edible to my past list of Thanksgiving worthy root vegetables – turnips, radishes, rutabagas, parsnips, and carrots. (OK, carrots were there before.) Botanists refer to these five plants as having “true” roots. What that means is their tap roots are somewhat straight, grow directly downward, have rather tapering shapes with thickened areas for carbohydrate storage. And they do store well when we keep them in cooler places at 32 to 40 degrees F. The turnips, radishes and rutabagas are all members of Brassicaceae or Cabbage Family. Some refer to it as the Mustard Family or Cruciferae for the cross-shaped petal arrangement of their flowers. Parsnips and carrots are members of a different family, Apiaceae or Parsley Family. Some of their close relatives are the herbs you may be using to season your food – parsley, cilantro, anise, dill, cumin, fennel, celery.
Roasted root veggies. Radishes, exempt from cooking, will be used in a salad.
I must confess, as a child, I pretty much refused to eat any of the root veggies I am now preparing for Thanksgiving. Roasted together with onion slices (another type of root vegetable) and preserved lemons, they are quite delicious. The use of an acid, like lemon juice, will decompose geosmin molecules that give many root vegetables an earthy, musty smell. Give them a try and don’t forget to write “lemon” on your list of plants. I am now officially rooting for root veggies!
I guess that most people usually expect to read about strawberries in the spring and summer. This small, low-growing perennial strawberry may just be creeping near the edges of your yard right now. Still mowing to mulch your leaves?
Compare plant size with spruce needles
Mock Strawberry or Indian Strawberry loves foot traffic AND mowing AND may still be blooming in your yard. Look for it! I took photos of mine in flower during the first week of November. The yellow flower made me stop and check it out. Then I found some bright red fruits nearby.
Look for the pointed sepals going every-other-one with the three-toothed bract leaves on the bloom without petals
Potentilla indica, previously known as Duchesnea indica, is a member of the Rose Family and came to live in this country from Southeast Asia because people thought it was a pretty ornamental plant that makes a great ground cover. Boy, does it cover the ground! Its reddish stolons, or runners, take off horizontally to root here and there at the nodes where its toothed-leaves emerge. Those leaves are palmate and made up of three leaflets. Blooms appear singly and have five small, pointed sepals and five larger, toothed bracts in alternating whirls under their five yellow petals. After pollination by small bees and flies, the fruit, less than an inch long, appears – pointing upward, making it highly visible. You can clearly see the seeds attached all over the outside of the strawberry like red goosebumps.
The fruits showing their seeds
These are not the yummy, sweet, succulent, strawberries of spring. They are small, relatively dry, spongy, and tasteless. Edible, but who would want to? Ha! Birds, squirrels, rabbits, mice, raccoons, deer. This extensively naturalized import does have wildlife benefits! Actually, humans have benefited from these plants for hundreds, if not thousands of years, because of their medicinal qualities: fresh leaf poultices for skin ailments and insect bites, tea for cold symptoms, probably due to vitamin C, D, and iron content. Recent research shows properties that act against the squamous cell activities of various cancers.
Don’t confuse Indian or Mock Strawberry with the Wild Strawberry, Fragaria virginiana, that grows in Pennsylvania. Our native plant has white flowers, blooms in the spring, and has its seeds tucked up inside its fruits!
How beautiful the leaves are this fall! Our hills and mountains appear upholstered with green leaves during the growing season. Now with the lessening of sunlight due to shorter days, the leaves have begun shutting down their food production. As the amount of chlorophyll, the green color, slowly fades from the leaves, other pigments in them become visible – xanthophylls (yellows), carotenoids (oranges), and anthocyanins (reds to purples). Sometimes all the colors may be displayed in a single leaf!
At the edge of the woods, this Striped Maple is getting more sunlight.
Right now, Striped Maples (Acer pensylvanicum) are excellent examples of brilliant yellow. Small understory trees hardly getting above sixteen feet tall, they just shine out like beacons from the shadows under the taller mixed hardwoods where they like to grow. Look for the leaf shape as you walk or ride along the back roads. They differ from the common maple leaves because they are bigger, up to seven inches long as well as across, too. They are three-lobed instead of five-lobed…and the lobes point straight forward instead of out to the side. The pointed tips of the lobes are long and thin. With such a large leaf area, I’ll bet those points act like drip tips to help drain off the rain that beads up on them. The leaf base is rounded where its reddish stem and its three main veins meet together at the bottom. As an understory tree, the development of them is slow, but will accelerate when an opening with more light becomes available. Then they can grow up to thirty feet tall with trunks eight inches in diameter. Their range is from Nova Scotia to the North Georgia mountains and west to Michigan and Ohio. They grow in cool, rocky woods and seem to prefer slopes. At least, that’s where I saw most of the ones I was stalking for a photograph!
Green and white striped trunk.
The striped part of the common name refers to the easily-identified outer layer of bark that is green with white vertical stripes when the tree is young. It darkens up with time to brown, but those stripes are still quite visible. Striped Maples may live for a hundred years. Indeed, they must be very hardy because they get chewed on a lot. Rabbits, deer, beaver, porcupine, and the caribou and moose populations of our more northerly neighbors, all browse on them at one time or another during the year. Some resources indicate that this type of maple can start to regain twigs and leaves as stump sprouts rather quickly, about two months, after being denuded and trimmed to the roots. Their roots which are shallow and wide-spreading, make the trees strongly competitive for soil moisture and nutrients. Our colonial ancestors fed green and dried leaves of this tree to their cattle in winter and would turn them out early in spring to graze on the newly growing foliage in the woods near their fields. Today, tests are underway to determine if there is a practical application for an active anti-tumor substance isolated from Striped Maples.
Many odd, strange, and curiously costumed kids of all ages are out and about at the end of October. So, let’s take a look at a creepy, gelatinous growing thing that likes to live in and digest decaying logs. Heh! Heh! Heh!
Tremella – jelly fungus
You can find Tremella in the forest – in the duff on the floor, or mysteriously appearing on hard and soft wood – especially dead trees, lying there decomposing. Tremella’s unseen hyphae eat the wood from the inside of logs where you cannot see them doing it. Creepy! Then, when they have digested enough for extra energy, they will reproduce and create more of themselves to take over the world. (Oops, I didn’t mean to say that.)
…they start small
They exude jello-like masses of lobed or wrinkled or leaflike jelly with spores inside it. These globs can be orange, or yellow, or black, or reddish-brown in color, depending on the species that produced it. They will break apart and dissolve to let loose all of the spores that will take over the world. Heh! Heh! Heh!
…and just keep oozing along
IT’S JELLY FUNGUS! Seriously, it is a fun kind of fungus because lots of folks don’t recognize it as one, and make icky, yucky noises when they see it or are brave enough to touch it. “Trembling” Tremellas… and they don’t just appear for Halloween, but can ooze into existence from May to November. Be vigilant and watch for them – in the woods, on your back fence, the sides of a raised bed. They are coming!!! Unfortunately something has taken over my mind…and my computer. I must sign off for n
American Dittany, Cunila origanoides, is a perennial plant in the Lamiaceae or Mint Family. “American” is attached to its common name because there are other plants native to Europe with the same name. The second part of its scientific name indicates that this plant resembles Oregano. Not too surprising, as quite a few of our cooking herbs are classified in the Mint Family as well. In fact, along with square stems and opposite leaves, aroma is one of the BIG family traits. Basil, Sweet Marjoram, Sage, Lemon Balm. Rosemary – to name just a few. There are lots – that are mostly native to other continents.
Check out the opposite and slightly serrated leaves of an upright plant.
I accidently became acquainted with American Dittany almost forty years ago as I tried cliff climbing near a creek. My boot slipped, and I grabbed the nearest rocky ledge. My reward was two fold: 1) I did not fall; 2) I was suddenly blessed with an amazing aroma from the plant growing nearest to my nose. Through all the following years of visiting that cliff and those plants, I have become aware of the decrease in their population. When I climb up to find them, I have to look and step really carefully in order to get photos. They now appear smaller than the reference books’ height of eight to sixteen inches. I missed their blooming time this year occurring from August to October. None of the plants I saw had their tiny, two-lipped purple flowers or the dried remains of them. Maybe they didn’t have the stored energy in their fibrous root system to reproduce.
This plant was hanging over the edge.
American Dittany or Stone-mint or Frost-mint is native to this continent from New York to Florida and west to Texas and Illinois. It tends to grow in dry forests and in the thin soils of rock outcrops, especially where vegetation is sparse. The serrated, lance-shaped leaves, dotted with oil glands (the scent), are opposite and stalkless, flowering from their axils. The wiry stem is brown and appears woody. When rolled between my fingers, I can feel the bumps that make it “squared”. In some resources, American Dittany is dubbed as a “sub-shrub” which is a dwarf, woody plant. I have not yet witnessed the reason this plant received a common name of Frost-mint. Evidently, when the watery sap pushes out at the bottom of a stem that has been cracked open by a hard freeze, it freezes into ribbon-like projections around the base looking like “frost flowers”! I would love to get a photo of that! I may have to let that task to someone younger and more agile. At my age, I probably shouldn’t be climbing around on cliffs in the slipperiness of winter.
Sometimes I find more than plants – a message for all mankind!
Recently, staff from the Tioga State Forest spent some time on the Coal Creek property to gather information to help them develop their management goals for the property and identify any immediate needs that NPC should work on while we own the property.
Is the drainage on the roads working? Are there invasive plants that should be addressed sooner rather than later? Are there any timber stand improvement activities that could happen?
Thanks to the support of NPC’s members, we were in a position where we could buy the Coal Creek property earlier this year. NPC will own the property while the Active Treatment System (ATS) for Coal Creek, Morris Run, and Fall Brook is built.
Once the ATS is up and running the property will be transferred to the Bureau of Forestry and managed as part of the Tioga State Forest.
After a morning on the property conversations are underway and lists are being drawn up. We’ll begin having some conversations about what are next steps and what’s reasonable for NPC to take on during our ownership. Stay tuned for future updates as those plans are developed and we start to implement projects.
One thing that everyone seems interested in is the property’s historic uses. One group walked to the northern end of the property and explored some old roads, now grass covered walkng paths that led to a coal mine. During the jaunt, they found a stone “wall” under one of the walking paths (former road).
In looking at the 1938 aerial image the road that is now walking path can be seen. It’s evident the road was being used and people needed to get to where the road was leading. Now, it’s finding that spot on the ground.
Stay tuned as we learn more about the property’s past while exploring what its future will look like.
