Volunteers and Students Help Rebuild Champlain Valley Landscape

Federal grant supports The Nature Conservancy's forest restoration work

West Haven, VT—9 September 2004—Volunteers return to The Nature Conservancy’s Hubbardton River Clayplain Preserve this month to help plant 2,000 trees. Over the next five years the Conservancy will plant 19,000 trees, grown from locally collected seeds, at this site. Local trees and seeds are better adapted to the specific soil and climate conditions found in the valley, and their use improves the success of restoration work.

Over 162 volunteers kicked off the planting last spring. They included students from local schools such as Rutland High School and Green Mountain College, kids from organizations such as Camp E-Wen-Akee and the Girl Scouts, and many local citizens.

"Volunteering is a very rewarding and positive experience for our students and provides an opportunity to give back to the community," said Deirdre Kelly, Educator at Camp E-Wen-Akee. "The Nature Conservancy’s landscape restoration work is a perfect complement to our core ecology curriculum and outdoor program."

To support restoration work The Nature Conservancy was recently awarded over $113,000 in funding from the Natural Resource Conservation Service (NRCS) Wetland Reserve Program and the US Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) Partners for Fish and Wildlife Program. The Nature Conservancy is actively raising private funds to match the federal grant award.

"Grants like this are awarded to private landowners for restoring wetlands -- including former agricultural lands that were once wooded and contained significant wetlands," says Heather Potter, Director of The Nature Conservancy’s Southern Lake Champlain Valley Program. "Restoring native plant communities has many benefits such as improving wildlife habitat, reducing erosion of river banks, preventing the spread of invasive species and improving water quality in our local rivers and lakes."

These efforts will be focused on The Nature Conservancy’s Hubbardton River Clayplain Preserve, a 250-acre parcel the Conservancy purchased in 2001 for the purpose of restoring ecologically-significant clayplain forests. Consistent with the Conservancy’s scientific approach to conservation, this project will also evaluate various restoration techniques.

"The lessons we learn in our restoration work at the Hubbardton River Clayplain Preserve will help The Nature Conservancy, local landowners, and other conservation organizations know how to more effectively protect and restore clayplain forest," said Mary Droege, Director of Ecological Management and Restoration for the Southern Lake Champlain Valley Program.

The Hubbardton and Lower Poultney River watersheds are home to rare stands of clayplain forest that once dominated the Champlain Valley landscape. Clayplain forests are now estimated to exist on only 10 percent of their historic range in Vermont, and only in small, fragmented stands. The small size and isolation of these stands make them vulnerable to a variety of threats, from storm damage to invasions of exotic plant species. With a rich variety of nut-producing trees such as oak and hickory, these forests are a vital food source for game and non-game wildlife.

"Our work is a jumpstart not an endpoint," says Mary Droege. "We’ve been out there planting a lot of seedlings, but they are young and nature has a lot of work to do before these places can once again be called a forest."

Champlain Valley Native Plant Restoration Nursery

Tree and shrub seedlings used for restoration work within the Champlain Valley are grown from locally collected seeds at the Champlain Valley Native Plant Restoration Nursery.

The Nursery, in collaboration with the Poultney-Mettowee Watershed Partnership, held its first open house on August 28^th, to celebrate the growth of its seedling stock. Former Nature Conservancy Board of Trustee member David Cunningham led a tree planting demonstration and close to 150 tree seedlings were sold to members of the public for conservation projects.

The Nursery, located on Nature Conservancy property in Whitehall, NY, is a partnership between the Poultney-Mettowee Watershed Partnership and The Nature Conservancy’s Southern Lake Champlain Valley Program. As of July 2004, over 19,000 seedlings produced from locally collected seeds were growing in deep-cell containers. Murray McHugh, the nursery’s manager, coordinates with volunteers and interns to accomplish seed collection, propagation and growing operations.

For more information on volunteering call Mary Droege at (802) 265-8645 ext. 21.

For more information on the Native Plant Nursery call Murray McHugh at (802) 265-8645 ext. 23.