Start Thinking Summer (Camp)…

What better thoughts could be drifting through your head on a grey winter day than hopping on rocks to catch tadpoles in the warm summer sun?  Or finding a cicada, freshly emerged from its underground slumber, stretching its wings on a dewy morning in July?  Or watching a snapping turtle’s slow downhill descent back to the cool pond, after laying her eggs in the green grass near the barns?  Well, I don’t know about you, but just thinking about the summer goings-on of Fairview Farm is like soul-food for my cold, cabin-fever stricken self.

While these thoughts might seem way too cheerful and exciting for a February afternoon, they will be reality in just a few short months for all of the lucky nature explorers and adventurers that attend URWA’s Nature Day Camp program!  What a great time to start planning all of the scavenger hunts, stream walks, water races and nature crafts that we have in store!  This year will be full of all new activities for our campers, including raising monarch caterpillars, mushroom hunting and orienteering activities.  Probably the most exciting part about this year’s camp will be the free exploration time we’ve set aside for campers to tromp through the streams, forest and meadows with URWA’s trained Naturalists, looking for whatever nature has in store for us!

We are so excited to have expanded our day camp to include a session especially for “big kids” ages 10-12.  This is our new Pleasant Valley Mills Farm Camp, which will be at the farm of the same name along Roxiticus Road in Mendham.  In addition to the Day Camp Educators, every day we will be learning from the farm’s operators about how they take care of their animals and farmland.  We will also be exploring the habitat surrounding the farm which includes part of Patriot’s Path and a beautiful section of the North Branch Raritan River!  This is something brand new for URWA and we are sure that it will be so much fun!

One of URWA’s Nature Day Camp Educators this year is Suzanne Skrzenski, a graduate of East Stroudsburg University with a B.S. in Environmental Studies and Biology. After college Suzanne worked at South Mountain YMCA Residential Camp in Wernersville PA as an outdoor educator for 3 years, and completed a full term of service in the Americorps Watershed Ambassadors program through the NJDEP.   She is now a substitute in the Phillipsburg School District and a swim coach at East Stroudsburg University.  She was one of URWA’s Nature Day Camp educators last year and we are so excited to have her back for another fun filled summer program!

Lauren Theis is URWA’s Stewardship Program Manager and will be the second Nature Day Camp educator for 2010.  She graduated from Cook College (Rutgers University) with a B.S. in Biological Sciences, and has been active in teaching extracurricular dance, art and Spanish classes in Mount Olive Township.  Just like Suzanne, Lauren completed a one-year term of service in the Americorps Watershed Ambassadors program through the NJDEP.  Since then, she has been organizing educational programs with scouts, families, volunteers and schools in our area through URWA’s Natural Science program.  She is so excited to be a part of Nature Day Camp this year and can’t wait for all of the adventures in store!

We hope you will join in the fun at URWA’s Nature Day Camp this year!  We invite you to stop by any time to explore Fairview Farm’s 170 acres of wildlife habitat, 5 miles of trails, bird and butterfly garden, and Nature Classroom.  If you have any questions or would like to sign up, visit URWA’s website at www.urwa.org, call Lauren Theis at 908-234-1852 x12 or email ltheis@urwa.org.

New Jersey Creates Plan to Keep Harmful Plants from Spreading

Last month the New Jersey Invasive Species Council completed a four-year effort to develop a plan to deal with the tremendous ecological and economic problems caused by the spread of invasive, non-native plants and animals across New Jersey. The threats posed to our state by invasive species are real: New Jersey suffers over $290 million in losses every year as a result of impacts from agricultural weeds and other pests. About 30 percent of the plants now growing in our state are not native. Plants including purple loosestrife and garlic mustard, which are widespread across our region, crowd out native plants and alter the composition, structure and function of ecosystems. Water chestnut and Eurasian water-milfoil are literally choking many lakes, ponds and streams right here in the Upper Raritan watershed.

The New Jersey Strategic Management Plan for Invasive Species provides practical, science-based recommendations to delineate control measures for troublesome species, utilize an early detection/rapid response methodology to prevent the establishment of new invasive species, and restore natural and agricultural systems that have been damaged. Furthermore, the plan calls for better public education and improved coordination among government agencies and neighboring states.
This plan needs our support! The Upper Raritan region offers areas of extraordinary natural beauty, wildlife habitat, agriculture, and it provides clean drinking water for all of us who live here and more than one million residents in other parts of New Jersey. To protect and preserve the natural systems on which all this ecological and agricultural productivity is based, we must stop the spread of invasive plant and animal species. URWA recognized this fact a few years ago and recently co-founded the Central Jersey Invasive Species Strike Team with the Friends of Hopewell Valley Open Space. The Strike Team represents our state's first comprehensive effort toward invasive plant management through a public-private partnership that is pooling its expertise and resources to reduce the spread of invasive plants. In its first year alone, the Strike Team detected 978 emerging invasive plant populations and eradicated 251 of them in the Highlands and Piedmont regions. The Strike Team’s 160 trained partners and volunteers also made presentations to civic groups, business associations and local leaders, reaching over 500 citizens with the message about stopping these plants before they degrade natural habitats and threaten biodiversity. The NJ Department of Environmental Protection cites our Strike Team as a model for what can (and should) be done state-wide.
Happily, implementation of the Strategic Management Plan for Invasive Species will be budget-neutral over the next two years. All of the near-term recommendations it makes can be accomplished by staff already in place and resources that are available now. These recommendations call for the State of New Jersey to implement such common-sense measures as:

• Establish a permanent NJ Invasive Species Council
• Establish ongoing communication channels between NJ and neighboring states
• Pre-screen all new plants proposed for introduction to NJ
• Prohibit the sale of invasive and potentially invasive plants
• Fully implement the statewide deer management program
• Apply Early Detection/ Rapid Response methods to prevent new infestations

Of course, these steps will not resolve all the problems related to the spread of invasive species, but they’ll go a long way before additional staff and resources will be required over the longer term. Please encourage Governor Christie and his Cabinet to implement the NJ Strategic Management Plan for Invasive Species. And, do your part – as you plan your spring and summer landscaping projects, make sure you do some research and avoid invasive or potentially invasive plants. You can get lots of great information about the plants that threaten our state and the ones that truly belong here on our Strike Team web site (www.cjisst.org).