A New Life for the Willett Branch; A New Park for the Westbard Sector

New development is coming to the Westbard sector and it will increase the density of the area three-fold.  New residential and mixed use building will be where small shops once operated.  With this change, we MUST have green space.  The Draft Master Plan proposes a new Stream Valley Park and a naturalized Willett Branch creek which would run through the sector like "a green ribbon" providing residents with walking trails, seating and a way to enjoy the outdoors.

Email the Planning Board HERE to tell them that you support this vision for the sector and that no changes should be made or exceptions granted in the new master plan. If the email doesn't work for you, you can download a sample letter HERE.

Email NOW!  The Planning Board meets on December 3 to discuss the environment elements of the Proposed plan.

WE WANT THIS, 

Willett Branch as it could be.

NOT THIS,

Sample Letter Supporting the Naturalization of the Willett Branch in the Westbard Sector.

Download a copy HERE.

 Dear______________________

I support a Westbard Sector Plan that includes a naturalized Willett Branch.  The environmental planners have come up with an innovated design that makes the creek an amenity for the area – a place where people can walk, enjoy nature and congregate.  The current state of this creek is shameful.  The walls are covered in graffiti and the banks are lined with trash.  It winds behind the building where it is out of sight and out of mind. But it doesn’t have to be that way.  Instead of turning their backs to the creek, new development would embrace the creek as part of their open space making the Westbard Sector a show place for the County.

Moving forward, we need open space for the new residents of the Westbard sector to stretch their legs and enjoy the beautiful natural area that the Little Falls watershed has to offer.  Please vote to support a Master Plan with strong environmental component and a naturalized Willett Branch with no exemptions or waiver for any development or developer. 

Sincerely,

______________________________

Contact Information

Planning Board
Casey Anderson, Chair
M-NCPPC
8787 Georgia Ave.
Silver Spring, MD 20910
MCP-Chair@mncppc-mc.org

County Council
Council Office Building
100 Maryland Avenue, 5th Floor
Rockville, MD 20850
county.council@montgomerycountymd.gov

County Executive Ike Leggett
Office of County Executive
Executive Office Building, 2nd floor
101 Monroe St., Rockville, MD 20850
ike.leggett@montgomerycountymd.gov
ocemail@montgomerycountymd.gov  

Mow Your Leaves for a Better Environment!

Big piles of leaves by the curb, a certain sign of autumn and lots of fun for kids to jump in. What could be wrong with that? Not to be the Grinch Who Stole Leaf Pile Jumping, but everything. Leaves in the gutter make their way to the creek where they decompose and cause nutrient bloom. Leaves in the gutter mean no leaves around the base of your trees where they provide an organic blanket for the trees during the winter. Leaves in the gutter mean you are wasting valuable nutrients for your lawn.

So, this year, take a tip from Winterthur, the spectacular DuPont gardens in Delaware and mow your leaves right on the lawn.

From a Washington Post article

For more than 20 years, the gardeners at this expansive and famously leafy estate have been mowing leaves with (...) lawn mowers. The machines inhale the leaves, chop them into shreds and deposit them as the mower moves along. Engine noise is confined to the muted chug of the mower, not the incessant high-pitch whine of the leaf blower.And there are no bags to unhook and drag anywhere, just a confetti-like litter left on the grass. Ripped into morsel-size pieces, the flakes melt away in two or three weeks as microbes and worms do their work of enriching the soil.

It is such a simple system that (Chris) Strand, garden director, and Long, assistant garden curator, wonder why it hasn't caught on. They are certainly converts in their own gardens. "I spend a fraction of the time I used to spend raking and transporting leaves," says Strand.

This process is endorsed by none other than the Scotts Fertilizer Company. On their website, they recommend you

Take the grass catcher off your mower and mow over the leaves on your lawn. You want to reduce your leaf clutter to dime-size pieces. You'll know you're done when about half an inch of grass can be seen through the mulched leaf layer. Once the leaf bits settle in, microbes and worms get to work recycling them. Any kind of rotary-action mower will do the job, and any kind of leaves can be chopped up. With several passes of your mower, you can mulch up to 18 inches of leaf clutter.

So, give your rake a rest, save the local government some money and help the environment all by mowing your leaves. It works for the Winterthur Estates and it will work for you. When spring arrives, you'll see great results. The leaf litter you mowed this fall will have disappeared. And your grass will look greener than ever.

And if your children need a pile to jump it, rake them one and when they're jumped out, put those leaves under your trees and around your shrubs - free and beautiful mulch!

Great Lawn Fertilizer and Winter Habitat

The National Wildlife Federation states "In addition to becoming natural fertilizer for your soil, leaves that stay where they fall create “mini ecosystems,” according to another post by the group. Chipmunks, salamanders, earthworms, turtles and other small creatures live in the leaves or use them for food and nesting material, and butterflies and moth pupae like to spend the winter in the leaf layers."

University of Michigan Study Endorses Mulching

Here's another good article about mowing your leaves that sings praises to the value of mulching your leaves right on the grass.

http://www.mlive.com/homeandgarden/index.ssf/2012/10/mulched_leaves_offer_food_prot.html

The author addresses the problem of oak leaves - hard to mulch, but with patience, they will shred.

Fine Gardening Magazine Encourages Leaving the Leaves

Mowing leaves into your lawn can improve its vigor, and unraked leaves in planting beds don’t smother shade-tolerant perennials
by Terry Ettinger

If you dread the annual fall leaf-raking marathon, I have good news for you: Raking and collecting leaves every autumn is a tradition without scientific basis. Research has proven that mowing leaves into your lawn can improve its vigor, and observation shows that unraked leaves in planting beds don’t smother shade-tolerant perennials.  Click HERE to read more.

Norwood Meadow is Blooming

The hard work of hundreds of volunteers working countless hours to clear invasives non-natives and plant almost native 1,000 wildflowers has paid off!  The meadow at Norwood Park has been blooming all summer!

The first flowers we saw were Old Man's Beard (Penstemon digitalis) followed by a lot of grasses. The Norwood Meadow is almost 50% grasses to provide winter habitat for small mammals and food for birds.  Next we saw Sweet Cecily (Osmorhiza claytonia), a native wildflower that came up on its own!

June brought more grasses with beautiful seed heads and a few black eyed susans, as well as mint. We planted 3 kinds of milkweed in the fall and they all came up, but none of them bloomed.  This is common for first year milk-weed.

Finally, the meadow is in a riot of bloom with woodland sunflowers (Helianthus divaricatus), goldenrod (three varieties of Solidago) wild lettuce, purple mistflower Conoclinium coelestinum) and boneset (Eupatorium serotinum).  

I have been going through old pictures and it's gratifying to see the before and after photos.

Our work, however, is not over and we have another planting day planned for November.  We also need a lot of help weeding as mile-a-minute and porcelainberry are aggressively returning.  There is a weeding work day scheduled for Saturday, September 19.   Details are on our website.

Tallamy on Caterpillars, Song Birds and Native Plants

What a treat to hear Doug Tallamy talk last week. Doug is the author of Bringing Nature Home: How Native Plants Sustain Wildlife in Our Gardens.  He advocates very persuasively for native bio-diversity in our own yard and his talk featured lots of pictures of caterpillars.  Caterpillars, it turns out, tell us a lot about the health of our eco-system.  Each type of caterpillar needs a specific host plant and if you don't have that host plant, you won't have the caterpillar or its adult phase - butterfly or moth. And we need butterflies to pollinate, but more important we need a lot of caterpillars to feed song bird nestlings, small mammals, larger mammals, spiders and more. And we need a lot of different types of caterpillars because with ecological health is measured in bio-diversity.  

Tallamy wants us to create native areas in our own yards.  We could focus on restoring natural area, but he points out that all the lawn in American equal many, many more acres than the National Parks, so they are a logical place to start to restore native plants.  If just half the lawns in American planted native plants, it would give us some 20 million acres of native space.  

One take away was just try a 12' by 12' native spot in your yard.  He counted caterpillars in 12 x 12 native gardens versus 12 x 12 gardens with no native plants.  It was shocking - the plots with native plants had 100s of caterpillars and the non-native 1 or 2.  This is because butterflies and moths only eat the native plants they evolved with.  He also spent a lot of time counting how many caterpillars birds need to feed their young - something like 6,000 for a little bird feeding three nestlings.  So, even a little native plot will go a long way to helping the food chain.

Some good resources for native plant lists and sales can be found on our website at 
at http://www.lfwa.org/bay-friendly-gardening  and http://www.lfwa.org/updates/are-you-attracting-butterflies-your-garden   

Also, Doug Tallamy's website - http://www.bringingnaturehome.net/ is an excellent source for bang-for-your-buck plant lists.
Sarah

Sarah Morse
Executive Director
Little Falls Watershed Alliance

Tips for Controlling Lesser Celandine

Every year, we get a lot of emails oohing and ahhing over the beautiful yellow flowers that have blanketed the Parks.  These are lesser celandine and while they are pretty, they are diabolical.  A non-native invasive from Europe, it has crowded out native spring wildflowers to the point where we are seeing none.  Our native birds and pollinators cannot feed on the celandine, so we are also see a decline in native insects.  One field study of celandine found no pollinators in the site they were censusing.  That is scary!  But the most scary part is that the celandine cannot be pulled or easily controlled.  It grows from little corn size tubers which live 8 inches underground.  If you pull the tops, the tubers break off the sprout again.  

Meghan Fellows who is in charge of the Weed Warrior program and has been monitoring the problem sends this information on how to control or eradicate it.  It's lengthy but thorough and worth reading.    One take away is don't plant it in your yards.  It will take over everywhere.

From Meghan Fellows:

Dear Weed Warriors,

Many of you have sent in questions and concerns about lesser celandine.

Yes, it is getting worse. Floods and dispersal events spread this plant throughout our area. They are also extremely good and taking over new ground. Those pesky yellow carpets of weeds have replaced what should be a bounty of spring ephemerals (and their pollinators) are painful to watch - we want to DO something.

Unfortunately, science has not kept up with our need. There is NO good, reliable way to kill celandine.

Some popular suggestions:

Dig it out.

Most people know not to pull it out - those pesky underground bulbils stick around and thrive in the disturbed soil. So people have resorted to digging out the clumps whole. This can work in areas where the soil, moisture and all other factors are inline. It generates a ton of waste (soil and plant matter) and does a number on the health of the soil you're leaving behind.

This waste cannot be home composted, so the only option is to send it to the county yard waste compost.

This works best in garden beds, or in very small infestations (1-10 plants).


20% Acetic acid

20% Acetic acid has been herralded as the organic alternate to glyphosate. Many people forget that when you're using it to kill plants it is a pesticide (not allowed for volunteers to use on parkland). However, let's explore this tool as to whether it is useful in a private situation. The mechanism of how it kills is important to consider when trying it out on a new species/situation. It is a top "burn" killer. Meaning above ground plant parts will die, but the roots do not die. Therefore this would best used on an annual plant, or in a situation where you could apply it repeatedly (not more often than every 2 weeks). 20% Acetic acid is actually recommended for sidewalk/driveway cracks and in gravel. But do be careful and wear protective gear, this is a strong acid and can burn. Household vinegar is 5% acetic acid and appears to have no consistent effect.

Lesser celandine is a perrennial - 20% acetic acid is unlikely to have any long term effect. I know of no direct, replicated experimental studies on the species/treatment, only anecdotes.

Here is a paper from University of Maryland on the topic: http://extension.umd.edu/sites/default/files/_docs/programs/ipmnet/Vinegar-AnAlternativeToGlyphosate-UMD-Smith-Fiola-and-Gill.pdf


Flame weeding

Flame weeding using a propane based torch is another method that achieves the top "burn." It leaves no residues at all in the soil. The roots/bulbils may or may not be affected. It has been used extensively for stiltgrass - key thing to note, stiltgrass is an annual. Theory says flame weeding should not work on lesser celandine, but a few Weed Warriors and I have an extensive trial set up in Sligo, Little Falls and Capitol View Homewood Parks. We have been working on this since February. I hope to finish collecting data by late May, analyze it this summer and maybe have a new method for next year. Or at least an answer as to whether it might work

Glyphosate
The only current reliable method of killing lesser celanine is to use glyphosate. As you all know we only use herbicides when it is absolutely necessary, and then in the minimum amount required.

The protocol for lesser celandine control is to foliar spray celandine in the time in the spring after it has leaves but before it goes to flower (typically less than 50% of the plants have buds). This is an incredibly narrow window that we are now out of. This year it was about March 27-April 6.

You must repeat this cycle for 3 years in a row.

I read this summary as there is no good method for controlling celandine. Many people have told me what worked for them in their own garden, and we appreciate that - we are looking at extensive infestations throughout parkland. All of the stream valleys and many of the parks in between do have celandine. This is a massive infestation.

What can you do?

Avoid areas with celandine. Avoid digging in them, or even walking through them. In a few months (usually by mid-June) the celandine has senesced and you can go back to work.

Garlic mustard on the other hand is out now, and there are key spots in the county that could use a lot of help (Sligo for one). Please pick garlic mustard!

Support efforts to research better ways to kill celandine.

Grow native ephemerals, if you can, in your own spaces. Studies have shown private yards can provide refugia for native pollinators and insects.

And please remind people not to plant lesser celandine! I've been told a number of stories of people removing it from parkland to put in their yards as it was "so pretty."

Meghan Fellows
Weed Warrior Volunteer Coordinator
(301) 962-1343 (o)
(301) 938-2399 (c)

meghan.fellows@montgomeryparks.org

Equity One Releases Concept Drawings for Westbard Sector

This is from Robest Dyer@BethesdaRow -

Equity One is showing the first images of its plans for properties it owns in the Westbard Sector of Bethesda, and previewed them at a media event on Wednesday, Feb 4, 2015. This was a somewhat unusual move, to reveal the renderings for reporters instead of at a large community meeting, or pre-submittal public meeting. The firm's Executive VP of Development, Michael Berfield, said he doesn't anticipate having a large meeting like those held last year again, saying that "at some point they become counterproductive." Instead, Berfield said, he is meeting with small groups, such as the Kenwood and Springfield Civic Associations. Click HERE for complete story...

Dog Poop and Fecal Bacteria

• Did you know that the fecal bacteria count in the Little Falls Branch is dangerously high?
• Did you know that dog wastes contributes significantly to the count?
• Did you know that by scoop the poop and disposing of it in your toilet or trash can, you can make a difference!

Dog Poop has been on a lot of people's mind lately!  It seems like snow brings out the worse in us and no one wants to pick it up.  We all know no one wants to step it it, but there are environmental considerations too.  Yes, it is organic and it does break down, but the ground can only absorb so much.  The rest is washed off the yards, out of the woods and into the creek.

The average dog produces almost 300 pounds of poop a year.  That's a lot to step in, but also a lot of pollution.  

According to the NJ Department of Environmental Protection: 

Pet waste contains bacteria and parasites, as well as organic matter and nutrients, notably nitrogen and phosphorous. 
Some of the diseases that can be spread from pet waste are:

• Campylobacteriosis- a bacterial infection that causes diarrhea in humans.

• Salmonellosis- the most common bacterial infection transmitted to humans from animals. Symptoms include fever, muscle aches, headache, vomiting, and diarrhea.

• Toxocarisis- roundworms transmitted from animals to humans. Symptoms include vision loss, rash, fever, or cough.

In addition to these diseases, the organic matter and nutrients contained in pet waste can degrade water quality. When pet waste is washed into a surface water body, the waste decays. This process of breaking down the organic matter in the waste uses up dissolved oxygen and releases ammonia. Low oxygen levels, increased ammonia and warm summer water temperatures can kill fish.

Excess phosphorous and nitrogen added to surface waters can lead to cloudy, green water from accelerated algae and weed growth. Decay of this extra organic matter can depress oxygen levels, killing organisms. Objectionable odors can also occur.

You can make a difference for clean water and clean shoes by scooping the poop.  A simple plastic bag full of poop in the trash, or even better, flushed down your toilet keeps fecal bacteria out of the creek.