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It is hard to believe that Summer is almost over, and we’ve certainly had a busy time of it in the watershed. I’d like to thank Blair Fleishmann for her four years of service on the Board. Although she is no longer working with OWA, Blair continues her busy schedule with many other Conservation oriented organizations. She currently serves on the Upper Oxford Township Historical Commission as well as supporting the Brandywine Conservancy, The Lancaster Farmland Trust and the Stroud Water Research Center. Thank You Blair, for your four years on the Board and for your dedication to the community. Please join me in welcoming Matt Kehoe to the Board. He’ll bring a perspective from the north-eastern part of the watershed. Welcome Matt! Pat Fasano has continued his work with the Amish community, visiting farms in Lancaster County on Tuesdays and Chester County on Fridays with our Amish Liaisons Henry Beiler and David Fisher. They have also completed a new outreach booklet that addresses Amish men and women not working on the farm. WE discovered that more than 60% of the Amish community do not farm. Our goal is to reconnect them to the land. 2009 was a watershed year for Amish easement applications. We have assisted more Amish farmers to preserve their farm in both counties, than any previous year by a wide margin. We have definitely gained their trust. The most significant example is we have actually had them call the watershed office to help them. Pat has also found time to work with Rupert Rossetti to get a grant to conduct a watershed assessment in the Cecil County portion of the watershed, and we look forward to seeing the results of their work. Aside from the ongoing Nitrate Task force and annual macro-invertebrate sampling, this is the first work we will have done on the Maryland side since 2005. You can read more about the project on the back page of this newsletter. Ed Thayer mteden@epix.net |
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President’s Message |
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Newsletter Fall 2009 |
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Celebrating 42 years of preserving and protecting the natural and historic resources of the Octoraro |
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Matthew (Matt) Kehoe is president of Kehoe Company, Inc., a 30-year-old sales agency. Matt holds a BS in civil engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and maintains a non-profit scholarship foundation for the Alpha Chi Rho chapter at RPI. He lives in the northeast corner of the watershed, with his wife Robbyn and their daughter Maeve. A small tributary to the Octoraro runs through the property, with one of the headwater springs in their basement! Matt has been a member of the OWA for the past twenty years and is most interested in working on projects in the Officer’s Run and Valley Creek sub-watersheds. You can contact Matt at mattkehoe@kehoeco.com |
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Our Mission: To restore and protect the natural resources of the scenic Octoraro Creek and to preserve and protect its farmlands, forest, and rural heritage through education, outreach, restoration, and community stewardship. |
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Please visit our booth at the 60th Solanco Fair, Wednesday September 16 through Friday September 18 www.solancofair.net |
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Around here we sometimes forget how scarce good soil is around the world. A common demonstration for students is to take an apple (representing the world) cut it into 4 quarters. Three of those quarters are water, leaving one quarter. Then cut the remaining quarter in half. One half is too mountainous, too hot or too cold. Then cut it in half again, the other half is too rocky, too steep, too dry or too wet. Then peel the top layer, leaving you with only a tiny section representing all the soil needed for growing food for all the people on this earth. Therefore take care of the soil, don’t let it wash downstream. Recently I attended a Crop Producers Conference at Penn State. The main speaker was Jill Clapperton, a Rhizosphere Ecologist. She presented a whole new outlook on the soil we stand on. Her focus was on establishing a healthy soil, thereby creating healthy plants and healthy animals. Ultimately improving soil quality increases soil productivity and food quality. She showed many pictures of creatures such as the ones below, which live in and on the soil. It is amazing how many different types of organisms live in the soil and how hard they are working and growing.
The pictures show springtails or Collembolas, which are micro-arthropods. These are extremely numerous in healthy soils and specialize in eating organic matter converting it to valuable nutrients for roots and other organisms to digest. All the soil organisms work together to create an extremely complex below ground food web. So our goal as landowners and farmers is to understand that it all begins with healthy living soil. Plain bare ground is not healthy, there needs to be something living in it and on it to sustain a healthy rhizosphere. This is one of the driving forces behind the strong movement for establishing cover crops and trying to have something growing green at all times. Raindrops hitting bare dirt will splash and dislodge small particles which can easily move downhill. A covered soil will greatly reduce the impact of a raindrop allowing more infiltration and less runoff. A healthy living soil has many organisms which work to create small and large biopores. These all contribute to stable soil aggregates and allow for soil aeration, better rooting and more recycling of nutrients. Certainly anytime you disturb the soil structure by tillage, you create an imbalance and destroy many living organisms in the soil. So think twice before hooking up to that plow or grapping for the shovel or garden tiller.
Thank you. |
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Ever see a wood duck streak through a wooded marsh? They can fly at a speedy 35-40 mph. The hen will often sound off an alarm call, hoo-eek, hoo-eek. This 1.5 pound duck prefers woodland streams and ponds for nesting and brood rearing. They feed upon wild rice, water lilies, acorns, nuts, beechnuts, grapes, berries and insects. In the Octoraro Watershed we have limited suitable habitat but where habitat exist the wood duck takes advantage of available nesting sites Wood ducks are cavity nesters and prefer natural tree cavities. In many areas and in our watershed these natural cavities are very limited. In 1994 nest boxes were placed along the East and West branches of the Octoraro Creek just upstream of the lake. Unfortunately the blizzard and then high waters in the mid winter of 1996 most of those boxes were destroyed. In the spring of 1996 the PA Game Commission, Chester Water Authority, Octoraro Watershed Association and the Oxford Chapter of Ducks Unlimited began to replace boxes and establish new ones. Before long 50 boxes provided nesting opportunities for wood ducks were in place. Since 1996 those 50 boxes have been maintained each year with annual checks to remove old nest material and add new wood chips. Most at this point have been replaced with new boxes. Some have been moved slightly to make them more enticing to the hens as they search for a nest site in mid March. Hens will return to same area each year and yearling |
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hens will return to the same vicinity to their home nest. The hens will lay 8 – 15 eggs and then begin incubation. All the eggs will hatch the same day and the ducklings must leave the nest within 24 hours. In the man-made nest boxes, fine wire is placed inside the box up to the hole so the little ducklings can exit the box. Predator guards are on each box to prevent loss to such predators as raccoons, black snakes and squirrels. Even with all this help only 20% of the young ducklings will survive their first year. To further help the wood ducks and other waterfowl that use our watershed for nesting and during migration, small portions of the East and West Branch of the Octoraro Creek just upstream from the lake have been posted as “Restricted Areas” to allow wildlife a place to rest. These no admittance areas provide waterfowl a place to rest during times when they are stressed the most, during migration, nesting periods, brood rearing and winter survival.
Those who have heard the call of the wood duck or listened to the hum of the marsh on an early spring night perhaps can understand the labor of love that goes into maintaining wood duck boxes, providing the resting areas, conserving and preserving our Octoraro Watershed. |
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The Octoraro Watershed Association was successful in securing a grant from Maryland’s Chesapeake Bay Trust (www.cbtrust.org) and MD Department of Natural Resources (www.dnr.state.md.us) to conduct an assessment in the Stone Run sub-watershed. The goal is to identify and prioritize between ten and twenty “in the ground” projects that can be implemented to improve water quality and reduce Stormwater run-off. The Center for Watershed Protection (www.cwp.org), based in Ellicott City, MD, will be our technical partner, and will conduct both a stream corridor assessment, to identify in stream problems, and an “upland” assessment, to identify the root causes of those problems. The work will take place this Fall, with a final report and plan for implementation completed by year-end. Rupert and Pat Fasano will be working with Bryan Seipp of CWP, who will be the project manager.
Stone Run is located on the PA / MD border, with the bulk of the watershed in Maryland, and includes the town of Rising Sun. We received letters of support from the Mayor, the Cecil County Commissioners, and the Upper Western Shore Tributary Team, as well as encouragement from the Cecil Soil Conservation District and the Natural Resources Conservation Service. Thanks to one and all!
If you have any questions, or if you live in the Stone Run watershed and have some information to share, please contact Rupert by email or at 410-378-3473 |
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