NICHES Land Trust

Another 37 Acres donated in Carroll County: Frog’s Glory!

marykate — Thu, 17 May 2012 13:01:06 +0000

Margaret Marchand, artist and resident of Carroll County, has generously donated land along the Tippecanoe River to NICHES. Having inherited the cabin and land from her parents in 1998, Margaret moved from Arizona, continuing her art inspired by the natural surroundings. The land includes restored prairie bursting with little bluestem, purple and yellow coneflowers along with oak/ hickory woods bejeweled with crimson fire pinks, wake robin trilliums and spring beauties. 37 acres in total will be donated to NICHES by Margaret. As per Margaret’s request the property will be named Frogs Glory, in honor of the one room school house that her mom taught at in Tippecanoe County. At this time, there are no plans to develop trails on the land. But the property will be open to the public for their quiet enjoyment of the natural world from dawn to dusk every day of the year.

It’s people like Margaret that inspire us here at NICHES to continue the work we do…those whose values include preserving and restoring these natural lands for an entire community of plants, animals and people to thrive and survive.

Join the Delphi Opera House Gallery of Contemporary Art for a reception in honor of Margaret Marchand and her paintings on Thursday May 31 at 6 pm located at 109 S Washington Street in Delphi.

Mussels Report

marykate — Thu, 03 May 2012 17:45:28 +0000

John Tritt has been helping NICHES in many ways from helping to eradciate reed canary as pictured at Indian Creek Basin to inventoring properties. For the past year, he has been working with the DNR along NICHES Justice property on the Wabash River in Cass County.

While the walks I have had along the limestone bluffs on the river have always turned up lots of mussels of different species, I was very happy to get John’s report this morning. 30 species of mussles found, and only 4 were solely represented by weathered shells. Among the 30 are a Federally endangered species, Northern Riffleshell, and an additional state endagered, Sheepnose and state special consern, Kidney Shell.

Each species of mussels has a unique life history, with the larval stage attaching to a particular species of fish or group of fishes before dropping off and living out there lives in their clam stage which has limited mobility. Without the fish host, the mussel will die out. As an adult the mussel faces a multitude a threats from siltation and chemicals that inhibit reproduction. The presence of such a rich diversity of mussels is a testament to the quality of the Wabash River in Cass County.

Hopefully we can all work together to keep the Wabash trending in an improving direction.

Pistol Grip mussel pictured below

Join NICHES on the water this Saturday!

marykate — Thu, 03 May 2012 15:55:48 +0000

For those interested in the Carroll County float for Saturday May 5.

Water levels look great for Deer Creek.

We will plan to meet on state road 75 just south of Camden on the north side of the bridge at 10 AM ET. There are 2 trips that people can take, either 3.7 miles to county road 300 N or 10.5 miles to Delphi. We will figure out the various shuttles with the people that are going in the morning. If you are planning on attending, please give me a call 765-427-4345 or drop me an email gnyberg@nicheslandtrust.org

Unfortunatley, we do not have extra boats so this trip is for people with boats only.

Peace

McAllister Foundation pledges more for Acquisitions!

marykate — Fri, 27 Apr 2012 14:31:24 +0000

McAllister Foundation has informed us that they have pledged $25,000 which brings us very close to finishing the fundraising effort for Mulvey Pond. Our fundraising goal for this property was just under $90,000 which included purchase price and funds to steward and restore this property in perpetuity. Their pledge now brings us just $4,000 shy of our total goal. We are excited, with the closing on the yet unnamed 65 acres in Warren and Tippecanoe County this past week NICHES now protects over 2,600 acres – please join us and the McAllister Foundation and lend your support to these preservation efforts.

Getting Out and Let Your Kids Get Dirty for Earth Day

gnyberg — Sat, 21 Apr 2012 13:16:07 +0000

This report recommends making Mud Pies for Earth Day!

The National Wildlife Federation report makes that case by highlighting the benefits of letting children get messy outside – and its release coincides with Earth Day activities in Indiana this weekend. Dirt is good, a new report says – especially for children. Meri Margaret Deoudes, who oversees the federation’s “Be Out There” initiative, says most youngsters naturally want to be messy and cites good reasons to let them dig around.

“There’s some natural bacteria in dirt. Don’t think too much about it as a parent, but that actually helps build up their immune system.” Getting grubby equals happiness for many children, she says, and scientists have found some clues about why.

“Some of the research is showing that there is something in dirt that actually triggers serotonin, which makes kids more happy, more relaxed, and also some of the studies are showing that that helps them perform better in school.”

For young children, Deoudes says, there are tactile benefits to playing in the dirt. Encouraging them to make mud pies and create forts also counts as exercise, she says.

NICHES lands were highlighted in Public News Service story. http://www.publicnewsservice.org/index.php?/content/article/25999-1

Join Gus out at Holley Savanna this weekend with the kids.

BIOBLITZ at Weiler Leopold

gnyberg — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 15:11:25 +0000

On May 5 a bioblitz will be held at NICHES WeilerLeopold/ Black Rock Barrens Nature Preserve. Details are still be worked out, but the current plan is to inventory plants, fish, snakes and salamanders from 3-5 PM and crepsucular species from 8:30 to 11 PM. A dinner at Martell for volunteers in between.

While we know many things about the lands that we protect, there are many more that we do not know and bioblitzes can be a great way to gather people towards the goal of discovering what is on the land.

If interested, mark the date on your calendar and let Gus Nyberg gnyberg@nicheslandtrust.org or 754-423-1605 know and we will forward details as they are solidified.

The Blitz is being arranged by Steve Kimble of Purdue. Steve has been researching box turtles and used Weiler Leopold as a portion of his study area.

Protected Lands growing near Black Rock

gnyberg — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 17:33:24 +0000

Property being acquired is in black, Current NICHES lands in red and County lands in green

NICHES recieved word this weekend of the Roy Whistler Foundations generous support of $75,675 for the permanent protection of 59 acres between Black Rock and Tippecanoe County Parks’ Ross Hills and Camp properties. We expect to close and take ownership of this property within a months time.

The new property is a mixture of mature xeric oak woods carpeted with cut leaf toothwort right now, some woods with a recent grazing history, siltstone barren ravine and an upland field that will be restored within the next couple of years and Wabash River floodplain that was retired last year.

While we have a couple pieces to go still, the addition of these lands brings us one big step closer to securing a lasting connection for people and wildlife to move through this landscape unimpeded.

While the support from the Roy Whistler Foundation is fantastic, we are still in need of $34,320 of support from individuals (like you) to meet our total goal of $181,995.

Wright Rock Creek

gnyberg — Mon, 19 Mar 2012 19:48:40 +0000

Roughly 2/3 of the 40 acres south the creek on the property were farmed roughy 45 years ago. The area was allowed to revert back to nature, and has largely been colonized by black cherries, black locust, multiflora rose, autumn olive, hackberry and a few oak trees. All those species of except the oaks do not produce much in terms of combustible leaves. In this portion of the preserve with financial assistance from NRCS and the USFWS, we have begun a long term restoration that will involve controlling the nonnative elements, thinning the canopy through girdling and dropping undesirable species to allow light to reach the woodland floor, seeding in acorns and grasses to slowly build up a new generation of oaks and associated plants.

The other 1/3 of the south side is a good quality woodland with snow trillium, cow parsnips, cut leaf toothworts, skunk cabbage, march marigolds and fire pink to name a few. We returned fire to a 2 acre portion of the property in 2011, which went well and this past Saturday returned fire to the whole south side. The flames are not dramatic, usually less than 2′, but can still alter and change the community.

While most of the former agricultural areas did not burn and we did not expect them to with this burn, the intact woods burned well. A few spring ephemerals were burned up, most will return quickly this year and vigorously next, but the occasional fire every 4-8 years will do much to control early leafing out woody species such as ohio buckeye which is quite prevalent in the bottoms and do not respond as well to the fires.

Wright Rock Creek has a short trail that winds through the south side of the preserve, and will be a great place to watch the recovery of oak woodlands in our area.

Fire

gnyberg — Tue, 06 Mar 2012 18:20:46 +0000

Burning season is upon us. Over the next 6 weeks, we will be conducting controlled burns on a number of NICHES properties.

Fire helps us to control the structure of the woodlands by eliminating fire sensitive species and allowing oaks to thrive. In prairies and woodlands, the process of fire leaves minerals on the soil and in more readilly available state for plants to uptake. The fertilization of plants can be seen in the increase bloom of flowers in burn units.

If you have a desire to participate on fires, or to observe fires, please get in touch and let us know and we will keep informed of when they will occur.

Conducting fire is dependent on the weather, we need certain conditions in regards to the wind speed/ direction along relative humidity and temperature to be within pararmeters outlined in burn plans for the units.

Burning conditions look good for this Friday March 9. We will hopefully be burning 2 units, one during the day at Indian Creek Basin and the other at Warren Piece (located near Carbondale in Warren County and not a NICHES property) in the evening. If you want to observe, the evening fire is the better, restroom facilities and an opportunity to cook out afterwards. Let us know if you would like and we can send you directions to Warren Piece.

Cheers

First signs of spring

marykate — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 16:27:40 +0000

Ron Haston sent this picture from Weiler Leopold. Just a hint that spring is around the corner! What are you waiting for?! Let’s get out into the great outdoors!