beaver creek wetlands association the spotted...

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In this Issue Creek Restoration................ 1, 6-7 Upcoming Workshops .................1 From the President ......................2 Volunteer Accomplishments .......3 Invasive Plants ........................ 4-5 Creek Census .......................... 7-8 Investing in Wetlands ..................8 Letters .........................................8 Spotted Turtle Society .................9 Beaver Creek Wetlands Association The Spotted Turtle Volume 22, No. 4 Winter 2009 www.beavercreekwetlands.org Beavercreek residents and bike path users have surely noticed major earth-moving work along a stretch of the Little Beaver Creek between North Fairfield and Factory Roads. The Greene County Park District with assistance from many local groups recently secured a federal grant to improve the stream. Work there will reroute and repair parts of the stream for erosion and flood control, water quality, wildlife conservation and scenic beauty. Little Beaver Creek restoration under way The workshop on Wetland Mitigation Banking and Wetland Delineation will be open to the public and is particu- larly suited to a mix of individuals including developers, consultants, conservationists, community planners, regulatory agencies, park personnel, scientists and students. The worshop is in planning and will feature well- known key speakers to explain current knowledge and regulations regarding wetlands. A field trip to wetland and stream restoration sites will cap off the meeting. The workshop will be held at Wright State University November 12–13, 2009. Watch for more detailed information in the next issue of the newsletter. The Midwest Native Plant Conference will be held July 24-26, 2009 at the Hope Hotel by Wright Patterson AFB. The focus will be on native prai- ries and wetlands, the importance of native plant communities and how you can include these elements in your landscapes. The workshop includes programs and field trips. A percentage of the proceeds will benefit the Beavercreek Wetland Association and the Marianist Environmental Education Center(MEEC). Local vendors will be available to address your native plant needs. For more information e-mail [email protected]. Upcoming Wetland Workshops Slated for 2009 Complete story on page 6 > Above: erosion which severly undercut a hillside is being halted by moving the stream many yards to the north. Photo by Jim Amon

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In this IssueCreek Restoration ................ 1, 6-7Upcoming Workshops .................1From the President ......................2Volunteer Accomplishments .......3Invasive Plants ........................ 4-5Creek Census .......................... 7-8Investing in Wetlands ..................8Letters .........................................8Spotted Turtle Society .................9

Beaver Creek Wetlands Association

The Spotted TurtleVolume 22, No. 4 Winter 2009

www.beavercreekwetlands.org

Beavercreek residents and bike path users have surely noticed major earth-moving work along a stretch of the Little Beaver Creek between North Fairfield and Factory Roads. The Greene County Park District with assistance from many local groups recently secured a federal grant to improve the stream. Work there will reroute and repair parts of the stream for erosion and flood control, water quality, wildlife conservation and scenic beauty.

Little Beaver Creek restoration under way

The workshop on Wetland Mitigation Banking and Wetland Delineation will be open to the public and is particu-larly suited to a mix of individuals including developers, consultants, conservationists, community planners, regulatory agencies, park personnel, scientists and students. The worshop is in planning and will feature well-known key speakers to explain current knowledge and regulations regarding wetlands. A field trip to wetland and stream restoration sites will cap off the meeting. The workshop will be held at Wright State University November 12–13, 2009. Watch for more detailed information in the next issue of the newsletter.

The Midwest Native Plant Conference will be held July 24-26, 2009 at the Hope Hotel by Wright Patterson AFB.

The focus will be on native prai-ries and wetlands, the importance of native plant communities and how you can include these elements in your landscapes. The workshop includes programs and field trips.

A percentage of the proceeds will benefit the Beavercreek Wetland Association and the Marianist Environmental Education Center(MEEC). Local vendors will be available to address your native plant needs. For more information e-mail [email protected].

Upcoming Wetland Workshops Slated for 2009

Complete story on page 6 >

Above: erosion which severly undercut a hillside is being halted by moving the stream many yards to the north.Photo by Jim Amon

2 Spotted Turtle—Winter 2009

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Spotted Turtle Name and Logo: Noted area wildlife artist Charley Harper generously donated the art for our logo in 1988. Charley passed away in 2007 and will be sorely missed. His work has been adopted by the National Park Service and is appreciated worldwide. Our newsletter recognizes the Spotted Turtle as an icon for the many rare animals and plants protected in the Beaver Creek Wetlands.

Submissions, Questions, or Comments: We rely on members like

President’s Message

Founded in 1988, the Mission of the Beaver Creek Wetlands Association is to protect the wetland ecosystem in the Beaver Creek watershed through partnerships, community networks, and public education.

Welcome to a whole new year in the wetlands!

you to make this newsletter the product of several diverse voices. If you have an idea for an article or a picture to include, please send them to [email protected]. Also, we welcome any comments or questions. For submissions, questions, or comments, please include “newsletter” in the subject line of your e-mail. We reserve the right to edit for content or clarity.

Donations of Land/Easements: If you are interested in donating land, placing an easement on property, or re-membering the BCWA in your will, please

don’t hesitate to call the Beaver Creek Wetlands Association at (937) 320-9042.

BCWA Annual Report: Copies are available by request. E-mail the office at [email protected] or call (937) 320-9042.

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The next twelve months are full of promise, excitement, and yes, hard work.

Ahead is a new year of helping our wetlands to re-charge the aquifer which is our community’s water source. Did you know that the mitigation project north of Phillips Park (#10 on our map) helps recharge our aquifer with upwards to 5,000,000 gallons of water per day? Water sup-ply and water quality is a world-wide concern and we take pride in this effort by the BCWA and our partner, Greene County Parks District who own this particular site, and the Greene County Sanitary Engineering Department who constructed this wetland, to protect our source and ensure its future.

Our calendar is filling up with projects for 2009:• The work to control invasive species continues with

renewed vigor.• An expanded trail system for the Koogler Reserve (#6 on

our map), owned by partner Beavercreek Township, is to get underway in spring, thanks to a grant from the Dayton Foundation and the leadership of Trustee Rob Evans.

• Public outreach is increasing with speaking engagements before community organizations.

• Educational literature is being designed to involve chil-dren in wetland discovery.

• New signage for all of the public access sites of the Bea-ver Creek Wetlands, including specific site information and maps, is planned for summer installation.

Come take a hike, see some birds, snap a photo! Come see turtles, frogs, flowers and more. This is a whole new year for you to discover the natural beauty and ever chang-ing vistas of the extensive Beaver Creek Wetlands.

Susie Scott, President, BCWA

Beaver Creek Wetlands Association 3

ACCOMPLISHMENTS OF OUR VOLUNTEERS

FOR 2008

Creekside ReserveGreene County ParksOur volunteers have been very busy this year removing invasive species like Bradford Pear, yellow clover, cattails, lesser celandine, sweetflag and—yes, we still have honeysuckle. Recently they planted 77 native wildflower plugs, like Cardinal Flower and Lobelia, grown in Don Geiger’s MEEC nursery, and 10 Black Haw Viburnum plants dug early in the spring and nurtured through the summer. These will add a lot of color to the area next summer and fall. The Little Beaver Creek is being redesigned between Factory Road and N. Fairfield Road to change and improve the stream dynamics during heavy rains. Look at it from the bike path. It looks a little raw now with all the clear-ing, but just give it a little time.

Phillips Park Township Park: next to Rotary Park off Dayton-Xenia RoadA dam that controls the water level in the Phillips Park Wetland was renovat-ed (muskrats and erosion have rerout-ed some of the water) by laying down a special filter cloth leading to the dam and constructing new flow control structures. The banks were then lined with big stone. Over 80.5 volunteer hours later the project was completed. This represented moving tons of stone chain gang style. Check it out. Park at the barn, walk over the hill down to the creek, bridge and dam. In addition, on Greene County land upstream of Phillips Park, the Boy Scouts built an observation tower involving over 400 hours of the scouts’ time. A picture and write-up was in our last newsletter on our web site.

Fairborn Marsh Beaver Creek Wetlands Assoc.: north of the Division of Wildlife’s parking lot on New Germany-Trebein RoadHoneysuckle has been our main focus this summer and fall. Clearing of trails took 15 hours after the fall windstorm and 57 more hours were mostly spent clearing honeysuckle from the woods area next to the marsh. Some new plantings also were made from

Volunteers have collected seeds for replanting of the cleared areas. This year’s Creekside volunteer hours totaled 485.5 and represented 20 different individuals and ages from 13 to 67.

Removing drain tile—Woo Hoo!

This volunteer is a “natural.” A Baltimore Checkerspot caterpillar helps control invasive honeysuckle.

Volunteering works—pass it on.

the nursery and from plants grown by our volunteers. The removal of honeysuckle allows moisture to be maintained and sunlight to penetrate the ground allowing seeds we never knew were there to sprout this spring. Some volunteers collected or planted seeds in the prairie or woodland, too. A big contribution to our efforts was the time donated by Fairborn Parks to mow the south section of the prairie in preparation for a burn scheduled this fall or winter.

TrainingStudents learned to identify and eradicate Purple Loosestrife, adding 12 more hours of volunteering at the Siebenthaler Fen.

... And The OthersThe above numbers do not involve the time preparing tools for doing the work or planning, which our technical advisors, Professors Jim Amon and Brother Don Geiger log each year. The BCWA organization wishes to thank all the volunteers and advisors for a job well done. You are making a tremendous difference for future generations to enjoy. We invite you readers to join us in the spring, as our tasks will involve a new trail and possible tower and yes—more honeysuckle. Watch our website for announcements. Gloves and boots are usually required, but what a learning experience!! —Robert Louis

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4 Spotted Turtle—Winter 2009

they really look quite different from the PLS. All of these plants are long-lived perennials.

Purple loosestrifeLythrum salicaria

PLS came from Europe as an herb, a garden flower and probably in great numbers as seed contaminating the ballast (stones and water) used to stabilize the ships of the day back in the 1800s—maybe earlier. It seems to have landed on the east coast and slowly spread west and a little south-ward. The seeds are tiny and stick to almost anything, so people, mammals, birds brushing by the plant, stepping in the mud around it our sloshing through the water become transporters of seed.

As the seed germinates in the spring it becomes buoyant and easily floats downstream with the flowing water. When it settles on a muddy bank it quickly injects a rootlet and grows, sometimes quickly enough to bloom and produce seed in the first year. Lots of seed! Each seed capsule

can contain dozens of seed and a small plant may have hundreds of seed capsules, larger plants produce seeds by the tens of thousands. In my studies we found germination rates of the seed to be around 90 to 99%!

PLS grows rapidly and soon pro-duces a dense mat of roots with many subsurface sprouts, so that by the time the plant is two or three years old it is virtually impossible to pull these plants out of the ground without leav-ing a viable sprout behind. The plants can grow very close together and their roots intertwine, forming a solid mass of nearly rock-hard material. When the seed of a competing native plant tries to germinate it can’t find soil, and the PLS has already captured most of the nutrient available.

Of course this dense growth crowds out other plants, too. PLS often towers above its competitors, shading them from nourishing sunlight. I have seen some plants up to 8 feet tall. PLS can really grow fast, too. In the lab I put a cutting of a stem in pure water and when I looked three days later it had roots 4 inches long—lots of them. So, that means that pieces of stem floating down stream can establish even when seed are not present. Yikes!

So why don’t insects go crazy and eat these plants now growing, in near monocultural stands, into oblivion. Well, insect grazers and plants evolv-ing together in regions where these plants were native seem to have gotten used to one another. Some plants produce chemicals that insects avoid, and insects develop strategies to feed on plants that are most tasty or have fewer chemical defenses. When PLS came to the USA, none of the insects (or any of a number of microbes, birds, mammals, fish, amphibians, lizards, worms, etc) recognized it and were not “programmed” to eat it, poison it, make it sick or anything like that. So it arrives with no natural enemies.

Occasionally I get a glimmer of hope on this front. I have seen Japanese Beetles eating PLS to almost skeletal proportions. Of course PLS had already produced a load of seed so the timing was off for this to be a

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How invasive plants get to be a

problem

Purple loosestrife

As you know by now the Beaver Creek Wetlands Association is taking on a major initiative to bring non- native, invasive plants under control. What you may not know is how we got into this situation and why these plants are such a problem.

Purple loosestrife, Lythrum salicaria; Reed canary grass, Phalaris arundinacea; and Common Reed grass, Phragmites australis, are three cur-rent invaders that can illustrate how it works. I will give each of these a short abbreviation to shorten the text and make the reading easier. They are in the above order PLS, RCG, and CRG.

Each of these plants is a so-called wetland plant and does exceptionally well in many USA wetland habitats. Each is similar in many respects to native species too. RCG—Phalaris and CRG—Phragmites apparently have close relatives that are nearly indistin-guishable from the native strains and that means it took a while for us to realize that they were a problem. PLS has a few relatives in the same genus (Lythrum) that grow around here but

Beaver Creek Wetlands Association 5

control mechanism. Natural enemies have been imported to help control this invader but they don’t do well in small early invasions. More about that in another issue.

PLS gives you a good introduc-tion to how plants can become inva-sive—they just get all the right breaks compared to their native competition. Sure, give Mother Nature another 1000 years or so and maybe some of our local insects etc will learn to make a meal of it.

Reed canary grassPhalaris arundinacea

Reed Canary (RCG) has lots of similar characteristics. The seeds are a bit larger but they transport by animals, people, mud and water just the same. Seeds can germinate under almost any condition as soon as they drop from the plant in early summer. I have seen them fall into the water-filled cup formed by the leaf of the Cup Plant, germinate and produce leaves and a stem by early summer. Knocked to the moist ground, they instantly grow.

RCG has some other qualities that make it a survivor. Unlike many wetland plants it does fine in period of drought. It seems to thrive in flood-plains or wherever there is an alterna-tion of wet and dry. Studies by Joy Zedler and her students in Wisconsin have shown that it does not mind be-ing submerged in sediment that would kill many other plants such as the very important sedges.

RCG produces nodes along its stem and while most stay dormant,

Reed Canary Grass

leaving the growing to the top of the plant, each can and does germinate when the plant falls over, is partially buried by sediment, or is chopped of by grazing. As long as that node can find some moisture and nutrient it is going to produce a new sprout. It is also a cool-season grass that grows in great density early in the year, and totally smothers and blocks the light to anything below it. It can grow to over 6 feet high. If that isn’t enough, it has a second flush of growth in the fall right up to and even beyond first frost. Look the plant over sometime. It has essentially no diseases, and I rarely see anything eating holes in it leaves.

Common Reed grassPhragmites australis

Phragmites (CRG) is that feathery tall plant many of you have seen on trips to Lake Erie or in a few places in the Miami Valley. It looks much like an ornamental grass and has probably been sold as such now and then. It behaves much like RCG in that it has those dormant stem nodes that become rapidly growing stalks, but it also has rhizomes or underground stems, that travel yards and yards from the upright plant and occasionally send up a new

Common Reed Grass

sprout from one of those nodes. You can kill the top of the plant but the rhizome seems unaffected. Herbicides penetrate slowly and are useful but a slow acting control.

These plants do become so thick that you can call the stands a true monoculture. Nothing else survives. Their seed is wind borne and they seem to love settling down on dis-turbed soils where they soon take over. They appear to be tolerant of whatever runs off highways because they grow right up to the edges of the road. Some say they tolerate salt and perhaps other pollutants and this is one way they get an advantage over the native plants.

Next time I will try to explain how knowing a few of these facts help us in our efforts to control these nasty wetland invaders.—Jim Amon

Footnote: Much of what is said above comes from a number of highly techni-cal sources. A few of my personal observations are also noted. I will try to sort out a few good ones and put the references on our webpage under publications or something like that for those of you who would like to get into this a bit further. JPA

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6 Spotted Turtle—Winter 2009

Over the decades, highway construction and utility access have greatly modifi ed the natural channel of the Little Beaver Creek. During that time urban expansion decreased green space while storm water runoff increased from the now impermeable roads, homes and businesses. Together these forces have led to severe bank erosion and the creek bottom has become more deeply entrenched in its fl oodplain.

Straightening and deepening of the waterway has diminished the stream’s capacity to absorb the storm water into the fl ood plain, and much of the low quality water moves quickly to the Little Miami River where it does more harm. There have been other unwelcome changes to the origi-nal natural stream such as tainted runoff that recently killed fi sh in a small tributary.

This coordinated effort by Greene County Sanitary Engineer-ing, Ohio EPA, Greene County Park District, Greene County Soil and Water Conservation District, MEEC and BCWA will oversee in-stream habitat restoration and stream bank stabilization along 2,100 feet of the Little Beaver Creek.

Many individuals and or-ganizations made this project possible, including Don Leeds, Grant Administra-tor, Greene County Soil & Water Conservation District; Jim Schneider, Project Manager, Greene County Park District; Jeffrey Hissong, Director, Greene County Sanitary Engineering; Kristen

Risch, QA Manager, Malcolm Pirnie, Inc.; and Don Geiger Of UD, with the help of volunteers largely from the Beaver Creek Wetland Associa-tion.

Over the past year or so volunteers have been working in the surrounding areas to im-prove habitat there so that when the stream res-toration is fi nished the entire Creekside Reserve will be a far better and biologically complete habitat. Faculty and students from the Univer-sity of Dayton have also been doing biological survey work in the creek so that the ecosystem, before and after restoration, can be compared.

Restoration includes a complex series of steps designed to remove the problems and reconstruct a stream system that closely approxi-mates the former natural state of the stream.

In mid-November, contractors began the heavy earth-moving work to resculpt parts of the

streambed and banks. Their work plan includes moving the stream to halt dangerous erosion under a steep cliff, removing old railroad trestles and putting curve back in the stream in just the right places. Restoration will stabilize the stream banks and improve aquatic habitat, through the installation of J-hook weirs and cross vanes, structures made of stone and enormous boulders that defl ect the moving water to slow the erosion and direct the stream in more natu-ral ways. As part of the project

300 feet of stream channel will be relocated. Many of these improvements will help pre-

serve stream bank structure, provide habitat for fi sh and other aquatic animals and supply food for aquatic insects. They also improve in-stream

Little Beaver Creek restoration project underway

> Continued from page 1

Cross vanes built of heavy stones help redirect stream fl ow to reduce erosion.

300 feet of the creek has been moved. The undercut hillside at right is the back of the wetland created in 2002 by the Route 35 & North Fairfi eld interchange construction.

< Construction extends west to Old Mill Lane, just off North Fairfi eld Road, and east to Factory Road > Ji

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Beaver Creek Wetlands Association 7

habitat by creating pools for cover and riffl es that provide oxygen. Improvements to the fl oodplain may bring opportunities for greater diver-sity of wildlife. A new walking path is also being installed along some stretches.

Lead contractor on this project is Malcolm Pirnie of Columbus Ohio. Their environmental engineers are specialized in stream restoration.

A large amount of work lies ahead, principally in helping to restore plant and animal life in the areas disrupted

Continued >

Top: University of Dayton biology students collect fi sh and aquatic insects from the Little Beaver Creek.

The University of Dayton Biology department is one of the partici-pants in the Little Beaver Creek Restoration project. Led by Profes-sor Jeff Kavanaugh, their task is to provide chemical and biological data to monitor the progress of stream restoration.

Prior to the heavy equipment work, baseline data was collected on the fi sh and aquatic macroinver-tebrate (insects mostly) populations. This knowledge provides insights on the overall health of the stream and will be a valuable tool to assess the project’s success.

“We collected that fi sh sample over a 200 meter stretch of stream,” says Kavanaugh, director of the UD Vivarium. He and his students follow Ohio EPA sampling proto-

cols to achieve valid monitoring events. UD participants included Allison Gansel, Eryn Moore, Jacklyn Paulik, Joshua Siefring and Molly Simonis. The fi sh were later returned unharmed.

Most of the fi sh UD collected are classifi ed as “tolerant” because they survive and even prosper in areas of signifi cant environmen-tal stress. However, four species (hogsucker, longear sunfi sh, green side darter, and rainbow darter) are classifi ed as “moderately intoler-ant” because they are strongly associated with healthy fi sh com-munities but are occasionally found in slightly degraded areas.

Fish species collected include carp, white sucker, blacknose dace, golden shiner, fathead minnow, bluntnose minnow, largemouth bass, bluegill, green sunfi sh, north-ern hogsucker, longear sunfi sh, striped shiner, yellow bullhead,

Catching UpUD documents diverse residents in Little Beaver Creek

by construction. A major aspect of the project is the emphasis on continued monitoring and adaptive management to bring back natural habitat. Adaptive management means that unanticipated conditions that may require different approaches will be integrated into the project until the restoration is stable and performing in a more or less natu-ral way. This long-term management is very often overlooked and omitted from restoration projects of this type.

Work began as the leaves came down, and the work site quickly began to look pretty raw. But that will only be for a short time, for nature abhors a vacuum. Once spring arrives we hope to see the beginnings of a healthier, more robust stream that’s better able to cope with storm runoff, and strike a better balance between people and nature. Long-time visitors to other wetlands locations can attest to the remarkable recuperative powers of nature when we are wise enough to work in concert with it.—Mark Martel & Jeff Kavanaugh

New pathways promise all-weather access for hikers. Just add spring!

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8 Spotted Turtle—Winter 2009

Annual Gaining Ground Campaign

Name

Address

City State ZIP

E-mail

Yes! I want to help continue reclaiming the Beaver

Method of payment: Check payable to BCWA

Credit Card Visa Mastercard American Express

Account Number

Expiration Date

Signature

To qualify for year-end tax advantages please return by

Please give to our annualcampaign at one of thesesuggested levels:

$1000+ $500 $250 $100 $25 Other:

937-320-9042P.O. Box 42, Alpha, OH 45301-0042www.beavercreekwetlands.org December 31, 2008 in the enclosed envelope

Creek Wetlands, including controlling invasive species.

Investing in Wetlands

These are difficult times. Just pick up the newspapers and read about all the troubles around the country and world. We all are suffering as we have watched our savings dwindle and our home values fall. But in the midst of this turmoil we all know we have obli-gations to help strengthen our family, our friends, and our communities.

The job of raising funds for any charitable purpose has become par-ticularly difficult. No one likes to put his or her hand out for help. But the BCWA’s commitment to the protection of one of our community’s assets is still strong. We hope you can continue to feel that commitment.

And what a value you get in the BCWA! With an incredibly low over-head and constant hard work of

your Trustees, volunteers all, the value of your charitable dollar goes very far with this organization. Your donations benefit you and your community with:• Clean water and air• Flood control• Preserving and improving natural

habitat and green space• Recreational trails • Educational opportunities

In November of 2008 we launched our annual Gaining Ground campaign with letters of appeal. It is not too late for you to help us meet our goals and further the work of the BCWA. Please feel free to use the form below and send it along with your check to BCWA, P.O. Box 42, Alpha, OH 45301.

Continued >

central stoneroller, northern creek chub, mottled sculpin, mud minnow, johnny darter, rainbow darter, and greenside darter.

Records from the 1980s and 1990s show that the fish popula-tions in Little Beaver Creek to be stressed, primarily due to dis-charges from industry and poorly treated waste water, but the recent studies by Kavanaugh seem to show improvement. Data from 1982 identified only 5 species of fish in the creek between the Greene County boundary line and Factory Road but Kavanaugh’s more recent work found about 25

to 27 species in the same stretch. Ac-cording to Mike Zimmerman of Ohio EPA much of that can be attributed to improvements in the waste treatment plant on Spaulding Road.

Kavanaugh says “the fish show an IBI or “Index of Biotic Integrity” of 42, which means that the stream is

meeting EPA’s Warm Water Habitat criteria for fish. That’s good.” The IBI is based on the numbers and types of fish collected. Below 40 would mean the stream is not meet-ing its designated use as warm water habitat. Of course it could get better and current work on habitat im-

provements in the creek should help that happen. Kavanaugh’s full data will be put into a report for the Greene County Park District.

Youngsters get a close-up look at fish Dr. Kavanaugh collected from the Little Beaver Creek, during the Little Miami River Watershed Festival in October.

Newsletter Kudos

I just love the new electronic newslet-ter. It lends itself to more photos. It is simply stunning.Good job!

Bernie ChachulaHunters Ridge

I think the newsletter looks grand. I re-ally appreciate the effort to restore the spotted logo done by Charley Harper (one of my all-time favorites!) to the original diamond design in the center of the turtle’s back; yes, less like a target, please. Truly the newsletter is wonderful and everyone should be proud of its appearance. Well done.

Margie PerenicBeavercreek

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Beaver Creek Wetlands Association 9

Join the BCWA Today!

When I was growing up along the Little Beaver Creek, the stream was so dirty and polluted we didn’t dare put a bare toe in the water. The smell was terrible, and contaminated barrels from the “barrel factory” upstream would occasionally wash down the creek. We didn’t even try to fish, for there were no fish in the water. We never saw deer, any type of waterfowl, or any sign of beaver in the Little Beaver. That was in the 1960’s.

When I returned to the Dayton area in 2002, after many years in “God’s Country” of northern Wiscon-sin and then Colorado, I was surprised at the natural areas right in the middle of Beavercreek. The old railroad is a bike-path, the undeveloped land along the Little Beaver is a county park, the creek appears clear and full of life, and fens bloom along the banks. A major stream restoration project promises improved flow, decreased erosion, cleaner water, and better habitat in the near future. Now the Little Beaver supports numerous species of fish! Great blue herons, kingfishers, red-tailed hawks, and whitetail deer are common residents. Even a bald eagle and mink have been seen nearby.

In 20 years, the BCWA has suc-ceeded in preserving over 1,700 acres along the Beaver Creek and Little Beaver Creek. Volunteers have labored building boardwalks and removing invasive plant species, biologists have supervised restoration efforts, educa-tors have shared the natural world with others, and generous donors have made it all possible. Now that the BCWA is 20 years old, we’re thinking seriously about how to help ensure the future of the organization.

The BCWA Endowment Fund, established in partnership with The Dayton Foundation, is a permanent nest egg to help us be good stew-ards of the wetlands as well as good stewards of our donors’ gifts. As our endowment grows, BCWA will be able to withdraw earnings from the account for projects like controlling invasive plants, maintaining trails, and public

education. The principal will never be spent, so that the fund may become a permanent source of income for BCWA.

Our plan to grow the endowment is not another fundraising campaign, but a process of sharing valuable information with our friends about BCWA and about alternatives avail-able to families for estate planning. Planned giving is like planting a seed —it can result in tax savings and/or income to you, while leaving a legacy to preserve and protect our wetlands, now and forever.

BCWA Endowment donors are members of the Spotted Turtle Society —a committed group of people who understand that preserving wetlands contributes to clean water and wildlife habitat for future generations. Anyone may be a member of the Spotted Turtle Society by making an outright or planned gift to the BCWA Endowment Fund.

We are thankful for the support so many have given to BCWA over the years and we hope that through our endowment building, friends of BCWA will have a means to offer their support long into the future.

To learn more about the many gift options that can help grow the Beaver Creek Wetlands Endowment Fund, please contact:

Beaver Creek Wetlands AssociationAttn: Endowment CommitteeP.O. Box 42, Alpha, Ohio 45301(937) 320-9042www.beavercreekwetlands.org

—Kate Hagenbuch

Choose your member level: $5 Student $10 Senior (60+) $15 Individual $25 Family $35 Contributing $50 Supporting $100 Patron $1,000 Life

Please make your check payable to BCWA andmail to: BCWA, P.O. Box 42, Alpha, OH 45301

Name

Address

Phone

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A 501(c)(3) land trust organization. Your donation is tax deductible.

Help reclaim our local wetlands corridor and restore it’s natural beauty and function. Your member dues fund land acquisition, education programs, habitat restoration and management of our preserve.

Get Past Issues OnlineYou can now find the latest copy on the BCWA Website. Visit the the Publications page and click on the Current Issue to download it. You can also find past issues of the Spotted Turtle here, as well as other publications, maps to our local Wetlands, news and member-ship information.Web master Rob Evans updates the site regularly, so check back often.Make sure we have your current e-mail address to ensure ongoing electronic delivery.

SPOTTED TURTLE SOCIETY

OfficersSusie Scott, PresidentRichard Robertson, Vice PresidentSue Rytel, SecretaryDoug Hull, Treasurer

TrusteesDeborah KarrEd PhillipsRichard RobertsonSusie ScottRichard SwigartEd DresslerSue RytelJudith StreiffMike ZimmermanJim AmonLorie BurgerRob EvansKate HagenbuchMark MartelChristina Simmons

Spotted Turtle EditorsJim and Carol AmonMark Martel

PublisherOregon Printingwww.oregonprinting.com

WebmasterRob Evans

Contact UsAdministrative [email protected]

[email protected]

Technical [email protected]

[email protected]

Visit us Onlinewww.beavercreekwetlands.org

P.O. BOX 42ALPHA, OH 45301

Label (1” x 2-5/8” ) here.Place carefully to

cover bottom line completelybut do not touch top line.

Moving? New e-mail address?Don’t miss an issue! Call 937-320-9042

or email: [email protected]

NONPROFITORGANIZATION

U.S. POSTAGE PAIDALPHA, OHIO 45301PERMIT NUMBER 76

The Spotted Turtle | Volume 22, No. 1 | Winter 2009

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