Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy

Happy Summer Solstice! This is the day of the year when we have most number of hours of daylight…longest day of the year here in the northern hemisphere, while it’s the shortest day of the year in the southern hemisphere.

If you’ve been doing a photo journal of nature through the seasons, today is the day to go back out to your special nature spot and get your picture. We started this last fall with the Autumnal Equinox, so if you did each season you should now have four seasonal views of your nature spot.

I think its pretty neat to take a look at a place from this perspective – all the changes – the sights, the sounds, the smells – yet with the familiar at the foundation. Have a happy day.

If you plan to drive from Loudoun into Fairfax or DC on May 20, it’d be a great day to use the Dulles Greenway. On May 20, 100% of tolls collected will be given to local charities and Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy will be one of those recipients.

Funds received by Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy through this charity drive will be used for habitat restoration projects, environmental educational programs, and scholarships for children to go to nature camp. You can learn more about the Drive for Charity on the Dulles Greenway’s information page.

It was great seeing so many of you yesterday afternoon.  What a great day we had to get together, enjoy some good food, listen to the wonderful music played by Karen Strick, and catch up together. 

Spring Ligi did a great job talking about our Loudoun County Bird Atlas project, some of the findings to date and the importance of this project for bird conservation here locally.  And, it was wonderful to talk with our Science Fair winners and see their projects.

As for the business part of the meeting, our slate of officers was presented by our nominating committee (I had the honor of reading the report) and was voted on by the membership.  Our Officers for this 2 year team are: President: Joe Coleman, Vice President: Nicole Hamilton, Treasurer: Linda Sieh, and Secretary: Rockie Fera.

Congratulations to Paul Miller for being named LWC’s Volunteer of the Year.  Paul has made significant contributions to Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy with all his hard work in building our Environmental Education program for children, helping out at every habitat restoration project , being involved in our Programs committee as we plan field trips and speaker programs, and always being on hand to help out.

I’ve posted a few photos from the meeting to our Facebook album – feel free to check them out.  Many thanks to everyone who helped pull together the Annual Meeting – 15 years is a great milestone!

To celebrate Environment for the Americas’ International Migratory Bird Day on May 8, the Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy (LWC) has scheduled 10 different bird walks, all led by experienced and enthusiastic birders.  Every one of the walks has great habitat that is important to both migrating and nesting birds.  Some of the sites are regularly visited while others are only open to birders a couple of times a year.

If you are interested please join us on one of the following walks.  To get an idea on how many people are planning to attend please let us know if you are planning to attend by registering online on our IMBD signup page.  If you need more info on a site or directions please contact Joe Coleman at jcoleman@loudounwildlife.org  or visit “Loudoun’s Great Places” on the website.

All the walks begin at 8 am unless otherwise noted.  From east to west in Loudoun County:

1) Algonkian Regional Park, led by Bill Brown.  Algonkian is a Northern Virginia Regional Park which includes extensive wetlands and rich forested bottomland along the Potomac.  Bill completed a bird list for the park a couple of years ago.

2) Horsepen Preserve (privately owned), led by Andy Rabin and Linda Sieh.  This heavily forested preserve is immediately upstream from Algonkian and has several wetlands and small streams.

3) Bles Park and distant viewing of a Great Blue Heron rookery, led by Gerry Hawkins and Nicole Hamilton.  Bles Park is a small jewel of a Loudoun Co park that borders the Potomac & includes meadows, wetlands, and heavy forest.  After Bles the group will drive to a close-by spot where they will view, with scopes, a 55-nest Great Blue Heron rookery along Broad Run and close to Rte 28 that LWC has been working to protect.

4) Banshee Reeks Nature Preserve, led by Dori Rhodes & Del Sargent & co-hosted by the Friends of Banshee Reeks.  Banshee Reeks is a 725-acre nature preserve with a wide diversity of natural habitats rich with wildlife.  LWC was the lead organization in establishing the Banshee Reeks Nature Preserve in the late ’90′s.  In addition to the Friends of Banshee Reeks, there is also a VA Master Naturalist Chapter at the preserve.

5) Dulles Greenway Wetlands Mitigation Project, 6 am, led by Bruce Hill and Cheri Schneck.  LWC has partnered with the Dulles Greenway who created these wetlands to mitigate the wetlands lost in the building of the Dulles Greenway.  For years LWC has monitored bird populations on the wetlands and more recently established a bluebird trail here and begun monitoring other wildlife as well.  With special permission from the Dulles Greenway, LWC periodically lead walks on this 200-acre wetlands.

6) Ball’s Bluff and Red Rock, led by Robert and Cathey Daugherty.  Ball’s Bluff and Red Rock are two heavily forested Northern Virginia Regional Parks in Leesburg that border the Potomac.  While well-known for their many spring wildflowers, these parks are also nice spots to find a wide variety of migrant and nesting birds.

7) Rust Nature Sanctuary, led by Phil Daley and Paul Miller.  Owned by the Audubon Naturalist Society this 68 acre preserve has a wide variety of different habitats on the edge of Leesburg including a meadow, a mature deciduous forest, a pine plantation, a pond, and a rare perched upland wetlands, all of which attract migrants and are also home to several interesting nesting birds as well.

 Morven Park, 8:30 am, led by Bruce Hill and Cheri Schneck.  Morven Park is a private large historic house and estate that encompasses over a 1,000 acres of gardens, fields, lawns, and extensive forest along the Catoctin Ridge right outside Leesburg.  The trails in the forest are rarely open to the public and are a good spot to find a nice variety of nesting & migrant birds.

9) Phillips Farm, led by Dale Ball and Mimi Westervelt.  Waterford, a well-preserved Quaker village dating to the 1730′s, saved the 144-acre Phillips Farm from development a few years ago.  In the last three years LWC has partnered with the Waterford Foundation, who owns the farm, to plant over 1,200 trees and shrubs along Catoctin Creek, a State Scenic River that is home to a wide variety of birds and other wildlife.

10) Blue Ridge Center for Environmental Stewardship (privately owned), led by Joe Coleman and Larry Meade.  This 900-acre property in the northwestern corner of Loudoun Co borders the Harper’s Ferry National Park and is only a couple of miles from the confluence of the Potomac and Shenandoah Rivers.  It includes heavily-forested mountain slopes, numerous vernal pools, and two different stream valleys along with large meadows, a lightly-managed power-cut, and several ponds and is home to numerous birds, mammals, and other wildlife.

The Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy is also sponsoring a Birdathon from May 1 through May 15. 

Hope you can join us on one of our May 8 walks!  You can sign up for any of these on our website: http://www.loudounwildlife.org/IMBD_Signup_Form.htm

Over the next 15 days, teams of nature enthusiasts, young and old (hopefully you!), will get together, plan some time to get outside, and count birds – all for a good cause! There’s still time for you to jump into this if you’d like to form a team.  You don’t need to be an expert birder and in fact, this is a great way to start learning about birds!

To participate in the bird-a-thon, simply find a friend or two, set a day that you’d like to go birding (you can do it for just a few hours or more if you like), download the bird count form, and pick a place to bird. You can do your bird count in your backyard, neighborhood or local park at any time between May 1-15, or join us on one of our bird walks on May 8 and get some help with your bird identification.

Prior to doing your bird count, talk to friends, family and colleagues at work and let them know what you’re doing (they may give you a funny look but that’s part of the fun) and see if they’d be willing to sponsor you in your count. Many people pledge a flat amount of anywhere from $10 on up while others pledge a per species amount like 10 cents a species (so if you see 30 species, they’d donate $3.) Donations are tax deductible and we have thank you gifts for donors giving $100 or more as well as prizes for bird-a-thon participants.

I hope you’ll join us in this annual event!  More information can be found on our Bird-a-thon page.

Goose and Catoctin Creek – Recognition of 40th Anniversary of Scenic River Program

The Loudoun County Board of Supervisors has adopted a resolution to recognize the Goose and Catoctin Creek with regards to their scenic river status in the context of the 40th anniversary celebration in 2010.  The recognition will take place at the Board Meeting Room on Monday, 5/3, at 6 pm.

There will be a display of photographs from Dept of Conservation and Recreation and a slideshow of photo’s submitted by: Mark Jeffries, Carol Clay-Ward, Chris VanVlack, Versar and others.  These may be viewed at http://www.flickr.com/photos/41631858@N05/sets/72157623804736704/

Learn more about the Virginia’s Scenic River Program at: http://www.dcr.virginia.gov/recreational_planning/srmain.shtml

It was September, 1969 when Senator Gaylord Nelson of Wisconsin announced that in the spring of 1970, there would be grassroots demonstrations across the country to raise awareness for the widespread degradation of our eco-systems and the need to turn that around. 

Then, as promised that following spring, on April 22, there were environmental teach-ins across the country and over 20 million people participated.

Forty years later, Earth Day continues to be recognized and celebrated on April 22 and today over 500 million people in 175 different countries join in the celebration. And while really every day is earth day, it’s great to pause on this one day and truly take stock of where we are with the health of our planet and where we’re going.

I was first introduced to the idea of Earth Day when I was in college in the ’80s. There was a cool t-shirt (which yes, I still have…in spite of a stain or two) and fun activities across campus, but from my vantage point today, the idea of Earth Day was still just a murmur back then.

Today, there are Earth Day and Green Living events that take place in towns across our area and more people are aware and plugged in to it.  And this is how we change – we become aware, we  tell others, we embrace new ways of thinking of doing. Change happens slowly but every journey begins with a single step. 

So let’s raise our glasses, put our hands together and celebrate our great earth with all her diversity of species! Wish friends and family a Happy Earth Day and talk about our environment. And as we’re talking, let’s also show and do….Let’s take steps that we can make – both great and small – to restore our habitats, clean up our pollution, change our ways so we tread more lightly. Let’s make sure that we have done everything we can to have and ensure a healthy ecosystem, because we’re all part of this system.

One Planet, One Future, right?

Join us on Sunday, May 16 at the Rust Nature Sanctuary (Leesburg) for a great evening with good food, good friends and lots of nature talk at our 15th Annual Meeting!  It’s pretty cool to have an all volunteer organization make it to 15 years – so come on out and celebrate! 

Beginning at 5:00 p.m., the evening will include refreshments, delicious food, music, a raffle, wildlife habitat exhibits showcasing local flora and fauna, and a short program by Spring Ligi, Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy’s Atlas Coordinator.

Spring will describe the first year of the birding atlas, how much we have already learned, and what we hope to accomplish over the next four years.

President Joe Coleman will report on the state of the organization, and LWC’s science fair and volunteer awards will be presented. Join us for this fun and informative evening – meet new nature friends, catch up with old ones! This is such a great time to enjoy each other and talk wildlife! 

Please RSVP via our Sign-Up Form. For more information contact Helen Van Ryzin at hvanryzin@loudounwildlife.org.

Ann Garvey has organized an excellent Native Plant sale to take place on Saturday, May 22, 9am to 4pm at Rust Nature Sanctuary in Leesburg. You can download the flier here.

Two local nurseries will be bringing their plants and if you want, you can contact them now to place an order so you’re sure to get the plants you want…..like maybe some milkweed !

Hill House Farm and Native Nursery: http://www.hillhousenativeplants.com, or email to hillhousefarmandnativenursery@yahoo.com

Nature-By-Design: http://www.nature-by-design.com, or email to randee@nature-by-design.com 

 For those planting Monarch Butterfly Waystations this year, here’s a list of the plants we recommend: Swamp Milkweed (Asclepias incarnata) , Common Milkweed (Asclepias syriaca) , Butterflyweed (Asclepias tuberosa), Ironweed (Vernonia fasciculate), Sweet Joe Pye Weed (Eupatorium purpureum), Purple Coneflower (Enchinacea purpurea), Blackeyed Susan (Rudbeckia hirta), Goldenrod (Solidago), New England Aster (Aster novae-angliae)

For other plant ideas, take a look at our Gardening for Wildlife Plant list – it has not only the names of great native plants and their attributes but also the wildlife that you’ll attract by including them in your garden. You can download the full Gardening for Wildlife Plant list or use our Gardening for Wildlife search tool to generate targeted lists of plants.

Each year, Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy forms a judges panel for the Loudoun County Science Fair.  On the date of the fair, our judges attend the event, view the science fair projects, talk to the kids about their projects, and select three students as our award winners.

Each of our award winners will receive an award check and letter from Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy, which will be presented at our Annual Meeting on May 16th.  The students will have their projects set up at our Annual Meeting as well so you can see what they studied and ask them questions.

This year, the 29th Annual Loudoun County Science Fair was held on March 18th at Briar Woods High School. There were numerous excellent projects and the students were all enthusiastic. It was a tough decision for our judges, but our three winners and their projects are:

1st Place: Alexa Rizzo, from Dominion High School in Sterling. Alexa did a study on the composition of fish ear bones to determine fish migratory routes. Ear bones absorb certain chemicals in water so studying the composition of the ear bones can provide insight into where a fish was born and developed.

2nd Place: Aubrey Higginson, from Stone Bridge High School in Ashburn. Aubrey’s project was on quantifying the economic value of tree cover. Aubrey used aerial photos of Loudoun county to better understand current tree cover.

3rd Place: Lyons Sanchez Concha, from Park View High School in Sterling. Lyons project was titled “Which root grasps soil best,” and was an interesting study of whether grass is the best plant to use to prevent soil erosion on a hillside.

You can see the listing of our past Science Fair award winners on our website at LWC Science Fair Awards.