Native Plants and Their Role in
the Upper Penns Creek Watershed
– a Growing Greener Grant Project
In Spring of 2001 the Pennsylvania Native Plant Society began a Growing
Greener Grant project funded by the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental
Resources under the education and outreach category. The focus of this project
was to investigate the role of native plants in the Upper Penns Creek watershed
and their relationship to water quality.
Another component of the project was to compile a website
overview of the study findings. This site includes a complete
list of survey sites, a plant list, and an interactive Floristic
Quality Assessment Calculator, as well as numerous resources
and information on Heritage Sites and Outreach Projects.
Click
here to visit the website.
Point Lookout Study
In April 2000, wildfire burned 130 acres at Point Lookout,
south of Havice Valley Road, in the eastern end of Mifflin
County. After this wildfire occurred, resource managers
within the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources
had several questions about regrowth, and when Helen
Roback of the Pennsylvania Native Plant Society called
them offering to do inventory work on state land, the
Point Lookout Study was born.
The first question was "How does fire
within the forest affect new growth and species diversity,
and how much does deer browsing affect the appearance of
new species?” The
second question that arose later was "How would
fire affect the new growth and species diversity in an
area without or having little established or competitive
regeneration in an area harvested down to shelterwood
stocking levels?"
Several plots were set up to study these questions. For
comparison, an area of similar elevation, aspect, and
vegetative type was chosen in an area that had not been
burned. In March 2001, a shelterwood regeneration cut
occurred on about one acre of the burned area, and in
June 2001 a one acre plot was cut in the unburned area.
The study will compare vegetative regrowth in four treatment
areas or locations. Within these locations a fenced and
unfenced area has been designated for study.
The Pennsylvania Native Plants Society
has agreed to conduct the repeated inventory of established
plots within these treatment areas. Four volunteers are suggested
for each study area, and at least two visits per year
are requested. The study areas are:
1. Burned, uncut; fenced
and unfenced
2. Burned, shelterwood cut; fenced and unfenced
3. Not burned, uncut; fenced and unfenced
4. Not burned, shelterwood cut; fenced and unfenced
DCNR has
established the boundaries of these areas and erected the
fences. We met with the DCNR representative, Mark Potter,
to begin this project. The study will continue for at least
six years, and DCNR will analyze and summarize the data which
has been collected. This project allows PNPS members to make
a significant contribution to knowledge about regeneration
of forests in Pennsylvania, which could affect future land
management decisions.
For further information call Helen
Roback at 814-867-3522.
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