It’s time to go for a walk

Posted on March 29, 2015 by paulmozina

Pati and I met Dr. Jim Meeker, and his wife Joan Elias, when their neighbors, Greg Legault and Janette Christie (Legault), introduced us on the memorably challenging, private, cross country ski trails they had woven across their adjoining properties in Gurnee, Wisconsin. We began renting Greg’s cozy cabin back in the early 90’s and I remember how starstruck Pati was when we met Jim, who already had a reputation for the manoomin, aka wild-rice, research he had done in the Bad River’s Kakagon Sloughs.

Jim and Greg at the South Point Banyan Tree house

One of Jim’s best pictures of the Kakagon Sloughs

Jim and Joan befriended us and we stayed in touch over the years. Pati and I were truly saddened when we heard that Jim had “walked on” (see page 10 in this issue of Mazina’igan, or expand the article shown below.)

I felt lucky and blessed to be in Gurnee on March 21 for the Memorial Service and Celebration of Jim’s Life (Pati had a business commitment in South Africa.) Here are a couple of testimonials:

Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission is grateful for Dr. Meeker’s many contributions as a former staff member, scientist, teacher and mentor, but mostly as a very gentle, approachable human-being, filled with kindness and concern for all living creatures, but especially those plant-beings!

or, this from the Northland College Magazine (see page 8)

A professor of botany and natural resources, Jim shared his passion for the outdoors with students in the classroom, field and laboratory. Jim fostered an inter-disciplinary approach to solving problems and used an experiential pedagogy before those approaches were being promoted within higher education.

Jim loved to share what he learned from nature: “It’s time to go for a walk!”

One of Jim and Joan’s favorite places in the neighborhood: Potato Falls.

That is the upper falls above cascading over multiple tiers, and below we see the lower falls.

I got a real treat when I met a team of kayakers who had just run the upper falls!

Check out Jonathan Sisley’s run down the upper falls, which begins around 1:00 into this video (thanks for sharing this Jonathan!)

Back at The Springs, there was buckthorn to cut and pile. Andy Buchta stacked all the brush I laid down near the marl factory.

I continued clearing the areas on both sides of the trail a couple hundred yards from the parking lot on Hwy ZZ, in what used to be, The Buckthorn Alley.

Tuesday I focused on the left side of the trail…

…and cut many a buckthorn, though it’s hard to tell (below, same three views after.)

On Thursday I continued cutting on both the right and left sides of the trail (below, before cutting, looking right, then left.)

Below, the same three views after a 6 tanks of gas in the chain saw.

Ben Johnson joined me after work to help rake out and rehabilitate the burn rings/scars from the last brush pile burning season. The skunk cabbage is emerging.

Believe it or not I was back at it on Saturday. I’m trying to cut as much buckthorn as I can while it’s still dormant. Andy is following close behind piling the brush. Thanks Andy!

Ben has been helping Anne Korman, Assistant Superintendent KMSF – Southern Unit, work on a plan to make the Scuppernong Springs Nature Trail handicap accessible from the parking lot to the Hotel Spring and we had a date to review project. The removal of the bridge by the Hotel Spring has opened up some new perspectives on how to route the trail. Anne, and her boss Paul Sandgren, scoped out the situation and they are seriously considering building the new bridge over the river at the old sawmill site at signpost #12. The new trail would follow the berm that formed the lower pond.

This would be a beautiful spot to cross the river, with the added bonus that the east bank of the old bridge site, which has some very unique springs and flora, would be allowed to return to a natural state. The DNR Water Regulations and Zoning engineers will have a say in the matter for sure.

While Ben moved boardwalks and cleared a trail along the berm, I continued cutting buckthorn on the left side of the trail, where I left off last time.

That is how it looked before I got started. Andy joined me and piled tons of buckthorn while I cut.

I can’t wait to see how these wetlands respond in the absence of the buckthorn cover!

Ben and I had an excellent adventure exploring the northeast corner of the Scuppernong Springs Nature Preserve and then we took a tour.

I’m excited to share that the Natural Resources Foundation has added the Scuppernong Springs Nature Trail to their 2015 Field Trip Schedule.

See you at The Springs!

p.s. Thanks to Mark Miner for monitoring bluebird houses!

Marsh Madness

Posted on March 11, 2015 by paulmozina

I hope Spring is here to stay!

It’s been crazy here on the home front. Pati, my African Queen, left for Cape Town today and I’ve been cramming for my “day in court” on Friday. Like Ian Anderson sang: “Nothing Is Easy”.

I’ll tell you what looks easy though: two experts driving forestry mowers cutting huge swaths of buckthorn in a couple hours, that would have taken, even The Buckthorn Man, weeks to do with a brush cutter.

We had absolutely perfect conditions for DNR Facilities Repair Worker, Don Dane (that title doesn’t even begin to describe what Don does!) and Forestry/Wildlife Technician, Mike Spaight, to mow buckthorn at the Hartland Marsh. This latest initiative at The Hartland Marsh, spearheaded by Kevin Thusius, property manager for the Ice Age Trail Alliance, manifested it’s first concrete result last week thanks to Paul Sandgren, Forest Superintendent Southern Unit – KMSF Lapham Peak & Glacial Drumlin Trail East, donating two full days of his best equipment and crew. Thanks Paul!

Way back on February 27th I spent a few hours at The Marsh flagging a firebreak for the prescribed burning we hope to start in 2016. How about this Oakitecture!

Last week Thursday and Friday (March 5-6) , just before this blessed thaw, Don and Mike came out and hit the buckthorn hard. They completed the firebreak, and some mowing on the uplands, on Thursday.

And on Friday, they continued working the uplands all the way back to the hillside below the Gazebo on Cottownwood Avenue.

I love those guys!

Back on Monday, March 2, I was joined by Andy Buchta and Ben Johnson as we cleared glossy buckthorn from the tamarack grove on the northwest side of the Ottawa Lake Fen State Natural Area.

Here is a panorama view taken from the middle of the fen.

Closing in around the tamaracks…

… is a thicket of glossy buckthorn.

It was a glorious day; our last of the season over there no doubt.

Last Saturday, March 7, Andy and I continue clearing the buckthorn near the old marl factory wall. Here is how it looked when I got there.

I won’t get tired of saying it was a great day!

We gutted the core of the last nasty buckthorn thicket on this wedge of land just west of the marl factory wall, and I think I can finish it off with one more day’s work.

I was pretty tuckered out when the sun went down.

See you at The Springs!

Blind Traveler

Posted on March 1, 2015 by paulmozina

I felt the first hint of Spring Sunshine on my face. It’s coming!

That splash of life and color arrived, just in time, in my in-box last week from Matthew J. George, a kindred soul, and so much more.

“Fine Art Photographer, Creative Consultant,Tree Hugger, Sculptor, Storyteller, Witness, Explorer, Trailbreaker, Wanderer, Bohemian, Celt, Granola type”

Are you the “Blind Traveler” Matthew?

The title you gave to the picture above is a beautiful metaphor to contemplate the difference between “an exoteric, literal meaning and an esoteric, inner teaching”.

Matthew, it was a pleasure to meet you on the Sand Prairie and I Thank You for sharing these beautiful pictures with us.

The picture above, along with the first in the post, were taken at the Eagle Oak Opening State Natural Area. Below, Matthew explores Bluff Creek East: “… It’s always a little different where I go and how I get there, but I bet you have an idea of how and why I do it. I am looking for the “real” Kettle Moraine — the one that is hidden beneath the invasive brush — the Kettles you and I envision how they should look and feel. Thanks to your, and your team-mates efforts, the Southern Kettle Moraine has become one of the most exemplary examples of what Wisconsin must have looked like a few hundred years back.” The Bluff Creek Springs.

Below, Matthew takes advantage of a new perspective revealed sans buckthorn at The Springs. “I am an avid hunter of the Spring Ephemeral flowers that bloom in the areas before the canopy fills with leaves, but there needs to be little or no invasive growth in order to find them. Now I can find them much easier. I am talking about Hepatica, Spring beauties, Jack in the Pulpit, etc. These Spring Ephemerals are inherently descriptive of the “real” Kettles.”

Check out Matthew’s fine photography at: Matthew J George, Rain To River Photography!

Photographers treat the old marl factory wall at The Springs like a canvas (#3 on the Trail Brochure), and I think it’s going to become even more popular when all of the buckthorn is cleared away from it.

I have been looking forward to clearing both sides of the trail between signpost #2, commemorating The Tibby Line, and the marl factory for a couple years now and I’m pleased to report that I finally got after it. Andy Buchta, just back from his adventures Down Under, joined me to stoke the fires.

Tuesday morning was cold and windy.

I lit the brush piles shown above and then started a few new piles amongst the buckthorn. Thanks for all your hard, volunteer, labor Andy!

Tuesday Afternoon.

We returned on Thursday and had another fantastic day.

We finally broke clear through to the marl factory wall!

I’ve been working so long into the short Winter days that it’s been a while since I took a walk around the loop as the sun set.

Back at The Wall.

See you at The Springs!

Ugly Buckthorn

Posted on January 9, 2015 by paulmozina

Winter is a great time of year to appreciate just how ugly buckthorn is. Contrasted with a majestic oak or stately hickory, the buckthorn’s lack of grace and beauty is readily apparent. It grows like a cancer, stealing nutrients, water and sunlight from the healthy flora it invades, and some research indicates it has an allelopathic impact as well. It’s polluting our forests and obscuring the natural beauty of the landscape.

I try to make the best of the opportunity I have to work at The Springs, and that means getting out year-round to do battle with the buckthorn. But, it is definitely harder to motivate when the temperatures drop and the snow begins to accumulate. After bailing out last Sunday, I did get out a couple times this week and I’m getting used to winter again.

Tuesday morning fetching some water at the Hotel Springs.

On my way to signpost #2, I stopped to check out the work that Chris Mann, Ben Johnson and the Kettle Moraine Land Stewards did on Sunday. That was a nasty day that The Buckthorn Man wimped out on. They made good progress pushing back the wall of buckthorn on the east side of the trail as it leads to signpost #1.

I stirred up the coals and warmed up before heading to my destination near signpost #2.

I picked a spot where a huge aspen had fallen, and there was lots of dead wood to start a fire, and was soon joined by Andy Buchta.

After a few hours cutting, my chainsaw was running rough and I had to stop and figure out what was going on; there was a part loose rattling about somewhere inside. There is always something new to learn about chainsaws and, apparently, when I replaced the muffler a few months ago, I did not tighten the screws properly. Fortunately the saw is designed to capture the screws if they work themselves free and I simply had to screw the muffler back on. We got modest results and dispatched some very ugly buckthorn.

Below, looking west, then east.

I took my gear back to the truck and returned to hang out by the fire.

Thursday proved to be a bit more challenging; Andy informed me that it was -4 when he arrived, and snow was forecast for the afternoon. I was joined by Chris Mann, Austin Avellone, Phil Hass, Drew Ballantyne and Andy Buchta deep in the Buckthorn Alley, where the trees were hideously misshapen after years of falling over themselves and resprouting. The views below are looking west, north and east from where I parked my sled.

Drew keeps our drinks from freezing.

We sent many odious buckthorn to hell that day. Below, mid-day, looking west and north.

Wrapping up for the day.

Compare this view west to the first look above

and, likewise, this view looking north.

Thanks again to Chris, Andy, Phil, Austin and Drew; you guys rock!

See you at The Springs!

The U. S. Government is a Pyschopath

Posted on January 4, 2015 by paulmozina

The Buckthorn Man enters 2015 swinging a chainsaw and a torch in the hopes that you will see the lay of the land.

Walk this trail with me: Start with an abstraction called government and make it real in your mind (reification); then anthropomorphize it with the worst of human characteristics i.e., psychopathy and you get the metaphor — The U.S. Government is a Psychopath.

Jan Irvin showed me this trail in his recent podcast entitled: “Remedy Roundtable 05 – Prof. Jay Courtney Fikes, Lydia & Royce White Calf – “The Lakota, Naropa Institute, and Wounded Knee – From Gen. Custer to Carlos Castaneda.” I’m embarrassed sometimes by my lack of recollection of history and resulting inability to put current events into context. When reminded of the way the Lakota were treated by the U.S. Government following the signing of the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868, and the way they are being treated now, in the context of the Keystone XL Pipeline debate, I know we are dealing with a psychopath.

It didn’t take but a few years for the U.S. Government to strip the Lakota of the vast majority of the lands, “…set apart for the absolute and undisturbed use and occupation of the Indians herein named…”, as declared in Article II of the treaty.

(Map sourced from OWE AKU International Justice Project)

The U.S. Government has physically, culturally and financially terrorized the Oglala Lakota, or Oglala Sioux, people since they first met. The latest abuse is the continued ignorance of their legitimate ownership claim to the lands ceded to them back in 1868, which, inconveniently, would give them veto power over the proposed path of the Keystone XL Pipeline.

(Map sourced from TransCanada)

The debate in congress focuses on man-made climate change, and the potential for a spill on the pipeline route to pollute the Oglala Aquifer.

But, missing in the debate in the mainstream media and congress, is the context that the proposed pipeline would pass directly through territory ceded by treaty to the Lakota: a treaty the U.S. government abrogated within 8 years of signing. The Lakota people are the only military opponent of the U.S. Government to capture it’s flag 3 times and they are not done fighting! They have refused to be bought off and they stand united to protect the earth and assert their legitimate rights.

I described the double bind I’m in volunteering at The Springs in a recent post i.e., I Hate Government — I Serve Government, and I tried to resolve it by suggesting that I’m really serving The Creator, not the the temporary owner of the land. And so I carry on…

The snow is swirling and blowing outside as I write this and I’m really glad we focused on burning as many brush piles as we could at The Springs, before they got buried. Thursday I was joined by Chris Mann and his team from the Kettle Moraine Land Stewards including: Andy Buchta, Austin Avellone and Phil Hass. Our goal was to burn all of the piles near the Scuppernong Springs Nature Trail parking lot on Hwy ZZ.

We did that and a whole lot more. I really enjoy working with these guys! The audio on this clip is drowned out by the wind at times, but you’ll get the idea.

Chris and Phil returned after dinner to listen to The Buckthorn Man rant.

I was in the neighborhood, fetching some water at the Parry Road Spring on Friday, and took advantage of the lack of snow to add some gravel to the beginning of the trail where water tends to puddle.

Here are a view perspectives of the areas we burned on Thursday.

I continued clockwise on the trail through the old buckthorn alley until I arrived on the east end and surveyed the areas we recently burned there.

I’ve been working well into darkness for the last couple of weeks so I really enjoyed seeing The Springs in the daylight.

When I arrived at the Emerald Spring, the water was cloudy and disturbed and I suspected a creature had just vacated the premises. In this video I jump to the conclusion that a turtle is making it’s home in the neighborhood, but I think it might be a muskrat. What do you make of this?

Turtle caves? Muskrat dens?

See you at The Springs!

Fire Works at The Springs

Posted on December 31, 2014 by paulmozina

We’ve been celebrating the end of 2014 at The Springs

with fire works of our own.

It’s been a great year, and we’ve accomplished a lot — some of which is really good. Visit the Archives drop-down list, on the right side of the Scuppernong Springs Nature Trail Home page, and pick a month to scroll through. I did just that, and added my favorite moments of 2014, one for each month, to the Posts I Like section of the Home page (scroll down and look on the right side.) I hope you have enjoyed your journey on The Scuppernong Springs Nature Trail with The Buckthorn Man in 2014 and that you will continue with me in 2015! I welcome your comments, suggestions, clarifications and corrections.

There is one thing that buckthorn fears more than The Buckthorn Man: FIRE. Buckthorn will fight you until you subject it to the flame. When you’ve been offended, slapped, pricked, tripped, mocked and poked by buckthorn, like The Buckthorn Man has, then you will understand how satisfying it is to cut, poison and burn this vermin foliage in a few hours time.

Usually we wait for snow cover before burning brush piles, but this Winter has been wet enough that I considered giving it a try. Our first burns at the Ottawa Lake Fen SNA were safely conducted and very productive. It saves a tremendous amount of time and effort when you can throw freshly cut buckthorn onto a raging fire, as opposed to piling it to burn another day (when it may be buried under 6″ of snow.)

Last weekend I began burning brush piles along the northeast rim of the loop trail. I tried, and failed, to light some of these piles last year, and was glad to get another chance at them sans snow.

I’ll never get tired of saying ‘it was a great day’!

Andy Buchta came out to help me and mentioned that he had finished piling the brush we cut, and did not burn, at the Ottawa Lake Fen SNA. Thanks Andy!

On Sunday, I had a date with Chris Mann and the Kettle Moraine Land Stewards and we continued where Andy and I left off on Saturday. But first, here are a couple of “the day after” views of what we accomplished.

The slope from the wetland shown above, east to Hwy 67, transitions from mostly buckthorn to mostly black locust. The black locust has been harvested but many of the buckthorn were simply pushed over. The ones that were cut did not appear to be poisoned. The combination of battered buckthorn and slashed black locust resembled a war zone, and I wanted to clean up the mess.

Chris, Andy and Austin joined me as we re-cut and poisoned the buckthorn stumps and fed huge fires with buckthorn and black locust slash. We cleaned up the lower portion of the hillside, leaving the rest for a contractor that the DNR hires. They grind everything up, which contributes fuel for a prescribed burn, but it is necessary to come back and poison the resprouts from the undamaged buckthorn root systems. On the other hand, our technique leaves much less fuel for a prescribed burn but kills the buckthorn the first time. It will be interesting to see how fire carries through these areas if the DNR is successful at executing a prescribed burn here in 2015.

The conditions for burning brush piles are still very good, so I’m going to try to burn as much as I can before the snow finally arrives. We got out again yesterday and continued on the west side of the wetland shown above, approaching The Buckthorn Alley.

It was a cold day and the fires felt real good. Andy, Chris and Austin standing before a huge blaze.

One of my favorite things to do is hang out by a fire on a cold winter’s night. I propped myself up with a pitch fork and watched the smoke trailing up from the embers and through the trees into the moonlit sky.

Happy New Year and I hope to see you at The Springs!

Sexy Buckthorn

Posted on December 19, 2014 by paulmozina

Who new? Cutting Buckthorn is SEXY!

The Buckthorn Man was raised Catholic, so it’s no wonder he didn’t find out.

Yeah, that was me back when I was just learning how to use my chainsaw.

So, when and where did The Buckthorn Man learn the “facts of life”? You won’t believe it. It was this past Tuesday, in the Village of Hartland’s Village Board meeting room! Kevin Thusius, Director of Land Conservation with the Ice Age Trail Alliance, explained that everyone knows it is sexy to cut big buckthorn with a chainsaw, but not so glamorous to do the maintenance required to keep the resprouts and seedlings from resurging. Ah, ha! now I understand that funny feeling I get when I pull the cord and my chainsaw springs to life…

It was an exciting meeting to say the least. Kevin is working on a plan, in conjunction with the Village of Hartland, the Waukesha County Land Conservancy, the DNR, and private landowners, to preserve the work I did at the Hartland Marsh from 2004 – 2011. It’s too bad I didn’t realize how sexy those times were: if only I knew then, what I know now. I’ll keep you posted as things develop at the Hartland Marsh.

Well, I could hardly contain my enthusiasm this past week as I returned to the east shore of the Ottawa Lake Fen State Natural Area to have a go with some very attractive buckthorn. I laced my chaps up tight, dabbed a bit of bar oil on my face and neck, wore my helmet cocked stylishly to the left (which I know buckthorn can’t resist), and plunged my chainsaw into the thicket…

Here is how it looked this past Wednesday before the orgy began.

I was soon joined by my randy buddies, Chris, Austin and Andy.

We had a very satisfying day whacking, piling and burning buckthorn.

As you can image, we couldn’t get enough of that hot buckthorn, and we returned on Thursday to find them ready and willing.

Chris found this old automobile and got in the backseat with a shapely buckthorn!

By the end of the day, I was spent…

Sparks were flying. I think this is the real thing!

See you at The Springs!

The Ottawa Lake Springs

Posted on October 29, 2014 by paulmozina

I hope you enjoyed the marvelous stretch of blessed Fall weather we recently experienced here in Southeastern Wisconsin as much as I did.

I chose to camp in late October at Ottawa Lake site #335, aka My Shangri-la, back in January because I wanted to enjoy the 5th annual Halloween Bash, and the event turned out to be magical indeed.

The campground was almost full Saturday evening for the climax of the festivities and a crescent moon hung over the lake. As Pati and I strolled amongst the fantasmicgorically decorated campsites, we were occasionally startled by ghoulish outbursts piercing the sweetly scented campfire smoke.

The pumpkin carving was exquisite again this year.

It was pure good fun, except for the premature report of the demise of the Buckthorn man, which I found very disconcerting.

Contrary to the epitaph above, I had a super productive week working on the Scuppernong Springs Nature Trail and the Ottawa Lake Fen SNA. I setup camp on Monday October 20th…

… then proceeded with my empty truck to the gravel pile Anne Korman (Assistant Superintendent of the Kettle Moraine State Forest — Southern Unit) had directed us to.

There were a few spots on the trail that tended to puddle and I filled them with stone.

Back at camp I enjoyed a dinner of fresh vegetables, stir-fried with the Buckthorn Man’s secret recipe curry brown lentils and wild rice.

On Tuesday and Wednesday I began clearing buckthorn and honeysuckle on the south side of a channel that drains a spring that emerges from a ditch just below Hwy 67.

Here is the view before I got started standing on the shoulder of Hwy 67 and looking towards Ottawa Lake.

People I meet on the Scuppernong Springs Nature Trail tell me that they used to be able to see Ottawa Lake from the highway. Now, the only way you could possibly do that is via the drainage shown above. I was determined to reopen this view as a tease to draw people into exploring this beautiful area. At the end of the day on Wednesday, I followed the drainage up expecting to see the water emerging from a culvert that drains wetlands on the northeast side of Hwy 67. Instead, the culvert was dry and I found the source was a bubbling spring on the west side of the highway.

On Thursday I took a day off, sort of, sharpening my chains in camp and later meeting Ben Johnson at the Hotel Springs to work on positioning a boardwalk that we had relocated to the cut-off trail. The rain didn’t dampen our spirits one bit! It was a pleasure to have Ben over to the campsite for dinner afterwards and we dried our butts off by the fire.

Lindsay Knudsvig joined me on Friday and we began clearing the north side of the channel that flows from the spring I “discovered” on Wednesday. Ottawa Lake is fed by many springs and I think this one may be the most substantial. Here are a couple views after we finished for the day.

There is a massive, pre-settlement, white oak near the spring’s channel.

Unfortunately, Lindsay could not stay for dinner, but Pati came out and we enjoyed the sunset and campfire.

There is an embankment on the north side of the channel that extends out to where the water joins the pond that is at the center of the Ottawa Lake Fen. There are excellent views south, west and north from this vantage point.

On Saturday I started to clear the buckthorn from both sides of this embankment. Here is what it looked like before I got started (looking left, then right).

I finished the left side on Saturday and began clearing the debris from the channel with the intention of getting a current flowing all the way to the union with the fen pond. That evening Pati returned to stay a couple nights with me and it was sweet.

On Sunday morning we took a nice walk around the Scuppernong Springs Nature Trail waiting for the day to warm up and then we headed to where the Scuppernong River passes under Hwy Z to do our last river monitoring of the year. You can view the data we collected in 2014 at the Water Action Volunteers site by searching by site (Scuppernong River at Count Hwy Z) and specifying the date range of April thru November and the “select all parameters” button.

In the last post I made the bold and unsubstantiated assertion that: “We do not see the diversity of macroinvertebrates typically found on stoney, sandy, bottom riverbeds…”, in the muck and marl filled stretches of the headwaters of the Scuppernong River. So, Pati and I repeated the same biotic index study we did at Hwy Z as part of our river monitoring, at four locations in the Scuppernong River headwaters where the DNR is planning to remove material to enable the river to headcut. We investigated the areas just upstream from where the changes will be made. Here is what we found (refer to this link to see pictures of the Macroinvertebrates):

Where the Scuppernong River crosses Hwy Z, which has a stoney and sandy riverbed:

Aquatic Sow Bug
Crawfish
Amphipod or Scud
Dameslfly larva
Giant Water Bug
Back Swimmer
Water Boatman
Riffle Beetle Larva
Pouch Snail
Caddisfly Larva

Now, at the four sites in the headwaters. First at the Old Mill site:

Aquatic Sow Bug
Crawling Water Beetle
Amphipod or Scud
Dameslfly larva
Predaceous Diving Beetle
Back Swimmer
Riffle Beetle Larva
Orb Snail
Caddisfly Larva

At the Hotel Spring Bridge site:

Aquatic Sow Bug
Fishing Spider
Amphipod or Scud
Nematode of Threadworm
Leech
Pouch Snail
Riffle Beetle Larva
Orb Snail
Caddisfly Larva

At the bridge to the Hidden Spring site:

Aquatic Sow Bug
Amphipod or Scud
Nematode of Threadworm
Whirligig Beetle
Pouch Snail
Predaceous Diving Beetle
Dobsonfly Larva
Caddisfly Larva

And finally, at the first bridge to the Hillside Springs:

Aquatic Sow Bug
Amphipod or Scud
Riffle Beetle
Riffle Beetle Larva
Dobsonfly Larva
Caddisfly Larva
Backswimmer
Water Strider

I think it is fair to say that I was wrong to conclude that there was not the same diversity of macroinvertebrates in the headwaters area, where the riverbed is generally full of muck and marl, as further downstream, like at Hwy Z, where the riverbed is stoney and sandy. I did have to literally drag the net through the muck and marl in the headwaters to get the samples so it may be the case the the macroinvertebrates there are not as accessible to the trout as they are in the areas downstream that are stoney and sandy. In any case, we will continue to collect data in the headwaters at the sites listed above next spring, before any changes are made to remove material from the former embankments, and continue to collect data after the changes are made.

Sunday evening we finished dinner early and raced over to the Indian Campgrounds to catch the sunset.

And finally, this past Monday, I finished clearing the buckthorn along both sides of the embankment that follows the Ottawa Lake Spring channel to its entrance to the fen pond.

One Last view from the highway.

I also pulled out a lot more junk from the spring channel including: a car tire, one 5 gallon bucket, three 1 gallon plastic plant containers, bottles, cans, logs, planks and deck boards. Walk with me as I follow the channel from the fen up to its source at the spring. There is a bit of drama halfway through when I get stuck in muck up to my chest and let a few choice words fly.

Last but not least, I captured these images of the brush piles that Andy Buchta made on the east side of Ottawa Lake in the area that I cleared last month when I camped at My Shangri-La. Thanks Andy!

See you at The Springs!

SEWRPC Surveys The Springs

Posted on June 15, 2014 by paulmozina

I love to landscape the landscape at the Scuppernong Springs. This distinguished tract of land deserves our love and attention for the sake of its beauty. So please, come out and help me dig a little spotted knapweed from the sand prairie!

The lay of the land at The Springs was evoked beautifully by John Muir, in his classic: The Story of My Boyhood and Youth, and I had to pinch myself last night as I walked alone behind the Scuppernong Spring and thought: ‘this is my garden’.

I’m intrigued by how others experience my garden.

Here is a great image from Landscape Photographer Byron S. Becker: “The photograph was taken in the spring of 2008 along Suppernong River near sundown. The camera was a 4×5 with a 90mm lens, using TriX 320 film and the exposure was 2 minutes; the developer was Pyronal.”

Below is an example of Kristen Westlake’s Fine Art Photography. You can see more of her images of The Springs, and all of her other outstanding work, here.

I had a wonderful week of beautiful weather for landscape gardening at The Springs! Last Monday, June 9th, I tried something new, per the advice of Jared Urban, and burned the first-year garlic mustard off the cut-off trail with my blow torch. Below is where the cut-off trail joins the main trail at signpost #13.

And after…

I got the worst patches and now the trail is officially “burned in” as Don Dane would say. I spent the afternoon digging spotted knapweed from the sand prairie and was glad to have Ben Johnson’s help with this seemingly Sisyphean task. We focused on cleaning up the lupine patches.

On Friday, June 13, I was joined by Dan Carter, Senior Biologist with The Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission (SEWRPC). Dan was continuing SEWRPC’s ongoing effort to document the vegetation at The Springs and invited me to come along.

SEWRPC has divided The Springs into 4 areas for their vegetation surveys:

1) The dry prairie at the springs (aka, the Indian Campground)
2) The dry woods
3) The springs, immediately adjacent wetlands, and upper reaches of the creek
4) The fen and sedge meadow in the vast open area immediately to the west (includes trench where marl was mined).

The first three areas listed above are located in the blue circle on the right below and the fourth is in the larger blue circle to the left. Click the links above to view SEWRPC’s preliminary vegetation surveys.

As we walked through Buckthorn Alley on our way to the hotel spring, Dan and I stopped frequently to make notes and take pictures. Dan recently completed his PhD in Biology at Kansas State University and he has a wealth of knowledge, understanding and wisdom. Here are just a few of plants he identified.

Be careful at The Springs! Poison Hemlock.

Bulrush

Forked Aster, a state threatened plant!

Valerian

Horsetail

We visited the Ottawa Lake Fen State Natural Area and Dan showed me two new springs that I had never seen before. They emerge from the east side of the wetlands and you can find them by walking across the fen from campsite #334 towards the north until you come across their outflow channels.

Of course, there were lots of interesting plants here too.

Bracken Fern

Lake Sedge

And the carnivorous Pitcher Plant

Thanks Dan, for showing me around the place I love!

I spent the afternoon pulling and digging spotted knapweed on the sand prairie. There is a bumper crop of this noxious invader!

A soothing sunset at Ottawa Lake.

A “Honey” moon at the Lapham Peak Tower.

I had the pleasure of spending yesterday, June 14, at my favorite spot again.

The Indian Spring is being quickly overrun by quack grass and water cress so I spent the morning pulling these invasive plants. Before…

… and after.

Then I moved up the hill to the sand prairie and continued pulling and digging spotted knapweed. It’s going to take years to get rid of this stuff unless I get a whole lot of help.

Speaking of which, my good friend Carl Baumann, who has been harvesting black locust on the south end of the trail, split all of the logs in my woodpile setting the stage for some cozy fires at My Shangri-La. Thanks Carl!

And Andy Buchta noticed the freshly cut buckthorn by the main entrance on Hwy ZZ and he has commenced to piling. Thanks Andy!

It was a great week!

See you at The Springs!

Buchta Wins Gold in PilingStyle

Posted on February 11, 2014 by paulmozina

It was a clear and cold morning at the 2014 Scuppernong Springs Olympics.

In, perhaps the biggest upset in Olympic history, Andy Buchta…

…surprised the pundits and walked away with the gold medal in the PilingStyle event. In his first appearance at the Olympics, Buchta, a roofing professional by trade, impressed the judges with his flawless technique and flair for the dramatic as he created tall, compact and uniquely expressive piles from the scattered, snow-covered, buckthorn brush. Andy flew under the radar all week as most eyes were focused on three time gold medal winner, the Russian brush piler, Boris Maksmopilenovitch.

(I turned on the camera’s date-time function by mistake!)

The Buckthorn Man surveyed the field just before the competition began.

While Andy experienced the thrill of victory, The Buckthorn Man suffered the agony of defeat. All week long in training The Buckthorn Man set new records for slashing and burning in his signature ChainsawStyle event. He was notably loose; joking with teammates, and seemed to have put his failure to win gold at the 2010 Hartland Marsh Olympics behind him. But on the big day, he bolted upright at the 5:30am alarm and it was game on.

Unfortunately, and indeed, heartbreakingly, it was not The Buckthorn Man’s day. The hose on his Red Dragon Torch cracked and spewed propane gas preventing him from lighting it and starting a brush pile on fire. Then, without a heat source, he was unable to keep his poison sprayer from freezing up, despite the fact that it contained only anti-freeze and triclopyr. When we ran into The Buckthorn Man at the trailhead, he was inconsolable; refusing, or perhaps incapable, of answering any questions.

We located this transcription of a discussion of The Buckthorn Man’s disappointing performance between Bob Costas and Cris Collinsworth on the internet (no wonder it was not televised live!)

Costas: I’ll be frank with you Cris, I think it is highly suspicious that The Buckthorn Man’s Red Dragon torch failed just when he needed it the most. I suspect the Russkies and, given his background in the FSB, that Putin was behind it.

Collinsworth: Ahh Gee, I dunno Bob. The Cold War is over isn’t it?

Costas: Not so fast Cris. Do you really think those evil commies have given up their dream of overthrowing monopoly capitalism and replacing it with a socialist paradise?

Collinsworth: But Bob, according to Antony C. Sutton’s seminal work Wall Street and the Bolshevik Revolution, WE funded the Bolshevik revolution and helped Trotsky and Lenin win recognition for their fledgling revolutionary government.

Costas: That sounds like a bunch of conspiratorial drivel to me Cris. Why would Wall Street support the Bolshevik Revolution?

Collinsworth: Bob, have you never heard of the Hegelian Dialectic, you know, thesis/problem, antithesis/reaction, synthesis/solution? The problem for the monopoly capitalists was that the masses were beginning to recognize how badly they were being exploited and how the rich were getting richer and the poor were getting poorer. So the financial oligarchs in the west created the reaction in the form of the evil communist empire to scare the people into believing that their liberties and freedoms were being threatened. Since Wall Street, via it’s interlocking relationships with the central banking systems across the world, was controlling the finances of both the “West” and the “East”, their solution was to play one off against the other, thus keeping the military industrial security complex fed and causing both the U.S. and the USSR to go deeply in debt TO THEM.

Costas: That is total Bullshit Cris. Cut his mic! (Costas, storms off the sound stage.)

Although he might have been able through shear force of will to persevere and get some work done, The Buckthorn Man decided to take the day off, relax, and enjoy The Springs.

When I emerged into this view of the prairie, I was stopped in my tracks by how quiet it was. I’ve been so busy at The Springs — I haven’t taken as much time as I should to look and listen.

Here is the view from the Marl Pit bridge, where I stopped to listen to the river.

The view from the gaging station bridge.

The Indian Campground.

The Indian Spring channel.

The Scuppernong Spring.

The Hillside Springs.

The Hidden Spring.

This one doesn’t have a name. How about the Robin’s Spring?

I left The Springs early and bought a new Red Dragon torch on the way to the Hartland Marsh, where I picked up a load of seasoned buckthorn for the party this weekend and spent the rest of the day wandering.

If you are, or want to become, a SuperFriend♥ of The Springs, or you just love The Springs, or you just want to help the Buckthorn Man celebrate his birthday, then come to our open house in Milwaukee on February 16th from 2-8:00pm. If you have not already received an invite via email and want to come, please contact me! Pati is going to make some crazy good food and we’ll have beer and wine and a roaring buckthorn fire outside on the patio. We hope to see you on the 16th!