December 9th-The Finale

It’s the end of my first semester here at the University of Vermont. For the last post before winter break, my assignment was to learn and write about some human history of my phenological spot. I found this PDF prepared by Sophie Mazowita for the City of Burlington back in April 2013. The document is chock full of history about how Red Rocks was established and how human impact affects the land leaving the City of Burlington to come up with efforts to prevent this. It also teaches about the natural land such as geology, soils, and hydrology. While I could literally write an essay about the whole history, I’ll just mention some little things that I found interesting.

The 100 acre land used to belong Edward Hatch, a prominent figure in Burlington around the 1800s. Here lied his private estate that Mr. Hatch used primarily for wood and pasture. Eventually, his family sold the land to Burlington in 1970 and thus began the transformation into a public park. The park was divided into two parts. the western section is the mostly wooded area and thus termed the natural side. The eastern side, including the beach area, is mostly comprised as a public area with picnic tables, walking trail and parking lot. Quite recently, naturalists have raised issues of over human interaction with some sections of the park. This interaction has introduced several invasive species and led to a clear intrusion into the non-pathed section. There is a section in the document about how to manage this issue and how the City of Burlington has tried to correct it. However, there is still much to be said and much to do. If you would like to read more about Red Rocks, I suggest that you visit this link: http://www.sburlrecdept.com/documents/RedRocks.ManagementStudy.pdf

Source:

Mazowita, Sophie. “Red Rocks Park: Working towards a community-based management plan.” April 2013. PDF.

~ by aeromano on December 7, 2017.

 
Skip to toolbar