Blog #3
My phenology spot in my hometown is our local nature center.
This Nature Center has a very interesting and important history. In the 1960s the government wanted to build a freeway. This would have endless negative effects on our town so the “freeway fighters” created the Shaker Heights Nature Center to block the freeways from being built.
Article – Freeway Fighters
There were many similarities and differences between the place in Shaker Heights and my place in Burlington. In Shaker, the woods and especially in such a preserved site such as the Nature Center the canopy and understory are much more spread out. In addition to this, the Nature Center is built directly in the Brook which is a part of the watershed in my area. This results in a very large wetland and marsh in what would usually be a northern temperate deciduous forest.
There are a lot of differences between the ecology of Northeast Ohio and Burlington. The first thing I noticed was the lack of birch trees which are very common in Vermont. The next thing I noticed was the difference in canopy and understory makeup of the Nature Center and most forests in Burlington, the trees are much less dense and spread farther apart in Ohio. I also noticed that the growth is much younger in the Nature Center than in Centennial Woods. This would make sense as one of the current missions of the Nature Center was to increase biodiversity.
Doing Research I learned that the Shaker Lakes and Nature Center along Doan Brook were put aside to be protected during the suburban sprawl of the late 18th century. The result of this is very evident as the oldest growth and most densely populated wooded areas are along the brook from Shaker Heights to Lake Erie
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