I have returned to my hometown in NJ for the holidays, and I went out to a new spot located in Loantaka Park. In this spot I see many similarities to my spot in Burlington. Below I have included a map to where I went today, as well as some photos that I took!

In this spot I notice that there are still hints of green and that it looks more golden than my spot back in Burlington. This is likely because this location is further south and hasn’t had any snow or cold spells yet – in fact the coldest its been so far has been 40 degrees Fahrenheit! In this spot, similarly to my spot in Burlington there is a section of tall grass. The grass looks the same as what I observed in my spot in Centennial. In these woods I see a lot of Green Ash trees and American Beech trees, where as in Centennial I noticed a lot more Maples and Eastern Hemlocks. In Centennial there were more new growths and as snags compared to here at Loantaka, which seemingly has more old growth trees. A cool think I noticed here is that some of the trees had tags on them which leads me to believe that people are doing research in this forrest. This is similar to Centennial which is also used for learning purposes, which is a cool coincidence! One thing that is visibility very different about this place is that it is more populated and there is a paved trail, where as Centennial has less people and does not have a paved trail. Centennial Woods feels like more of a natural area to me even though Loantaka has an 8 mile trail because here in Loantaka you see a lot of people and you stay on a certain trail. Another thing about Loantaka that is different is that it is hunting season here. Because of this I was not enticed to leave the paved trail, but in Centennial I would feel safer exploring.

Citations:

“Morristown, New Jersey.” Map, Google Maps. Accessed November 2020.

Grant, Samantha. “Centennial Woods Phenology Spot.” 2020. Photographs. JPEG File.