Centennial Woods Phenology Blog 2020

As the semester drew to a close, I took my last trip to the beaver pond of Centennial Woods. On my way in I was contemplative. I came across the hair, bones and hooves of a deer. At my site, there were more small trees taken down by the beavers. The structures they were building were bigger and longer surrounding the edge of the water and the water was higher. I thought on the prompt while at on the bridge. The power lines arcing over my site don’t let me forget the connection between humans and my place. Were it not for the human need for the high tension wires this spot would not be clear brush but instead be forested like the rest of Centennial. The little sign on the bridge always catches my attention too. It says that the trail is out due to the flooding from the beavers and someone has written on the sign saying “Don’t kill us this time UVM”. The conflict between nature, UVM, and the public is perfectly illustrated there in print.

If I was asked at the beginning of the semester if I felt like I was a part of my place I would have said no. Now, after watching the changes and growth of my place, I do. I didn’t feel all that connected to my place originally, I felt more like a distant observer. Now I feel like a migratory bird coming to stay for a while, then moving on with plans to return in the future. I’ve become a regular feature, coming in and recording and occasionally harvesting what little things I find.

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I am so proud of the industrious beavers! Their lodge is so much bigger! The wildflowers were finally bloomed as well.

First of all, my group unfortunately did not win. We were a tragically close second. Secondly, I did not get to participate in the BioBlitz as much as I wanted to as I injured my hand and spent most of the time either in the emergency room or the pharmacy. Just before that though, I went on a walk along the bike path on spear street to try and make some contributions. I was excited to see pussywillows and I stopped to collect some of the branches that had not begun releasing pollen. I also was cardinals, squirrels and slugs. Using iNaturalist was easier than I thought. I expected it to take a longer time to make entries but all I needed to do was post the picture and location to get going. I did not expect so many people to contribute globally but clearly a lot of people were inspired.

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This week I went down to Centennial two times with varying degrees of success. On my first trip on Friday it was snowing and I didn’t realize until too late that my camera lens was wet and my pictures came out pretty poorly. The next time I went was today (Sunday) and there was a group of people there so I couldn’t get very good pictures of the whole landscape. There were many very nice birds there and I saw dogs on my way in. I saw and heard redwing blackbirds and robins and a few black capped chickadees. I also saw tracks from the dogs and smaller squirrel tracks in the mud.

For my walk I decided I would walk around the city after bringing my ski boots into town to get heat-molded and then walk around Centennial later that day to check back in on my phenology site. I layered up, grabbed my boots and my roommate and made the walk down to outdoor gear exchange. One of the first things I usually notice when walking down into church street is all the barberry plants that line the lawns as ornamentals. I also noticed a little sapling that I was able to identify as American Beech by the buds. Unfortunately in my walk i only found domestic dog and squirrel tracks. I did however hear more bird calls that I did not recognize (though this means nothing because I don’t know all that many bird calls) which is always exciting. More people also seem to be walking their dogs as it starts to warm up and get sunnier.

Later, in my venture into Centennial and around it, I came across a tree that appeared to have sap leaking from it that had frozen. The sap icicles I didn’t find many tracks other than domestic dog again but this is partially because I did not go far off the beaten path due to the snow. Though now that I have my snowshoes that could change.

I had hoped I could walk myself out to my phenology spot in centennial woods and take a look around with all the snow but unfortunately I was a close contact to a person who tested positive from COVID so I am in isolation. Fortunately, a friend of mine had chosen the same phenology spot so she FaceTimed me and we took pictures together. A pair of dogs came by which was the highlight of my isolated day. We also were able to find more of the old beaver signs from last semester, now with the addition of beaver flooding warning signs. We saw some tracks that appeared to be rabbit but were old and thus hard to photograph. The water was all obviously frozen and snowed over but we also noticed that the reeds and brush were broken down by the weight of the snow making the area much clearer.

I feel especially lucky that my phenology location is Centennial Woods because we learn about that area specifically. The land that is now Centennial was once forested, albeit with a very different forest composition. As with most of Vermont, this was cleared for agriculture, specifically sheep grazing. Later, as agricultural trends shifted, sheep farms changed into dairy farms.

The land that is now Centennial was once split into five pieces of land that were eventually purchased by the University of Vermont. The consolidation of these plots began in 1891 and the final plot would be purchased in 1968. While the whole consolidation was originally 216 acres, the area would be chipped away at for various projects. The most relevant of these projects was when the federal government took part of the property in order to make I-89.

For a long time, Centennial was sort of in limbo. When concern for the environment grew in the 1970s UVM promised to set aside 9 natural areas. This included Centennial Woods. It was often used as a dump for the hospital morgue and even still some portions were being sold off and developed. Finally, in 1991 UVM entered an agreement with the city of Burlington that the university would get permission to develop some apartments if they make a plan for the protection of Centennial. UVM gave the rights to develop Centennial Woods to the Vermont Land Trust. Currently UVM is only allowed to dig educational soil pits, maintain trails, tap maples and divert stormwater, though the Vermont Land Trust did not want UVM to be able to divert stormwater.

This week after the Tuesday lecture, my friends Laura, Alanna and I went to Centennial Woods to visit our blog locations. Alanna showed me a new path I could take to walk to my area. As we were coming up on my spot snow began to fall. Knowing how much my mother likes snow I FaceTimed her so she could see it fall over my spot. The ferns looked incredible with snow on them. I was all the more appreciative of the snow knowing that it would be gone very soon. We saw very little wildlife while out, even less than previous trips. Despite this we did see some odd stumps that looked as if they had been chewed by a beaver. I had hoped to find tracks or scat but came up empty.