Below is a Google Maps Reference to where my Phenology Spot at home is. It’s in this park that I went to a lot as a kid. Something interesting I like to think about that is related to change over time is that this piece of woods feels way smaller now that I’ve grown up. I cannot tell if it’s because I’ve gotten bigger, or the neighborhood has grown, shrinking the original woods.
I originally thought there would be more differences between the ecology of Vermont and Ohio, but it is surprisingly similar. In my location there were Norway Spruce, Green Ash, Black Cherry, and a Sugar Maple. It was really cool that I could identify these just knowing the common trees in the Landscape of Vermont. Of course a difference is that there was snow at my Ohio location, but I know that’s just because I visited it later in the year. The first photo in the gallery above has really cool mushrooms that are growing on the fallen Green Ash. I believe they are Crimped gill. This fallen tree was also turned into a shelter, and this happens to be a common theme in the Jeffery Mansion Woods. I don’t know why there are so many shelters, but there are.
Another difference between both of my locations is the topography of the land; Ohio is flat. There is not much elevation change at all in these woods, except when going down to the creek. Alum Creek is horribly polluted and generally connected to a very unhealthy water shed. You can see the oil on top of the the water. It was always interesting to hear about the water problems in Vermont, when all I had known are the problems in Columbus. You can barely compare them because of how damaged most ecosystems are in Columbus and Ohio in general. But, there are efforts to conserve some natural areas like this one.