Recent Posts
- Bradford Pears on Raritan Avenue
- Donaldson Park Phase II Renovation: A New Beginning for the Ends?
- This Quick Brown Fox is Just Mangy
- Packing Peanuts Find a Home at Last
- Carnival of Environmental Issues
- Garden Club Revives; Backyard Wildlife Expands
- Board of Health Ordinances Online
- What is Your Favorite Nature Spot?
- The Early Bird Gets the Nest
- Street Fair in Highland Park
- Spring Birds in Local Parks
- Where to Buy Native Plants
- Great Backyard Bird Count Great For Highland Park
- Saw Seal, Photographed Same
- Scentennial Garden in Bloom: the Plan
Bradford Pears on Raritan Avenue
By leora | November 23, 2008
The Bradford pear trees on Raritan Avenue in the center of Highland Park, New Jersey showed some lovely foliage this fall. Trees like these were planted in many towns and cities in the 1960s. Unfortunately, this species tree is 1) not long lived 2) has brittle wood which tends to break in high winds and heavy snows. The fact that so many were planted means many communities have a monoculture (same species planted everywhere) — and if something (insect/disease) comes along and attacks; all the trees are vulnerable. It’s their white spring flowers and fall color that makes them attractive, so come back to this page in the spring for photos of the flowers.
Here’s what horticulturalist Michael Dirr says about this tree:
” … not a panacea for urban planting; to some extent problems are now starting to appear that should give reason to temper enthusiasm for the cultivar; incompatibility and severe splitting are occurring on older trees; Bradford tends to develop rather tight crotches and I’ve seen trees that were .. split in half; … its limitations have been recognized by knowledgeable plantsmen but… . buying public has not yet caught up; [ok for short term use] For 10-15 yrs with luck, the tree is magnificent… .. (also) genetically the tree is programmed to grow the way it does (with many branches around a common length of the trunk) — this cultivar was “selected” in 1963 by USDA Plant Intro Station in MD from seedlings of Chinese seed….”
Thank you to Karen Swaine for all her incredible knowledge that contributed to this post.
Photo Credit: Leora Wenger
See another Bradford pear with foliage, 2nd photo down on Raritan Ave post
Topics: trees | No Comments »
Donaldson Park Phase II Renovation: A New Beginning for the Ends?
By arnold | October 7, 2008
Shooting hoops at Donaldson Park (Photo: Arnold Clayton Henderson)
Where Phase I of the current Donaldson Park renovation redid just the center portion, Phase II moves to the two ends. Broadly, each end is getting more playing areas and more vegetation (native species at that!). Some elements are already completed, others in progress. Here, at the east end, two young men make their baskets on a basketball court that hadn’t been there. The parking area has been moved farther from the river (less flooding?). A thin asphalt walking path swings around it past wetland and river. With a planned adjacent restroom, and replantings, the east end of the park (abutting the tidal marsh and woods of The Meadows), should be both more usable and more natural. (Well, a reconstructed nature. The whole acreage was originally marsh, and you can’t turn it all back to that and still shoot baskets or run bases!) Keep watching.
Topics: Donaldson Park | 1 Comment »
This Quick Brown Fox is Just Mangy
By arnold | August 31, 2008
The strange critter of the canine family that has been seen around South Adelaide in Highland Park, that looks like a fox or coyote but has too-thin a tail, and that was photographed by Environmental Commission chair Mike Rosenberg, has now been identified. It is a fox with the mange. Its bushy tail hairs fell out.
Topics: nature | 1 Comment »
Packing Peanuts Find a Home at Last
By arnold | August 31, 2008
One big hole in most recycling programs is those lumpy white beads that come in so many shipments to you. Fortunately, some of the shipping and packing stores will take them for reuse. For one, the Highland Park UPS Store (55 Raritan Avenue) will take your leftover clean polystyrene packing beads (peanuts) for reuse. Remember, though, they take just the peanuts, not solid foam blocks, or bubble wrap, or air-filled plastic pillows.
Topics: Recycling | No Comments »
Carnival of Environmental Issues
By leora | July 17, 2008
No Highland Park environmental news right now, but you might enjoy visiting this blog carnival: Wiggly Wigglers hosts the Carnival of Environmental Issues.
What’s a blog carnival? A blogger submits a post on a topic related to the carnival, in this case the environment, and then the carnival host puts all the links together in one post.
Topics: blogs | No Comments »
Garden Club Revives; Backyard Wildlife Expands
By arnold | June 25, 2008
The Highland Park (NJ) Garden Club has been revived. Here are members on 28 May 2008 visiting the garden of Natalie and Arnold Henderson, Highland Park’s first certified Backyard Wildlife Habitat (National Wildlife Federation). The main flowers up front are cultivars of the native cranesbill geranium, in the true geranium genus. The Backyard Wildlife Program itself has been expanded in Highland Park, since we are now registered as trying for entire Community Wildlife certification. Send a message to Steve Barnes via “contact us” on this site if you’d like to learn how to have your own yard certified. (Hint: supply food such as berries for birds, nesting cover such as native shrubs, and water; that’s about it.)
Topics: meetings, native plants | No Comments »
Board of Health Ordinances Online
By leora | June 12, 2008
The Highland Park Board of Health Ordinances have been updated; a new noise ordinance has been added. These cover retail food establishments; litter; public nuisances; swimming pools; animal control; requirements for heat in apartment buildings; noise; air and water pollution; tobacco control; snow removal, and various other local health issues. You can find the link to the June 2008 ordinances and other environmental information on our info page.
Topics: health | No Comments »
What is Your Favorite Nature Spot?
By leora | May 29, 2008
Highland Park has a lot of nature in this area. Donaldson Park, the Rutgers Ecological Preserve, the Native Plant Reserve, the Meadows, and Rutgers Gardens, which is close to Highland Park, are a few. Can you tell us by leaving a comment about your favorite spot? What animals, birds, plants have you seen there recently?
Thanks for participating in this post.
Topics: nature | 3 Comments »
The Early Bird Gets the Nest
By arnold | May 23, 2008
The first bird to nest directly on Highland Park’s Eugene Young Environmental Education Center (NJ) chose a quite visible spot (see photo at left) on the raucous green solar roof structure. Actually, the structure is not yet truly solar: we need to find a grant to install the intended solar panels. But to the bird, it probably seems solar enough: warm, well lit, and securely wedged in among the girders. Whoever sees and can identify the bird, contact us. Then we can know what bird it is and watch the nesting/fledging process over the next several weeks.
Come down and watch the process as eggs are laid, hatched, and matured into fledglings.
Photo: Arnold Clayton Henderson, 21May2008
Topics: Environmental Center, Photographs, birds | No Comments »
Street Fair in Highland Park
By leora | May 18, 2008
Today is the annual street fair in Highland Park. Both the Shade Tree Advisory Committee and the Environmental Commission were represented.
Here’s the booth for STAC, with plants for sale and free tree saplings.
And here’s Arnold Henderson, who can tell you all about the environment in Highland Park:
Topics: Photographs | 1 Comment »