Bird Count, norwood park project
Sarah Morse
Spring Bird Count, Norwood Park

Thank you to Peter Givan for leading our spring bird walk in Norwood park. They recorded 31 species - the most species counted on one of our Norwood Park walks.

norwood park project
Sarah Morse
Summer News from Norwood Park Aboriculture ...

Lighting Bugs, Summer Bird Count, iNaturalist workshop, DIY mosquito management, and more. Learn more about what is going on in Norwood Park and the Norwood Park Arboriculture Project HERE.

Salt Testing
Sarah Morse
Salt Testing Shows Toxic Levels Continue into ...
Benthic Macroinvertebrate
Sarah Morse
Ameletid minnow mayfly found in Spring ...

It doesn’t take much to get our team of stream monitors excited and this month it was finding an Ameletid minnow mayfly at our spring monitoring of the Little Falls Branch.

Sarah Morse
LFWA Celebrates 17 years of Stewardship with ...

Mow Your Leaves for a Better Environment!

Mow Your Leaves for a Better Environment!

It’s time for our annual appeal: Leave the leaves , MOW don’t Rake (and never blow!)

Feed your lawn by mowing the leaves. It’s good for the environment and good for your lawn. We’ve been preaching the benefits of mowing your leaves for almost 10 years now and it’s beginning to catch on! If you’re skeptical, just try it on a portion of your lawn, maybe a side yard, or behind the garage. To quote Scotts Fertilizer: “When spring arrives, you'll notice something: The leaf litter you mulched up in the fall will have disappeared. Meanwhile, your rake will look dusty and neglected—but your grass will look greener than ever.” Yes, even Scotts Fertilizer is recommending that you mow instead of raking (or blowing)!

All Things Nature: Norwood Park Natural History Day

Mushrooms, trees, ceramics, rocks, ice cream, saplings, birds, milkweed balls, and more all came together for one big celebration at the Norwood Park Natural History Day, Sunday October 30.  Over 200 attendees learned about the trees in the Park, what kind of mushrooms grow where (and even sampled some cooked up right on site), learned about watersheds and the importance of native plants, and did some non-native invasive removal.  

Little Falls Creek Fails Macro Test; Stream Rated Poor.

Muddy water and a broken water main were the highlights of the Fall stream monitoring last Saturday, October 22.  No sooner had our volunteers started to sample than the water started to rise and turn muddy.  A woman passing by told us that there had been a water main break at a construction site upstream from our spot. With only three-quarters of the nettings complete, we abandon the water for safer ground.

Fecal Bacteria Monitoring Ends for Season

Thank you to our amazing volunteers for making this program possible and to Joe Barnes for coordinating the effort and publishing the data every week. The data from the final week was consistent with our findings through out the summer. Two sites on the Little Falls Branch pass, two failed and all three sites on the Willett Branch showed dangerously high levels. We are working with the WSSC to track the source of the fecal bacteria.

T-shirt Design Selected for Norwood Park History Day

We have a winner! The Norwood Park Natural History Day t-shirt design competition features Ginkgo, Redbud and Tulip Poplar leaves, and a Monarch Butterfly, as well as one of the well-loved merry-go-rounds at Norwood Park. Thank you to everyone who submitted art work and congratulations to winner Lucy O’Dowd

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Visiting Westbrook and Sumner Village

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This week I had the pleasure of visiting two of our habitat restoration projects to see how the plants were holding up. The goal in these project was to restore native plants to the areas - not so much as a landscaping project, but to bring back the wildflowers and plants that would normally grow in the area. We didn’t need to remove many non-native invasives, but just replaced the existing grass with native plants. I am pleased to say that both projects are doing well; it’s hard to even imagine what they looked like before. And there were butterflies and bees!

The Green Acres Meadow is Blooming!

Cardinal flowers, bee balm and mountain mint are just some of the flowers blooming in the Green Acres meadow. Volunteers have been hard at work weeding, mulching and planting.

Trees are mulched! After experimenting with several different methods, we decided to add mulch rings to the base of our new trees to protect them from lawn mowers which have been banging up the trunks.

Start helping your watershed today!