Tag: New Jersey Conservation Foundation
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Species are now being lost at fastest rate in history of Earth
By Michele S. Byers A few weeks ago, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service made headlines by announcing the removal of 23 species from its endangered list, but this was not good news. These species are not recovering, they are extinct and gone forever. The announcement was a belated obituary for these creatures which have…
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Swaths of Atlantic white cedar forest totaling 10,000 acres to be restored
By Michele S. Byers Step into a mature stand of Atlantic white cedar trees on a hot day and you will instantly feel cooler. These towering native evergreens grow so dense that they shade out sunlight and create forest floor habitat for ferns, sphagnum moss, liverworts, insect-eating plants, rare orchids and swamp pinks. In turn,…
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RIP PennEast!
By Michele S. Byers If long-tailed salamanders, northern long-eared bats, and the other creatures of forests, fields and marshes could throw a party, they’d be celebrating! They just won a permanent reprieve from an unneeded and unwanted gas pipeline that would have slashed a huge swath through open space, farms, forests and streams in Hunterdon…
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Young environmental hero: Sonja Michaluk
By Michele S. Byers The motto “Think globally, act locally” has been used for years to encourage local action on environmental problems. Sonja Michaluk, 17, has been thinking globally and acting locally since she was a 6-year-old monitoring streams for water quality in her hometown of Hopewell Township. And the Carnegie Mellon University student went…
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Warm air, more rain and more floods: the new normal
By Michele S. Byers New Jersey experienced its worst flooding in years on Sept. 1 when the remnants of Hurricane Ida dumped up to 11 inches of rain on a landscape already saturated from previous storms, including Hurricane Henri just 10 days earlier. Heavy rainfall was expected, but the torrential downpour and speed of rising…
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New Jersey’s trails have many benefits for Garden State residents
By Michele S. Byers Are you ready to get out and hike this fall? New Jersey has hundreds of miles of public trails: long and short, rural and urban, pedestrian and multi-use. Many are scenic, with especially stunning views and fall colors. Other trails double as transportation routes for walking or biking to work, shopping…
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To observe wildlife, consider setting up a personal ‘candid camera’
By Michele S. Byers In the early days of COVID-19 when New Jersey went into lockdown, Princeton University astrophysicist Gaspar Bakos and his three young sons were looking for something to do while stuck at home. They bought a $40 motion-activated wildlife camera, also known as a trail cam, and were amazed to discover how…
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New Jersey is in an ‘ecological sweet spot’ for 50 native orchids
By Michele S. Byers Leaves of green stand out in a drab winter landscape, when nearly everything else is gray or brown. That’s how a cranefly orchid was discovered a few years ago at a preserved farm in Salem County. Scott Breeman, easement steward for the New Jersey Conservation Foundation, spotted the leaves and thought…
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Bats and summer nights: perfect together
By Michele S. Byers Sit outside on a summer evening around sunset and look up. If you are in an open area with nearby woods, you may be treated to a dazzling aerial display of bats hunting for flying insects. “They are endlessly fascinating,” said Ethan Gilardi, a bat biologist with the nonprofit Conserve Wildlife…
