Restoration Roundup

In this month’s episode, we decided to talk to some stewards from Vermont’s riparian areas that also serve as recreational spaces. Oftentimes the priorities of restoration can be focused on the ecosystem side of things, ensuring wildlife passage, native species health, and the long-term well-being and function of a forest. However, there are many areas that need to balance those goals with the need to make an area safely accessible to people looking for recreational spaces in Vermont's forests and rivers.

Duncan Murdoch, the Natural Areas Stewardship Coordinator at the Intervale Center, Leila Faulstitch, the supervisor at the City of Montpelier Parks and Trees Department, and Kathryn Wrigley, the Recreation Specialist with the Vermont Department of Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR) are well experienced with this dilemma. They joined us to talk about the balancing act of protecting natural spaces while also fulfilling the Vermont culture of getting out into the mountains by discussing common problems, strategies, and hopes they have for the future.

Listen in on some of the background work that goes into keeping your favorite hiking trails, swimming holes, and river access points healthy and well-maintained while also helping visitors stay active, educated, and engaged in natural spaces.

For the thirteenth episode of Restoration Roundup we took a look at some of the active research being done in forest restoration. We spoke to three students from UVM’s graduate student program: Master’s students Kate Longfield and Stever Bartlett and PhD candidate Stephen Peters-Collaer. Working with the Rubenstein School of the Environment and Natural Resources and their mentors and advisors, these students are researching topics that will be coming into the field in the coming years.

From Kate’s work at the intersection of independent and governmental management of buffers to Stever and Stephen’s work on managing and analyzing different types of sites, we had a broad spectrum of topics to cover. How do landowners make choices about land management? How can practitioners most effectively prepare their plantings for success against invasive species and later-stage resource use? For now, we can only see the preliminary results, but these studies and the resources they produce will be valuable tools in riparian restoration.

Join our roundtable discussion with upcoming practitioners and get the scoop on research methodology and the rising questions being investigated in academia before being brought to general use in the field.

This week we are excited to share the 12th episode of Restoration Roundup--and the start of the second season! We spoke with Shawn Good of the Vermont Fish & Wildlife Department, Karina Dailey from the Vermont Natural Resources Council (VNRC), and Gabe Bolin of Stone Environmental about the work being done to remove the Pelletier Dam in Castleton, Vermont.

Dam removal is an important way to restore natural flows, habitat, and surrounding vegetation to rivers. Many dams in Vermont are long-standing, with a history of being used for industrial work or creation of recreational spaces such as fishing ponds or swimming holes, but projects like this allow for the passage of aquatic life and the restoration of rivers and their associated floodplains. The Pelletier Dam project has received its funding and permits, begun and nearly finished construction (or de-construction!), and is moving on to the revegetation and monitoring stage. We were excited to hear about the process and future plans for this site!

Listen to the episode to learn more about the history of dams, the general goals and tools of dam removal and restoration, how native wildlife interacts with dams (both man-made and beaver-made), and how launching a massive removal project can face challenges but ultimately come through with exciting results.

For our eleventh and final episode of the first season of Restoration Roundup, we spoke with Shayne Jaquith and Gus Goodwin of The Nature Conservancy (TNC) in Vermont, and Kristen Balschunat at the Vermont Youth Conservation Corps (VYCC), about a project TNC has been working on to restore the Hubbardton River and its surrounding clayplain forest in West Haven, VT.

Process-based restoration is a river and floodplain restoration approach that aims to reconnect rivers with their floodplains by adding woody material to the stream to trap sediment and restore the natural flow and evolution of the river. Due to logging, agriculture, and historical clearing of forests, a lot of streams and rivers have lost access to the naturally-occurring woody debris that is critical to their functioning. TNC has partnered with Vermont Fish & Wildlife and others to tackle this restoration project, which also includes revegetating the surrounding forest, much of which is now a hay field. A VYCC crew assisted with the in-stream restoration work this past June, and in the episode Kristen describes more about how they were involved and what they learned.

Listen to the full episode to hear how our streams and rivers have gotten to the state they're in now, why this kind of approach works and what its benefits are, how long it will take for the area to return to its pre-colonization state, and more!

In this episode we interviewed Katie Kain and Ethan Tapper to discuss the effects of invasive species on riparian areas, and strategies landowners and ecosystem managers can use to control them. Katie is a Fish and Wildlife Biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's Partners Program in Essex Junction, VT. She works with watershed organizations, conservation districts, and state and federal partners to restore riparian habitat with private landowners. The Partners Program provides financial and technical assistance to design and implement restoration projects. Ethan is the Chittenden County Forester for the Vermont Department of Forests, Parks and Recreation. He advises private landowners, municipalities, conservation organizations, foresters and loggers on the responsible stewardship of forestland, and administers Vermont’s Use Value Appraisal program.

Invasive species pose a serious challenge to the management of riparian forests by out-competing native plants. They erode stream banks and damage habitats and ecosystem services, to name a few of the negative effects. Invasive species are incredibly difficult to control and eliminate, pushing practitioners to get creative and make difficult decisions on how to manage invasives. Listen to this episode to learn about how climate change is exacerbating the effects of invasives, strategies to control them, the challenging but essential role of herbicides, and how the process of managing invasive species has shifted how ecologists view forests. 

To learn more about Vermont’s invasive plants, please go to Vermont Invasives' Gallery of Land Invasives. You can also watch a video about the most common invasive plants in forests in this region(created by our podcast guest, Ethan Tapper!). Finally, this video (also from Ethan) goes into further detail about controlling invasive plants.

In this latest episode of Restoration Roundup, we speak with three farmers who made the decision to restore riparian areas on their land. First we spoke with Geo Honigford, a retired vegetable farmer from South Royalton, VT who sold his farm last year. We also spoke with Larry Trombley from Swanton, VT, a landowner who leases his land to farmers, who was particularly motivated by growing up in Vermont and seeing how agricultural production affected the health of the Missisquoi Bay. Finally, we spoke with Guy Choiniere, a third generation dairy farmer from Highgate Center, VT whose land is conserved through a land trust and won an Aldo Leopold award for his conservation work on the farm. 

Over 80% of Vermont land is privately owned, meaning that a big piece of the puzzle with restoring riparian areas is connecting farmers to opportunities to restore a riparian site. All three men were approached by the USDA to restore a riparian area on their land. Though a shared reservation many farmers have is the loss of their land to the forest, we discuss with Guy, Geo, and Larry how the programs they worked with helped navigate how to best support their surrounding land and ecosystems, while still ensuring a productive farm. Join us in this special episode of Restoration Roundup where we hear from farmers themselves on how their restoration projects changed how they view land management, what they learned, and the positive impacts they’ve seen the forests make on wildlife and their surrounding waterways. 

If you or someone you know is interested in restoring a riparian area, click the link below for finding support to restore a riparian forest on your land through the Vermont Agency of Agriculture CREP Program.

n this episode we speak with Allan Strong and Margaret Fowle about the importance of riparian areas for birds, and how riparian forest restoration practitioners can best support bird populations. Allan is a professor in the wildlife biology program in The Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources at UVM. His research focuses on bird conservation and he currently serves as Chair of Vermont’s Endangered Species Committee. Margaret Fowle is a senior conservation biologist with Audubon Vermont; her work includes a variety of bird conservation projects that range from single species recovery and monitoring projects to habitat restoration on public and private lands.

There are many birds in the region that can be found in riparian areas, including a few that are endangered or of conservation concern. Birds in this category include bald eagles (which are listed as endangered in Vermont, though no longer federally), who build their nests in trees along rivers and on lakeshores. Great blue heron, American black duck, red-shouldered hawk, who all rely on riparian habitat, are listed by Vermont as species of “greatest conservation need.” Riparian areas also provide nesting habitat for more common birds like bank swallows or belted kingfishers, who then use the waterways to find food. 

Listen all the way to the end to hear us try Professor Strong’s famous turkey call!

The bird featured in this episode was the Yellow-throated Vireo. It was recorded by Martin St-Michel on May 18, 2014 at the George Montgomery Sanctuary in Brome-Missisquoi, Québec The song was downloaded from xeno-canto.org.

This project has been funded wholly or in part by the United States Environmental Protection Agency under assistance agreement (LC00A00695-0) to NEIWPCC in partnership with the Lake Champlain Basin Program.

In this episode we speak with two scientists from the U.S. Forest Service that are part of the American Elm disease resistance breeding and restoration program, Dr. Leila Pinchot and Dr. Kathleen Knight. Dr. Knight’s research has focused on the effects of non-native pests and pathogens in forested ecosystems, concentrating in emerald ash borer and our topic today: dutch elm disease. Dr. Pinchot is a forest ecologist whose research focuses on tree restoration for species impacted by non-native pests and pathogens. 

Elm trees' resilience against harsh spring storms and their roots' exceptional ability to filter out sediments make them critical species for floodplains. However, elms have become a rarity among floodplains due to the desolating impacts of the elm bark beetle (scientific name: Hylurgopinus rufipes of the Curculionidae family) that spreads dutch elm disease. The disease spread extensively across the U.S. in the mid-20th century killing more than 75% of elm trees by 1989. Dutch elm disease attacks the xylem cells of the trees which carry water and nutrients from the root to the stems and leaves, making it one of the deadliest tree diseases. This has severely impacted restoration and floodplain efforts, as no other trees fill the niche of Elm trees. 

Tune into this episode as we discuss Knight and Pinchot’s team's work in developing disease tolerant elms, the role of elm trees in riparian forests, gaps in understanding the disease, the impact climate change has on this disease, and more!

If you, or someone you know finds a large survivor elm on your property, you can submit it to the survivor elm database here.

In this episode we have a lively conversation with Brenda Sieglitz and Audrey Epp Schmidt about the potential of incorporating commercial agroforestry into riparian buffers to provide both ecological benefits and financial returns for farmers. Brenda is the Senior Manager of the Keystone 10 Million Trees Partnership, which is a collaborative effort, coordinated by the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, of 200 national, regional, state and local agencies, as well as conservation organizations, watershed groups, conservancies, outdoors enthusiasts, businesses and individuals willing to plant trees. Audrey is the Director of Business Development at Propagate Ventures, a company that helps farmers implement agroforestry on their land. Audrey works directly with farmers and landowners to identify the best-fit agroforestry approaches for their operations, and also leads the company’s strategic partnerships with non-profits, academia, and government.

Agroforestry is the strategic integration of fruit, nut, and timber trees on farms to achieve a range of benefits. Agroforestry, whether “extreme” riparian buffers (a term Brenda and Audrey use to describe the new practice of extending a conservation buffer by adding an agroforestry system upland of it), alley cropping, silvopasture, or other forms, can provide critical wildlife habitat and landscape connectivity, reduce erosion and improve water quality, provide shade for grazing livestock, and more. 

Although many forms of agroforestry have been practiced in other parts of the world and by Indigenous people in North America (and elsewhere) for a long time, it is still a relatively new practice in the northeastern United States. We discuss how efforts to increase adoption of agroforestry have been going in the Mid-Atlantic, where both Audrey and Brenda are based, and what work has been happening around these systems in New England.

We also discuss what the most popular plants are (elderberry!), how planning agroforestry systems is affected by climate change, and what policies could better support this kind of work.

In this episode of Restoration Roundup, we are joined by ecologist and naturalist Jason Mazurowski to discuss how practitioners and farmers can best support pollinators, particularly in riparian forests. Jason specializes in native pollinator conservation, and is currently working with the Gund Institute for Environment and Audubon Vermont on multiple field projects; he also serves as an adjunct instructor at UVM teaching courses on field ecology and native pollinators. 

New England has at least a few of all of the “super seven” pollinator species. Bees are the most effective and are responsible for 70-80% of pollinating services, and Vermont has more than 300 species of native bees. 

Pollinators are indispensable to ecosystems for the proper reproduction of plants, and for the provision of other ecosystem services. Many pollinator species are in decline, but some are actually increasing, and little is known about the status of many others. Use of chemicals can harm pollinators, or cause ‘pollinator traps’ where pollinators are attracted to good habitat but then get “trapped” by harmful pesticides like neonicotinoids. Climate change can exacerbate negative impacts on bee populations, jeopardizing pollinator-dependent crops. This spells trouble for farmers as pollinators, especially bees, provide an important economic service. 

Certain farming practices, however, can support pollinators in your area. Restoring riparian forests with an eye to maximizing plant species diversity, for example, can provide a range of nesting and feeding resources for pollinators.  Riparian forested areas can be part of the solution to declining pollinator populations, so join us on our third episode as we discuss how riparian buffers can support pollinators, alternatives to herbicides and practices to avoid, what kind of habitat and plant species are needed to best support pollinators, and much more!