MEETING MINUTES
Meeting Held Through Email Due to Coronavirus Restrictions
Attendees:
Gabrielle Oldham Dori Murphy
Ron Anderson Kathie Jarmon
Michael Morgan Tom Frederick
John Bennett
Treasurer’s Report
Tom distributed the Treasurer’s report to all. He defined funding available to the CCFCDB for projects and other monetary needs.
Update on Big Tree Program:
John reported:
On
April 3rd, Dori, Kathie and John re-measured trees from 2011. The first two are trees on private property
in the Calvert area. The American
basswood regained sole county championship status (it was a co-champion). The silver maple has new owners who had the
tree severely pruned, resulting in a considerable loss of points. The remaining 4 trees are at Cecil College. We found the triple leader yellow poplar had
split at the base, losing one of its leaders and has a huge rot pocket, so we
decided not to re-measure it. John then
went home; Dori and Kathie went on down the Nature trail and re-measured the
northern red oak (gained 20 points) and the mockernut hickory (gained 24
points). Later we learned the State
Champion mockernut hickory in Montgomery County had died, so the Cecil College
tree becomes the new State Champion.
Dori had previously discovered a large American hornbeam on the bank of
the North East Creek, so they measured that as a new tree, which became the new
Cecil County Champion at 109 points.
They also found and measured a new triple leader yellow poplar at 297
points. It does not yet qualify at the State level, but should be re-measured
in 5-10 years. Six trees remain to be
re-measured at a later time.
At
the State level, volunteers in Allegany, Baltimore City, Calvert, Carroll,
Cecil, Frederick, Garrett and Montgomery have taken advantage of the spring
weather to measure 42 trees—about evenly split between new trees and re-measurements. The dedicated ink printer for the MBTP has
stopped working, so the process for printing and mailing certificate packets
has backlogged. For the foreseeable
future, since there are no available funds, I will use my personal
printer. We have had problems converting
the certificate from the dedicated computer to my personal PC which has
increased the backlog. We also learned
there is a DNR FS policy on discarding DNR equipment which has to be followed.
Besides
the Cecil mockernut hickory, we also have two new ornamental cherry species as
State Champions. A weeping Higan cherry in Montgomery County is the only example in
Maryland. A weeping Yoshino cherry in
Carroll is at 275 points, exceeding the 254 point
former champion in Harford. The Yoshino
cherry was first measured in the 1990’s but had fallen “off the radar” until
tracked down by Geary Schwemmer.
Top: Yoshino Cherry Bottom:
Higan Cherry
Natural Resources Career Conference (NRCC) Update:
The Education Committee met via Zoom on April 5th.
So far we have 29 applicants
with 15 having been accepted by their boards as of April 2. The Education
Committee is holding off on making a decision about how many campers to allow
this year. The Garrett County Board of Education has not required us to reduce
our numbers. That could change. Garrett’s positivity rate is 4.11% as of April
4. That’s twice as high as it was a couple of weeks ago.
I made a small change in the Welcome Letter. We do not
require anyone to be vaccinated, but since everyone 16 and up is eligible now,
I am encouraging all participants to get vaccinated. The hope is if we have a
good number of staff and campers vaccinated Garrett will ease up on some of the
restrictions. I am really hoping we can do better than brown bag meals. It was
suggested at the meeting that people who were vaccinated may not need to get
tested. I’m checking into that. It could be a motivation for folks to get
vaccinated.
Staff and campers will be required to wear masks. We are
looking into giving a mask to each camper and staff. That way everyone has an
extra. Maryland flag or DNR logo are possibilities.
Dawn Balinski
is sending out statewide applicant updates periodically and everyone should be
receiving those. If you are not, let Tom
know.
Website Update:
Ron reported that he updated the website as follows:
Added American Hornbeam BT3767
Installed American Basswood BT2264 as sole county champ
Added March minutes
Added April agenda
New Business:
Tom reported:
A seasonal exclusion is now in effect because of FIDS Habitat until August 1st on the ENSP Salvage Harvest. The logger did a good job rehabbing the currently harvested areas with the drier weather. This has been a challenging site due to the soil types and wet winter. It made skidding very difficult and cost the contractor a lot work days.
The Backyard Buffer Packet seedling P/U days for Cecil County are Friday the 16th and Saturday the 17th.
Next Meeting: May 5, 2021