The purple line is to the right of a young 8 trembling aspen sapling that got its chance here on the north side of the berm when they stopped cutting the grass in 2009. The purple line goes from the ground up to a branch that was at my shoulder level (5ft). The yellow line is as high as the sapling and is over 6 times as long as the purple line indicating the sapling is a little over 30ft tall. The trunk has a circumference of 12 inches. Not bad for 8 years of growth.
The Trilliums did well this spring with 11 flowers. I'm not sure I could say that any new plants have developed but the existing plants are larger and more vigorous than previous years. I visited the trilliums in Ben Franklin wood as well this spring and they are doing ok. There are more red trilliums in the woods than I remember seeing before.
There doesn't seem to be very much field mice damage to the trees this spring compared to previous years. A few trees that had been girdled the previous winter but had still leafed out last year didn't come back this spring but I don't notice any damage that I can say for sure occurred this winter.
The white pines took a hard knock on their inventory of older needles over winter. Some of them look quite sparse except for the buds growing with the current year's needles.
The patch of dog strangling vine (at the end of Newhaven) I hand removed last year has come back strong. I have already removed 200+ stalks of dog strangling vine from the patch this spring.
Most but not all ash trees on the berm have been killed by the emerald ash borer. There are a few smaller trees that haven't been attacked yet and the smaller seedlings are growing especially on the north side of the berm.
