The Village Grows

 The Fort Street Pollinator Habitat has become quite the happening place, with heliopsis and rudbeckia getting much taller than such plants have any right to be--and unfortunately, sometimes collapsing under their own weight--

Keeled-over heliopsis

but blooming anyway.

with their persistent blooms

Perhaps the most exciting growth, though, was the team of volunteers that came out earlier this month to create a mowing edge of bricks salvaged from a to-be-demolished building. When the bricks were offered by the building's owner a few weeks ago, some dedicated workers used crowbars and brute strength to remove them from the old floor, load them onto a truck, and unload them in a storage area made available by the church across the street from the habitat. On September 17, workers, tractors, and trailers materialized, and the bricks were moved to their new location.

At least twenty-one people showed up early on a misty Saturday morning to make this project happen. They included members of a church committee, the Rotary Club,

the leadership program of a local college,               

a teenager and his grandmother,

general community members, and a City Council representative. The team had an age range of more than seven decades. 

Our crew worked hard

but managed to have some fun along the way.

Photo courtesy of Marsha Ward

Some senior pictures were taken while the staircase was being weeded.

And in roughly four hours, the team dug out and installed edging along the habitat's 285-foot length.

A project that started with a discussion in a church basement and five geriatric committee members pinning solarization plastic to a slippery slope has become something else entirely. Volunteers from three community organizations, several faith communities, and the neighborhood have engaged in several work days on the site. Our small city has provided land and invaluable logistical support. Some local businesses have donated materials.

And nature is doing the rest. What had been a hillside of invasive Johnson grass and poison ivy is now home to bumblebees butterflies, and songbirds, and gives humans a reason to stop and take pictures.

O frabjous day!

 Whatever that delightful word invented by Lewis Carroll was meant to mean, it does convey a sense of exhilaration, and yesterday's planting of Phase Two of our riverbank habitat and Phase One of a nearby butterfly garden definitely left its volunteer workers with that sense (though maybe coupled with a bit of exhaustion). As recently as April, the riverbank was a giant swath of black plastic, while the area adjoining a brick sidewalk in a historic business district was home to some nice daffodils, a lot of weeds and scruffy, hard-to-mow grass, and not much else. Today, the situation is very different.

Phase One viewed from the river trail

Phase One, planted in May, is thriving, and yesterday nearly twenty volunteers at different times planted a 200-foot stretch of riverbank with a mix of Ohio native forbs and grasses and that neglected sidewalk bed with over 200 seedlings of bee balm, butterfly weed, and coneflower. The day was genuinely a community effort, with people from the neighborhood, other parts of town, two churches, a college, and a master naturalist group joining forces for several hours. The ages of the volunteers ranged from eight to seventy-plus, and the day's tasks included wrestling with the last of the solarization plastic

and digging a LOT of holes.

 Phase Two does not look particularly exciting at the moment,

The view from the steps

The view from below

but we anticipate a lot of activity a few months from now. The neighborhood bees, skippers, and finches have been making themselves at home for some time, and this year's South-bound monarchs have used the riverbank as a way station.  

With three species of milkweed planted yesterday and more to come, next year these iconic insects will be able to complete their life cycle on our little patch of riverbank, and human visitors to Historic Harmar will be able to enjoy these pockets of wildness while strolling our little town.