Acorn Launch Pad — an Outdoor Classroom Wildlife Habitat Installation

Jun 072017

Acorn Launch Pad is an Outdoor Classroom wildlife habitat installation at the Laguna Foundation‘s Laguna Environmental Center, or LEC, located at 900 Sanford Road, Santa Rosa, California, 95401. Date: June 6, 2017. School: Orchard View School, Sebastopol, California. Teacher: Sunny Galbraith. Me: Tony McGuigan, from Spore Lore.

Acorn Launch Pad, hereinafter at times referred to as “ALP” for brevity, is a 3-season wildlife habitat installation. The project evolved during the winter, spring, and summer months of 2016 into 2017. The installation highlight is to plant a valley oak tree between a hubba hubba hulk of a log and a 1000 pound Cold Water Canyon Rock slab. Will the valley oak (Quersus lobata) live to 500 years? Will the tree lift the rock slab as it grows? Not for me to know in 30, 40, 50 years from now, but perhaps the students planting the tree will.

1 Year, 5 Months Before Installation

Driveway of Laguna Foundation’s LEC (Laguna Environmental Center), east view. The gate is behind me about 50 feet. Note the rock patch left of the road, at the foot of the culvert pipe, and the juncus rush clump. Juncus (Juncus patens), culvert, and ditch — sounds like water to me! This lower area will make good wildlife habitat, providing habitat’s 4 elements — food, water, shelter, and a place to raise young. Juncus at the site indicates year-round water; the valley oak and critters living in the tree, under the rocks, and in the soil will use that water.

Same view as above pic, but along the fence. Not too early to envision the project; Permaculture principles entail waiting a year (12 months!) before working a site. This winter’s job is to watch the water — how much water from winter floods will fill the site AND where will the water line be?

Culvert pipe outlet, north side of driveway, which connects low-lying pastures so the driveway does not flood so quickly. Will take lots of rain to flood over the road. Note how thick (happy) the juncus clump is.

7 Months Before Installation

It’s been nearly a year waiting on harvesting wood for Acorn Launch Pad. Last winter’s wet wood (WWW — and nothing virtual about it!) has sunbaked dry, has become lighter. Lighter wood means we can harvest a larger, bulker, hulkier log or tree trunk. Took 4 hours to get Hulk (strapped at angle) into the truck. Note the plywood board under the rear tire — the soft November ground is soft and a tire rut left in the mud would look messy.

Digging bars keep the plywood in place as the truck’s wheel spins right.

Webbing straps secure Hulk to a perfectly placed telephone pole. Ready?! Set!

Go!!! Hulk, an oak tree trunk section, arrives home, about 50 feet from the installation site, which is close to the fenceline on the left.

5 Months Before Installation

So where’s that driveway road? Winter in Sonoma County means water, sometimes flooding. Note how Hulk rests in slightly higher ground above the culvert. Note the lushness of the terrain — hard to imagine that in six months it will be a parched dry golden brown.

Later that same January 2017 day; the water has risen fast. Yikes! Almost lost Hulk to the flood, but now we know where flood level goes to at the site.

2 Months Before Installation

A rock slab is placed on top of 3 smaller landscape boulders. The rock slab, “Rock”, is a 1000 pound (½ ton) Cold Water Canyon (local to Sonoma County) rock. Thank you Stuart Schroeder for the fork lift delivery! The 3 smaller rocks will slow down Rock’s sinking into the soil and will create cavities for critters under Rock.

Installation Day — Part 1 (6 weeks before Part 2)

The students from Orchard View School have arrived. Rolling Hulk on its side, we discover . . .

ants! Lots of ants. Busy, swarming red ants, that bite. Obviously, we will be destroying some of their habitat, most likely a nest built under Hulk, as we install another habitat.

Today’s outdoor classroom project is about mechanical advantage, mostly class 1 leverage. Left, a long metal pipe is toed into the earth and pushed forward, from the top end, to move Rock more centered on top of the 3 landscaping boulders below. A student (second from right) pulls Rock at the same time using a come-a-long. A third student (right) keeps Hulk in place; on the other side of Hulk (far right, out of photo) are digging bars and pipes to anchor the come-a-long. Note that Rock still sits on the fork lift skid/pallet that helped Farmer Stuart deliver it. The wood pallet creates a lot of catching resistance — all the more reason to use mechanical advantage.

Fine tuning placement of Rock and retrieving the come-a-long chain.

Students begin digging Hulk’s hole, near enough to the rocks so that the tree trunk section will surface and rest on the rocks.

Topsoil and weeds from the hole is thrown into the rock pile to create a rich foundation for planting the valley oak tree.

Extra logs are temporarily placed to help create a mound of soil up against the rocks.

A western fence lizard (tail and foot visible under the pallet) inspects the new Recreation Room.

Finished for the day. Acorn Launch Pad waits for the next work session. North view. Note that weeds and mud have been thrown against the rock pile. Also, the extra logs have removed from the soil-mounding area and are now placed into the hole started by the students to alert anyone walking in the field.

A lizard on its way to the rock pile.

The warm sunny rock has coaxed a lizard out. Notice the little rock alcove it basks in, complete with overhead shelter from predators.

Habitat it and they will come!

Installation Day — Part 2 — Completion on June 6, 2017

East view. Time to finish this job, 6 weeks later than scheduled. Soft adobe mud has turned into brick hard adobe mud. Today’s job is a different job than it would have been in soft-mud spring. Summer’s heat and dryness have hardened the heavy soil. But we can fix that!

North view. First order of business — get water to the hole so that the soil will soften. A garden hose is stretched out in the sun to warm while tools are gathered. Removing any kinks in the hose now will help increase water flow. Note the dryness of the terrain.

Collecting tools and water from the Laguna Foundation’s Nursery.

Spore Lore™ Mobile Hydration Station on truck. Hoses deliver water into Hulk’s hole started by students.

Close-up view of getting water to the installation site. The odd-looking dome screen above the barrels is merely to keep the sun-warmed hose from kinking; I ran out of hard pipe to plumb the siphon. 5-gal buckets of water are used to replenish water flowed out of the drums, before the siphon is lost — sure beats carrying the water buckets to the site!

And we have water!

Plenty of time for the hole to be filled with water. Time to take in the beauty of this pasture land, and time to imagine how this habitat might contribute to it. A good time to plan completion of the job, work some art into the finished product. The metal digging bar represents how Hulk is to rest. Catching the eye — visitors to the Laguna Foundation will spot the oak log from afar. Diagonally, and opening away from the road, the log is positioned to welcome visitors. And as for the critters visiting or living in Acorn Launch Pad, they could care less about such artsy stuff.

Metal digging bar representing Hulk’s position — close-up view. Hulk and Rock will form a “planting box” for Acorn (the acorns planted to seed the valley oak tree). Fill canyon (trench between Rock and Hulk), plant tree. Simple! Oh, that’s right, no such luck; I’m doing the digging.

A lizard climbs rock,

and stops. Perhaps to savor warmth? Perhaps to conceal, not give away so freely, its hideout and/or home. “Who me? I am not here. I have disappeared into camouflage.” Note this camouflage expert’s position. Is it coincidence that this striped animal rests parallel to a like-colored, bleached grass stalk?

Close-up of western fence lizard entering ALP. Note pattern, color, and texture of Lizard’s right arm. Now do the same for the lichen it has landed on. This guy is good! “Where’s dinner? I heard there were wood beetles, earthworms, and froglets here.”

Let’s do the Can Can! Driwater® hydration cans will provide time-released irrigation to young tree roots a year from now. Acorn is set for launch in Fall 2017. Winter rains will help mature the valley oak seedling. Time-released irrigation, using the Driwater® system, will water the seedlings through next late spring and next summer. [No statement here is by Driwater®.] Note the twine line — it was used to keep the cans in place and to “chalk line” surface level. In order words, the twine marks how high the soil will be mounded. Keep in mind that this view of the planting mound is looking through Hulk — Hulk will be installed up against these cans, parallel to them and will form a “planting box”. Note how the cans’ tops have been positioned above soil level. The top will be removed to fill the cans with Driwater® material. Note the oak limbs under and alongside the cans — mycorrhizal fungi trenches in waiting. Those small oak limbs will break down, rot, and become food and homes for soil creatures from today till Acorn is planted. Then, upon planting, the decayed oak limbs will support growth to Acorn through absorbing and holding water and by providing an enhanced mycorrhizal fungi network.

Oak Lake fills while weeds/topsoil are harvested into a storage bin (pond liners are lightweight and strong). The alive weeds/topsoil will be used used to dress Acorn’s adobe hillside.

Roadside trash harvested. These old tree branches are good organic material that will come in handy.

Oak Lake expansion. The water is about 6 inches below grade, just low enough to be contained in the hole and not overfill. Time is the most powerful working agent — the longer the water sits in the hole, the softer the adobe clay becomes. Note the planting of sticks in the center of the soil mound. Those antennae are broken roadside trash branches — wood that will absorb water, break down, and leave a more alive soil for Acorn.

More water. Now the digging is under water, sliver of mud by sliver of mud. Slow digging but doable.

Hulk flipped into position. Note the closer (foreground) digging bar — it provides our workhorse, leverage, and will pull Hulk to it.

Ready?! Set!

Perfect! Hulk has cleared the end of the hole and can be flipped in.

It’s a flawless half turn nose dive! Notice how much more hole there is surrounding Hulk. Hulk will be pulled to the closer shore, toward the red strap. Doing so will allow Hulk to rest parallel with the hydration cans.

Supporting logs floated in Oak Lake to provide more organic material AND to preserve precious backfill soil. More wood in the hole means less soil needed to fill it.

Persuader (sledge hammer) sinks another supporting log next to Hulk. Note that Hulk has twisted on its side. Each flip of Hulk produces a different rainwater collecting surface. Might not sound like much but every drop of rainwater is a big deal to the fungi, flora and fauna that will call Hulk home.

Hulk lays almost parallel to the can line. Half of the adobe mound in the background will line the bottom of the canyon wedge, ensuring that Hulk will absorb water/moisture during rain/fog.

Mudworks. Downhill side of Hulk filled in with Oak Bog (puddle) created to capture rainwater.

Our old friend, Culvert. A great place to collect straw.

Straw is used to cover the wet mud and to help the habitat blend into local terrain.

Finished! North view. Acorn Launch Pad wildlife habitat installation is in.

Closer view of finished habitat. Acorn will be planted at the blue flag, between Hulk and Rock.

West view of soil mound awaiting Acorn.

South view. Note that the hydration cans are hidden from road traffic.

East view. Note that the hydration cans are usable (the lids can be accessed) yet blend into the habitat’s features. The cans will be more hidden in high grass as the habitat fills in with Life.

See you in the fall to plant (Blast off!!!) Acorn.

Thank you, as always, to Sunny Galbraith, teacher at Orchard View School, Sebastopol, and her students. Also, much thanks to the Staff and Board of the Laguna Foundation, particularly the Restoration and Conservation Science Department: Wendy Trowbridge, Director; Brent Reed, Ecological Program Manager; Sarah Gordon, Conservation Science Program Manager; Paul Weber, Restoration Field Supervisor; Asa Voight, Restoration Technician II; Hannah Werdmuller, Restoration Technician; and Julie Skopal, Nursery Manager.

Enjoy your habitat installations. Habitat it!

Tony

Dark Soil Light Wood Saddleback — an Outdoor Classroom wildlife habitat installation

1- Residential Habitats -- Critters and Their Homes, 3- Habitat It And They Will Come -- Tony's book, 6-Outdoor Classroom, Blog No Responses »

Apr 212017

Dark Soil Light Wood Saddleback is an Outdoor Classroom wildlife habitat installation at the Laguna Foundation‘s Laguna Environmental Center, or LEC, located at 900 Sanford Road, Santa Rosa, California, 95401. Date: February 23, 2017. School: Orchard View School, Sebastopol, California. Teacher: Sunny Galbraith. Me: Tony McGuigan, from Spore Lore.

Dark Soil Light Wood Saddleback (now that’s a name!) hereinafter “Saddleback” installation.

The Plan, from 2 months before the project. Name change was inevitable; the students had not been consulted. Plan is North View. Our project, Saddleback, is under East Log and the mounding of soil/rock/plants between the two logs.

In a nutshell, Saddleback is a wildlife habitat installation using a large trunk section to shelter an underground tunnel that leads to a rock outcropping and the surface.

Dark Soil Light Wood Saddleback — The Before. North east view. February in Sonoma County means mustard! Note the swath of vibrant yellow mustard in the lush grass-happy cow pasture beyond the Laguna Environmental Center’s fenceline. The line of trees on the pasture’s north border is Irwin Creek.

Prep — 3 Months Before Installation

Saddleback is a sister habitat to a previous outdoor classroom wildlife habitat installation: Twisted North Mound. In foreground, a student removes clay soil from under East Log to build the soil mound behind him. The trench was then filled with woodchips for easy removal when East Log’s habitat is created (beats digging out clay soil!).

Prep — Installation Day — Before Students Arrive

Turkey tail fungus on the oak trunk of West Log.

Turkey Tail fungus.

Meadow barley (Hordeum brachyantherum) plugs that will be used for the project. These plugs are leftovers in the Nursery; their survival rate will be poor. But, some may live to thrive in the habitat.

A plug of meadow barley. Note the moss “weed”.

Scraping away woodchips from under the East Log. See “Prep — 3 Months Before Installation“, above. Note the earthworm at my fingertips.

Soil critters thriving in the moist decaying woodchips under (shaded from sun) in the previously made trench.

Scraping away woodchips to preserve their integrity. We want to keep the soil we move from mixing with the woodchips.

Shading the woodchip pile with landscape cloth to minimize soil microbe/fungus fatality. The partially broken down woodchips are richly impregnated with decomposers, that is, microbes and fungus and arthropods and gastropods that want to eat the woodchips, thrive in them. Would be a shame to kill off such biota while installing a habitat. The opaque landscape cloth will keep harsh sunlight from the woodchip dwellers.

Taking shape. The trench under East Log is deepened. Soil in the tub, from the trench, will be added to Saddleback when the meadow barley is planted.

Shopping for something organic, something ALIVE! at the Habitat Resource Pile (an old woodchip pile with buried treasures). Note the middle stump, adjacent to the eaten out stump in the foreground — it has lived inside a large woodchip for over 3 years, always covered by chips. Now it is ripe to pick and place in a wildlife habitat. The stump itself is alive — it is impregnated with Life.

Prying Middle Stump (think Middle Earth) from the Habitat Garden’s woodchip pile. Note the dark richness of its bed — Are these woodchips are is this soil?!

Habitat it and they will come! Lots of Life, critters seen and unseen, fungi, stored water and its biome.

Stored in a tub, the precious stump is shaded in a plastic barrel. The stump’s transfer to the habitat will be in a few hours.

Harvesting compost from Compost Cricket Corral, as mentioned in my last post, Centipede Tunnel Perch.

Prep. Clockwise from foreground: 4-15 gallon pots filled with Nursery-discarded potting soil (free!), West Log, Cold Water Canyon rock slabs (standing and on garden cart), Middle Stump in white plastic shaded bin, plants (behind East Log in shade), black plastic bin of topsoil from East Log trench, tunnel of corrugated perforated habitated (holes cut in for critter entrance/exit) 6″ ABS, palm fronds, black landscape cloth covered mound of woodchips, wheelbarrow (rusty) of compost with an algae covered log, wheelbarrow (blue) of compost.

A bonus gift! We have 5 juncus Juncus patens to plant. Juncus, a reed, loves water; their presence indicates year-round water.

Installation — Dark Soil Light Wood Saddleback

Students have arrived and gather woodchips that will be used to finish the project.

In goes the tunnel, a custom designed critter tunnel, “Each Exit/Entrance is about 6-8″ long and 2″ wide (2 corrugation trenches).”, as described in Centipede Tunnel Perch.

Decisions, decisions — it is a school day after all.

Critter tunnel in place. Note the spaced cut-outs. Are you [critter] in or are you out?

Old palm fronds, salvaged/harvested from the Habitat Garden Resource Pile, are used to line the tunnel. Accomplishes: 1) keeps tunnel in place, 2) installs Life-alive! biome to project, 3) provides critters with a moisture laden maze of cavities, and 4) empties the palm frond pile. Turn trash to treasure!

Middle Stump has a new home. Saddleback gets an infussion of life.

Adding more wood for the habitat’s cavern-filled mound. Also, scraping soil to cover tunnel/palm fronds.

Backfilling to plant up against East Log.

Moving a rock slab into Saddleback.

And another rock.

The goal here is to create a planting mound joined with the plants in the foreground, those meadow barley of Twisted North Mound.

Soil for the mound.

In comes a cavity maker.

Saddleback’s north side is about to get a rock slab that will create cavities.

North end of Saddleback sealed off with a rock slab. Middle Stump is really now in Middle Earth!

Mounding soil.

And the bin of topsoil.

Woodchips.

Time to reclaim the woodchips from the start of the project.

Planting meadow barley.

Each meadow barley plug is planted top flush with soil surface. Then the grasses are lightly surrounded with woodchips, enough to support the grasses but not so much to block sunlight.

Planting meadow barley and juncus.

Dark Soil Light Wood Saddleback — The After.

1 Month After Installation

A western fence lizard surfaces from within Saddleback.

Same lizard back inside and out another exit. Fun in the sun.

Enjoy your habitat installations. Habitat it!

Tony

Centipede Tunnel Perch — An Outdoor Classroom Wildlife Habitat Installation

1- Residential Habitats -- Critters and Their Homes, 6-Outdoor Classroom, Blog No Responses »

Feb 142017

Centipede Tunnel Perch — The Before. Northwest view. Previous installations in the Habitat Garden (nearest to farthest): Cookie Monster Perch, Garter Snake Ravine, Log Pile Apartments, Compost Cricket Corral, Big Splash Hotel and Spa, and Salamander French Drain, the last of which is nearly under the willow to the left.

Centipede Tunnel Perch is a wildlife habitat installed near the Habitat Landscaping Resource Center (otherwise known as the “compost” and “log pile”) at the Laguna Foundation‘s Laguna Environmental Center, or LEC, located at 900 Sanford Road, Santa Rosa, California, 95401. The installation was an outdoor classroom activity. Date: January 19, 2017. School: Orchard View School, Sebastopol, California. Teacher: Sunny Galbraith. Me: Tony McGuigan, from Spore Lore.

In a nutshell, this wildlife habitat installation is 3 tasks at the Habitat Garden. The Habitat Garden can be considered the collective of wildlife habitat installations, some of which are listed under the photo, above, and all the natural (organic) materials on hand. Most of those on-hand materials are the compost and branch/log pile.

1st Task — To get a large mass of wood buried deep into the soil so it will provide moisture to critters months after the rains have gone.

2nd Task — To use the soil dug from the wood’s hole to direct water to the wood.

3rd Task — To plant native sedge to hold the soil bank downstream from Centipede Tunnel Perch.

Prep — 3 Days Before Installation

Northeast corner of concrete slab behind the Nursery. Right: Garter Snake Ravine habitat with “weeds”, mostly the alien (non-native) Italian rye grass, an annual (per the local farmer, Stuart). Left: Log Pile Apartments and Compost Critter Corral habitats and Santa Barbara sedge (Carex barbarae). The students will be sheet mulching over the weeds and planting Santa Barbara sedge to cover both sides of the slab’s corner.

A pile of old straw is moved away to dig the deep hole for the habitat. Ultimately, a perch-like long piece of tree trunk will stand upright in the hole. The deeper the hole, the more stable the vertical post/pole will be. Also, the deeper the hole, the shorter (off the ground) the pole becomes. Grandiose towering structure VERSUS safety — always a hard weighing between the two! Note the old straw was left there to break down AND to keep the adobe clay soil moist, for digging such a hole. Wet/moisturize the dry, hard adobe clay soil one day and dig into soft, pliable adobe the next day.

A further note about digging here. The digging is horrendous at this site — all the more reason to be digging here. We will be unearthing the nearby road crew’s dumping of asphalt road grading, circa 1950’s, including many book-sized slabs of asphalt. That “worthless” soil will be our new treasure in creating a berm of soil to direct rainfall to the habitat.

A shovel head deep into the center of the Earth. Note the straw bale far right and the little berm of hole soil between the straw and the hole. That berm will help keep rainwater (we are expecting rain on installation day) away from the area. The installation area will be slippery enough without a running creek!

Prep — 2 Days Before Installation

Centipede Tunnel Perch’s perch has arrived, complete with safety cone hat.

Late morning rain. Perfect time to start work. Tomorrow, this new wildlife habitat will be installed by Orchard View students. Note this microcosm canyon. Our intention here is to capture as much water as possible and store it for as long as possible, so that amphibians would thrive here. (If amphibians can thrive, most other critter groups will have a fair chance of survival, too.) So, the adobe canyon, once a road crew dump, has become an adobe-lined, wood-filled water basin with outlet.

Regarding the habitat’s water outlet (mentioned in last paragraph), it is the height of the Santa Barbara sedge thicket, downstream from Centipede Tunnel Perch, that determines how far and wide Habitat Garden Pond becomes. Alas, a lake is born, on each good rain. As rainwater sits in the Lake, submerged wood will saturate that rainwater and store it. (Habitat Garden Adobe Canyon if you must have a name.)

Water! Precious stuff. So, rather than allow this road runoff rainwater to escape into the field downstream, through the double gate, a small soil berm will direct the rainwater to the Habitat Garden, to then be drained behind the Nursery and flow into the field. Either way, berm or not, the downhill field will get the water. With berm keeps the gate area dryer and brings water to the Habitat Garden.

Prep — Installation Day — Before Students

Installation Day. The soil is saturated with very little water in the hole. Perfect! I like easier digging. Note the black ABS tape on the posthole digger’s handles at 3-feet and 6-feet. The hole will be dug to the 6-feet mark.

Preparing to dig. Note that the wheelbarrow is lined with straw to cleanly dump the wet adobe soil harvested from the hole. The metal digging bar will straddle across the sides of the wheelbarrow and provide a knock-off edge for clearing out the posthole digger clams. Posthole digger in foreground (clams are at collecting end).

Muck removal on a bright shiny day. Note that the wood, blue-painted metal trench shovel (top) has its curve parallel with the curve of the posthole digger clam (below). The shovel will be flipped to clean the posthole digger’s right side, maintaining curve-curve parallel position. Note digging bar for banging the mud loose.

Dry Run photo op. Sizing the ABS 6″ corrugated perforated drainpipe Tunnel in the habitat.

Using a Milwaukee HACKZALL® to cut the plastic corrugated perforated pipe to install Exit/Entrance’s in the tunnel. Centipede Tunnel Perch includes tenancy options for critters using it. Eat, stay, have a family here, at least take a drink of water (meets the 4 elements of Habitat), then you can enter or leave through the many Exit/Entrance’s. Each Exit/Entrance is about 6-8″ long and 2″ wide (2 corrugation trenches). Note my boots are pinning the drainpipe up against the table’s leg posts.

Halfway done installing Exit/Entrance’s on this side of the pipe. The pipe will then be flipped over so that Exit/Entrance’s can be cut into that side, position alternating with the first side’s Exit/Entrance’s. Note the sawblade’s angle to ensure that both long sawcuts will meet.

The Tunnel is ready for installation. Exit/Entrance’s cut-outs collected in center.

View THROUGH the Tunnel to the concrete slab below.

Installation Day — The Students Are Here!

Removal of the adobe berm inside the installation zone. This soil will be the foundation for the road runoff berm.

Weeding the soil bank before sheet mulching. Weeds are dropped in place to keep the topsoil nutrients/microbes on site.

Thriving on a damp winter day. This outdoor classroom rocks! Takes a Village to support outdoor classrooms.

Progress of the hole. A lower platform has been stomped around the perch’s hole. That’s adobe! Note the rain workgear: mud boots and work-friendly rainsuit.

Your job (Yellow Slicker) is to stand here. And teacher Sunny did it so well while students pried Santa Barbara sedge plants from their pots. The sedge clumps were evenly spaced on the cardboard sheet mulching. Loose soil fill over the cardboard and between the plants will secure the plants in place on the bank.

Perch has been dropped into its hole. Note the ropes hanging on Perch. A triad of ropes was used to upright the tall, heavy tree trunk. One more rope was used to spin Perch after it vertically rested in the hole.

Students secure/stuff/wedge one end of Centipede Tunnel alongside Perch in the hole.

Inspection. And good news — Centipede Tunnel Perch passes. Note that the left end of Tunnel goes into the hole for Perch, toward moisture. The other end of Tunnel opens to ground level, under a log pile (or wood causeways if you are a cricket) where food (smaller critters) are plentiful.

Student stands on Tunnel while it is buried with old straw.

Foreground: Finishing touches for sedge transplanting — loose soil to fill in thin spots.

Background: Entire old straw pile is thrown at the base of Perch.

Trimming the sedge = twist and cut with pruning shears. The sedge leaves are used for mulch between the newly transplanted sedge bundles. Do plants have a feedback system such that dead leaves in the soil trigger growth? Always questions!

Students installing a temporary soil bank retaining wall. Short branches horizontal, saved-from-the-wood-bin stakes vertical. By the time these flimsy materials rot, like next year, the sedge bank will be glad to eat it up, glad to be nourished by the decaying wood. AND, most of that decay process will be from our Decomposer friends. Habitat it!

Sedge Corners. Note the tempory retaining wall of mulch material (little sticks, stakes, woodchips, soil). Perch is the blonde piece of wood on the far right of the tower of perches.

Centipede Tunnel Perch — The After. Note far right, the pooled water stopped from going to the gate by the new berm.

Hop, hop, and a few more. Wonder if my froggy friends will be at Habitat Garden Lake tonight?

Farmer Stuart moving hay for Stone Farm‘s plow horses.

Sedge Corners lookin’ good!

Centipede Tunnel Perch lookin’ good!

Time to call it an Outdoor Classroom Wildlife Habitat Installation Day! Time to give up the habitat to the critters. Time to go home, watch the receding Laguna de Santa Rosa leave the oak meadows along its banks.

Thank you, as always, to Sunny Galbraith, teacher at Orchard View School, Sebastopol, and her students. Also, much thanks to the Staff and Board of the Laguna Foundation, particularly the Restoration and Conservation Science Department: Wendy Trowbridge, Director; Brent Reed, Ecological Program Manager; and Paul Weber, Restoration Field Supervisor, and Julie Skopal, Nursery Manager.

Thank you to Aaron Nunez, the then Ecological Project Manager. Aaron has left the Laguna Foundation’s employment and is currently working elsewhere. Yay for Aaron! We teachers, students, and critters all appreciated his work while at the Laguna Foundation.

Enjoy your habitat installations. Habitat it!

Tony

July 12, 2015 Workshop at The Laguna Foundation — 2 wildlife habitats installed

1- Residential Habitats -- Critters and Their Homes, 6-Outdoor Classroom No Responses »

Aug 022015

Let the games begin! And the players for last month’s workshop (July 12th) at the Laguna Environmental Center are a 600 pound Sonoma fieldstone boulder (left) and an oak rootball with stump (right). Both the boulder and the rootball will become the main feature of their own wildlife habitat installation. Stuart Schroeder of Stone Farm helped me (Tony McGuigan) place both the boulder and the rootball near the proposed habitat sites — nice to have a tractor do some of the work!

Early Morning at the Laguna Environmental Center

Here are some photos of the wonderful start to the day while preparing for the workshop to begin:

A western pond turtle keeps a wary eye from Turtle Pond Float.

A blue heron watches,

then flies over the pond.

A Western Fence Lizard peeks from under the Sonoma fieldstone boulder we will soon move.

Close-up of the lizard.

Tools at the ready. From left: pruners, digging bars, roofing tile puller, shovels, soil chisels, hoes.

And some of the materials we will be working with. Valley oak trees, deer tree tubes, Sonoma fieldstone boulders with water-holding cavities, driftwood, and wood stumps.

The workshop started with a discussion in Heron Hall regarding wildlife habitats for residential settings. Pastry, coffee, and tea make planning the day so much more fun! On hand for the habitat landscaping was one Laguna Foundation intern, two Laguna Foundation Guides, four participants, and me, a Laguna Foundation Docent, as instructor.

Big Splash Hotel and Spa

Behind the Foundation’s Nursery is a compost area, which itself is a rich animal habitat, as is any thriving compost. The Nursery manager recently asked all working at the Nursery to hang up the garden hose when finished; she wants to prevent contamination of the water left in the hose. The hose has been hung up, sometimes here, sometimes there. “Big Splash” wildlife habitat installation is about getting the hose hung up in mostly one place — the dripping water from the hose will provide water to the critters living under and around the large water-catching landscape boulders.

The Before. Big Splash will be directly under the hose hanging from Compost Cricket Corral’s southwest post. Moooo! Note the nutsedge (Cyperus esculentus L.), front left; it will be saved because of its native status. The surrounding weeds (non-native plants) will be removed to allow native plants to thrive around the habitat.

A hole is dug alongside the compost post. The soil is set aside in buckets for later use — this rich topsoil will be used to establish new Santa Barbara sedge and field sedge plants surrounding Big Splash. The large V-shaped boulder on its side (left) is blocked (to prevent movement) on a pallet next to the hole.

Melon (cantaloupe and honey dew)-sized fieldstone rocks are carefully positioned in the hole to maximize their water-holding surfaces. Some rocks have one or two thimble-sized cavities; other rocks present a smear of small holes that will hold water. The rocks, in total, will provide moist cavities for critters to gather water from. Other animals will prey upon those seeking the water. A habitat is born!

Using water to determine a rock’s most-water-holding position. The rock will be placed on the lower rocks so that the “lake” is most full.

A foundation of water-holding fieldstone awaits the large V-shaped fieldstone boulder, which will sit on top. The view is from inside the compost, looking toward the Nursery’s concrete slab.

The large boulder is leveled to test its best water-holding position. St. Mary’s River flows out of Lake Superior — think very small critter!

Lots of push and pull to get the 600 hundred pound boulder “level” so that it will hold water.

And take a breath — the fieldstone boulder is in place. The top boulder is placed to receive the hose drip. Once Boulder Lake (think like a microbe or tiny birdbath critter) is filled, the moistness/wetness/water will drip down the side of the large fieldstone boulder to smaller, also water-holding, rocks. There are about a dozen such rocks under Boulder Lake. Soil, plants, mosses, lichens, and critters will call this pyramid of cavities, nutrition, and water “Home”. In other words, 3 of 4 ingredients of habitat have been met: shelter, food, and water. Because some critters will stay local to, if not live in, the moist pile of rocks, those critters will reproduce near or in the habitat installation. Number 4 ingredient, “a place to raise young”, has been met.

Santa Barbara sedge (Carex barbarae) and field sedge (Carex praegegracillus) are planted among the rocks.

Woodchip mulch is added to suppress weeds and give moisture to the establishing sedges. The woodchip mulch will break down, leaving rich organic material, enriching the new sedge planting. Soon a white net of mycorrhizae will spread throughout the decomposing woodchips, thereby benefitting the sedges.

The hose is temporarily positioned using driftwood; we are looking for the hose position that will target the hose drip into the center of the boulder to create Boulder Lake.

A good watering to jumpstart Big Splash Hotel and Spa wildlife habitat. Soon the sedge plants will surround and shelter the base of the large boulder, providing food and shelter to small critters. Larger animals will return to the watering hole.

Big Splash Hotel and Spa is finished. One habitat down, one to go for the workshop session.

Shady Oak Root Of It All — Prep before the workshop

Site where rootball was harvested. The rootball is nearly camouflaged; look between the digging bars. The oak tree rootball, that is destined to become the focal point of a wildlife habitat installation, is covered in adobe soil, adding to its very heavy weight. This logger’s garbage is a treasure to us habitat landscapers. For him, the soil between the roots would ruin the chainsaw blade. But as a habitat feature, the soil will diversify the habitat’s materials. Most excess soil will be removed from the rootball just to get it in the back of the truck.

Oak Rootball arrives at the Laguna Foundation in April 2015. Because the project slated for the rootball is three months away, a corral of logs was made around the rootball. The logs will help hold the tall mound of woodchips about to cover it. The rootball will sit in moist woodchips for three months before being installed in a wildlife habitat. Since the rough plan is to bury the rootball in a new habitat (3 months from now), it will also be buried now — any Life in the soil-impregnated rootball will be welcome in the new habitat. The dead rootball will be delivered to the habitat ALIVE!

A log is attached to the chain tether. The rootball is nearly buried in woodchips. Come July, in three months, Stuart’s tractor will haul out the stump by the chain — sure beats digging out the rootball!

The Before. The Laguna Foundation’s Observation Platform ramp rises from a small hill above the cow pasture (left) and straw field (foreground). We will take advantage of the small hill’s slope to dig in the rootball, but we must be careful not to undermine the ramp’s supports built into the hill. The habitat’s valley oak (Quercus lobata) seedlings will be planted to allow tractor travel along the fence. Also, the trees will be planted a safe distance from the ramp to not encroach upon it.

Digging goes easier than expected. Actually it’s a problem — the earth is a mix of gravel and soil fill from the pond grading. We move the hole for the rootball further downslope to avoid undermining the ramp’s concrete supports.

Time for the rootball — up and out of the woodchip pile it comes.

And I get to ride.

The plan is to lay the rootball downhill to simulate a fallen tree. The milled (man-made cut) at the crown will be buried to help create a natural look. Note the straw bales; they were used to keep the loose slope from eroding the few days the hole was exposed before the workshop.

In goes the rootball. Note how the roots extend above the surrounding ground and that the stump cut is down in the hole. Also note the white patches on the rootball/stump crown — fungi was thriving on the rootball while it was buried in the woodchips. Close-up of fungi growing on the oak rootball.

Shady Oak Root Of It All — Installation (Workshop) Day

The rootball is tipped to lower the stump end below the level of the surrounding soil.

The rootball and other wood hulks are positioned half in, half out of the hole. Fill, fill, fill. Because so much wood is in the hole, there will be extra soil to mound above the hole, on top of the wood.

Soil engulfs the rootball.

A critter perch is laid in the hole to the right of the rootball. It will be mostly buried so that only a 4-foot length sticks out of the hill when the habitat is finished.

Other wood chunks are thrown into the hole to provide more cavities for wood-loving critters AND to displace soil. By filling the hole with other than original soil, we will be able to mound the soil higher, or perhaps make a berm of soil where there had not been one.

In go small oak branches and twigs, broken up by stepping on them. We want to create moisture retention and fungi spawning for the valley oak seedlings. Layers of organic matter (oak rootball/oak branches/oak woodchip mulch) will attempt to humbly simulate oak tree savanah soil, which is layered by decades, if not centuries, of decaying oak wood.

Topsoil from the hole, which was set aside in large bins, is used to fill over the poorer quality soil and the oak branches.

Here comes the first valley oak seedling.

Today I plant a mighty oak tree. Valley Oak (Quercus lobata) may live up to 600 years old. The Observation Platform might need a paint job by then!

The oak trees are in,

and covered with plastic tubes that will allow light in but keep deer from eating the young trees.

Oak woodchip mulch is spread around the trees.

The trees are watered as a final step to the completed wildlife habitat installation. Note the Medusa-like tangle of roots emerging from the ground. What is going on there? What critters will seek habitat there? Questions, questions. Keep asking!

Final Report

The workshop was a success. Thank you to the LF Guides, Marcia and Barbara, the workshop participants, and intern Sasha — we installed 2 wildlife habitats and nobody got hurt.

Thank you’s to the Laguna Foundation staff for your support of my work at the LEC. In particular, to Wendy Trowbridge and Brent Reed of the Conservation and Restoration Department and to Anita Smith, Public Education Coordinator, for her work in promoting my July 11th presentation and this workshop.

A big thank you to Tractor Man — Stuart Schroeder.

Enjoy your wildlife habitat creations. Habitat it!

Tony

Prep for Sunday’s (7-12-2015) Creating Wildlife Habitat workshop

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Jul 092015

Getting ready for this Sunday’s workshop — Tony’s truck bed load of fieldstone. The fieldstone will be used to create habitat installations during the workshop. Hands on!

Some of the fieldstone (above photo) has a lot of holes on its surface. Those stones will be useful in Cricket Corral Splash, Sunday’s habitat installation that will utilize the Laguna Environmental Center’s garden hose drip at the Native Plant Nursery. Every hose must eventually be shut off (very old saying), so when the Nursery’s hose is closed down, the drip will be caught by layers of pourous and water-holding fieldstone. A new Water Park for Cricket Corral Compost‘s critters! Critters will come from far and wide (from the compost and surrounding habitat) for the wet rock, for the moisture, for the pooling drops, for the water! Great place to meet other critters, too; might even find some to eat. It’s habitat! Was a hose shut off and left to drip dry BUT now is also a watering hole for microbes and crawly critters AND a hunting ground for larger animals.

A larger fieldstone will be used in the new Shady Oak Seat wildlife habitat installation. The installation will include planting 2 majestic valley oaks (juvenile trees are in 1-gallon pots), creating a subterranean wildlife habitat using a large oak tree stump and other wood hulks, and using a large rock to create a seat under the soon-to-be shady oak, while creating a habitat under the seat.

From the Laguna Foundation’s Events page:

About my workshop at the LEC on Sunday morning:

How to Create Residential Wildlife Habitat
Hands-on Workshop with Tony McGuigan
Sunday, July 12, 10:00am-4:00pm
Location: Heron Hall, Laguna Environmental Center, 900 Sanford Road, Santa Rosa, CA 95401
$55 ($45 for Laguna Foundation members). Suitable for 14 years and up (teens must be accompanied by an adult). Pre-registration required.

Join us for this informative and fun-filled hands-on workshop with habitat landscaper, Tony McGuigan. Learn how to “think like a plant,” “think like a critter,” and how to creatively foster wildlife habitat and thriving biodiversity in your own yard. Tony will begin the morning with a presentation inside Heron Hall (without Powerpoint!), then move outdoors for a tour of the habitat projects already installed in the landscape. Then we will dig in to create several new wildlife habitats at the Laguna Environmental Center! This workshop will include light to strenuous landscaping work in the sun, although there will be tasks for every ability. Local materials will be used including native plants, local rock and soil, tree debris, and driftwood. With a strong emphasis on creating natural-looking beauty and aesthetics in the landscape, this workshop will be practical and inspirational.

Tony McGuigan is a Learning Laguna Docent and creates wildlife habitat in residential and educational settings. He is author of the book Habitat It And They Will Come. His Spore Lore blog discusses Wildlife Habitat Installation and Outdoor Classroom projects. Tony (a Registered Nurse) is currently writing about the health benefits of working with soil and loving Life! See Tony’s monthly project work at the Laguna Environmental Center with Orchard View high school biology students and their latest project, “Turtle Pond Float.”

About my talk at the LEC on Saturday afternoon:

Habitat It And They Will Come
Presentation with Tony McGuigan
Saturday, July 11, 3:00-4:30pm
Location: Heron Hall, Laguna Environmental Center, 900 Sanford Road, Santa Rosa, CA 95401
$10 at the door. No RSVP necessary.

Join us for this entertaining and informative talk about the why, who, and fun-how of creating animal habitats in residential gardens. Learn about some of the challenges wildlife face in suburbia and solutions to create wildlife-rich neighborhoods. Discover what wildlife might be present in our gardens and practical means to attract those critters.

Tony is owner of Spore Lore and the author of Habitat It And They Will Come. His education includes Biology at Long Island University and certificates in Permaculture and Sustainable Landscaping. His passions include being a Learning Laguna Docent, a Wildlife Habitat Instructor for Orchard View School’s high school Biology outdoor hands-on class at the Laguna Environmental Center, a habitat landscaper, and doing creative wildlife gardening at home.

See you this weekend! Habitat it!

Tony

July 12 Workshop at the LEC — Creating Residential Wildlife Habitat

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Jun 032015

A Sonoma fieldstone landscape boulder on deck for July 12th’s workshop, Creating Residential Wildlife Habitat, at the Laguna Environmental Center. Note the boulder’s ability to hold water — it’s a critter waterhole!

Tony McGuigan to Give Talk in Heron Hall

Saturday, July 11, 2015:

Habitat It And They Will Come

Come hear the why, how, and fun of Tony’s passion for residential wildlife habitat landscaping. Hear how YOU can do such landscaping in YOUR own home gardening. Before and After pictures of the Laguna Environmental Center’s native plant landscape. Presentation will be followed by question session. Snacks.

When: Saturday, July 11, 2015, 3:00 – 4:30PM.

Place: Heron Hall, Laguna Environmental Center, or LEC, on Stone Farm, at 900 Sanford Road, Santa Rosa, California, 95401. The LEC is operated by the Laguna de Santa Rosa Foundation.

$10 at the door. No RSVP necessary.

Laguna Foundation’s Outings and Events

A red-winged blackbird struts his stuff atop Oak Tunnel Tower, a wildlife habitat installed by Tony McGuigan and the students of Orchard View School at the LEC, January 2014.

Tony McGuigan to Give Hands-On Workshop at the LEC

Sunday, July 12, 2015:

Habitat It!

We will build several wildlife habitats, ranging from simple to more complex. All installation projects will emphasize how such a wildlife habitat installation can be installed in a residential, city, suburban, or country garden. Short talk (no PowerPoint) with snacks, then hands-on landscaping. We will have fun!

When: Sunday, July 12, 2015, 10AM.

Place: Meet at Heron Hall, Laguna Environmental Center, or LEC, on Stone Farm, at 900 Sanford Road, Santa Rosa, California, 95401. The LEC is operated by the Laguna de Santa Rosa Foundation.

$55 ($45 for Laguna Foundation members). Suitable for 14 years and up (teens must be accompanied by an adult). Pre-registration required.

Laguna Foundation’s Outings and Events

Turtle Pond Float — an Outdoor Classroom wildlife habitat installation

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May 272015

Turtle Pond Float is a fix-it landscaping art project turned wildlife habitat installation. This project is an Outdoor Classroom project: Orchard View School; Sunny Galbraith, teacher, and 7 of her Biology students. Location: Laguna Environmental Center. Date of installation project: May 20th, 2015.

The Laguna de Santa Rosa Foundation operates the Laguna Environmental Center, or LEC, on Stone Farm, at 900 Sanford Road, Santa Rosa, California, 95401. This wildlife habitat installation is at the LEC’s (Laguna Environmental Center’s) pond.

We will “fix” the problem of a sunken pond turtle haul out; the log that was installed on the pond’s sloping bank and into the pond last year has sunken below water surface level. Also, we will make the landscaping seem more natural by hiding another log’s unsightly sawcut.

A western pond turtle climbs onto Turtle Pond Pier at the LEC, summer of 2014. The log has since sunken below the pond’s surface.

Prep for the installation

A volunteer steps forward. This eucalyptus arching limb, stored dry for a few years, will become Turtle Pond Float – a haul out and sunning log for Western Pond Turtles and a perch-over-the-pond for birds and flying insects, like dragonflies and damselflies. Note how I am using one finger to hold the arch upright — the log’s center of gravity is being displayed. Understanding the log’s density and center of gravity will help determine where a float (an empty bottle) will be attached to the log’s under side.

A eucalyptus arched limb comes out of storage. The long arch creates a wide floatable frame; the log will not spin in the water like a more linear log might. Therefore, the log will not roll over in the water and the perch end, foreground, will stay above water. An installed float under the perch end will keep the perch above the pond’s surface.

In the workshop, making a tether bolt/washer for Turtle Pond Float. [L to R]: my hand holding a 1/2″ hex head bolt, used cap to a 5-gal water cooler jar, 2″ plastic washer with 1/2″ hole (a 2″ hole saw cut the lid of a 5-gal bucket), the hex head nut.

Turtle Pond Float tether snapped together.

Using salvaged electrical wire and a 2-liter bottle to outfit Turtle Pond Float for the Pond. Note, for the bottle float attachment, four 1/2″ 90-degree metal brackets provide strapping holes for the electrical wire. 2″ deck screws secure the the brackets to the log. The loop of wire in my boot will help me tighten the bottle’s wire knot.

Turtle Pond Float’s bottle float sealed and secured. Ready to go! Note the wire ends tucked under the bottle. Also, the bottle cap was closed down tightly, wrapped with tape, and the tape was then pull-tied. Please don’t leak!

Installation Day

View north from the Laguna Foundation’s back porch. The outdoor classroom project today is across the pond.

The Before of the wildlife habitat installation, Turtle Pond Float. A bay tree log is beached against the pond’s sedge and juncus rush bank. One of the purposes of this wildlife habitat installation is to relocate/reposition the bay log, AKA, the Bay Log. The landscape will look more natural when Bay Log’s sawcuts are more hidden. Note the abundance of algae on the pond surface. Tule reeds grow out into the pond, left.

Before, west view. Note the pond surface, May 20, 2015, on installation day. We are moving toward hotter, dryer weather, summer. The pond surface will lower then. Alternatively, the pond level will rise in rainy winter. To keep the turtle haul-out log at a consistent level above the surface, the floating log will be loosely tethered to the shore, which will allow the log to rise and fall as the pond surface does.

The PLAN — Turtle Pond Float.

Pondside instruction. We will create a small juncus (Juncus patens, California grey rush) patch growing at the base of two partially buried and partially water saturated logs. Both the mud-to-log and water-to-log interfaces will provide habitat for pond creatures. Larger trophic animals (like turtles, water-loving snakes, salamanders and frogs, and birds) will utilize Turtle Pond Float’s logs as a sunning haul-out, a resting or hunting perch, or a wall in the mud to snuggle up to. Ducks and other shore birds will enjoy the cover of the bankside vegetation.

Digging the hole to bury the short (20 inches) tether log. Some of the sedge (Carex barbarae) dug out will return back to the hole. Rocks are collected in a separate bucket; they will be tossed on the tether log before the hole is filled in with mudbank soil, plants, and the end of Bay Log. Many buckets are used to separate out what comes of digging the mudbank hole. Organization now helps safely store away those pondside plants that we may use later. Better to have some resources, like native plants and good alive mud, left over than not enough to finish the project.

Mucking it up — digging away the bankside for planting and to bury the tether anchor (a sturdy, short branch section).

Four teams running. 1—Sedge mudbank diggers (right). 2—Pond algae collectors (left). 3—Field sedge planters (behind, out of view). 4—Historians — thank you photographers Jenna and Anita!

Holding a Pacific Tree Frog (Pseudacris regilla), also known as the Pacific Chorus Frog, found among the sedges. This non-virtual contact with Nature alivens the outdoor classroom project.

A crew of students (and teacher) weeds up slope from the installation site. Log of Truth, right, which some of these students installed in February of 2014, has grown in nicely.

Turtle Haul Out is being moved from its launchpad at the LEC’s Observation Platform’s packed gravel (water permeable) path. Note the eucalyptus limb’s modifications: the bottle float and the tether pin (1/2” bolt with 2” white plastic washer). The students will lower Turtle Pond Float to the installation crew waiting at pondside.

Instruction to the students: Get the log in the water without knocking off the bottle. So far, so good. The bottle end of the limb will go in first, with the float UNDER the log, and will be floated out to the middle of the pond.

Tying the driftwood “anchor” to Turtle Pond Float using salvaged electrical wire.

Clipping/cleaning the wire tie tether.

Juncus patens has been planted on top of and next to Bay Log (left, horizontal) and Turtle Pond Float (right bottom). Pond algae was used to mulch the planting. Note that Bay Log’s largest sawcut has been hidden in the reeds. Shhhhh!

Almost done. The wood limbs are in place and the planting is finished. Note how Turtle Pond Float’s end is above the water’s surface, now.

Finishing touches include returning some dead grass and organic debris to the planting AND slopping Bay Log with pond algae (right).

Log of Truth gets some TLC – weeding, planting field sedge (Carex praegegracillus), and mulching with woodchips. Note Turtle Pond Float just right and downhill of Log of Truth. The view is looking south, cross the pond.

The Laguna Foundation’s Director of Restoration and Conservation Science Programs, Wendy Trowbridge, inspects the completed Turtle Pond Float installation. Hmmmm.

Orchard View Biology students and teacher Sunny Galbraith, and me (Tony McGuigan) celebrate Turtle Pond Float and a successful school year of wildlife habitat installations! We are looking directly at the pond, west view.

View from the bridge, west, 27 hours after installation. Sunset bathes the pond. Turtle Pond Float will most likely sink an inch or two underwater as it saturates with pond water. However, the air-filled bottle will keep the haul out and sunning perch (left end) afloat. Calling all Western Pond Turtles!

And Thank You, too, Orchard View Biology students and teacher Sunny Galbraith. Nice bird, Cassidy!

Enjoy your wildlife habitat creations. Habitat it!

Tony

Badger Hole Hollow — Outdoor Classroom installs a Wildlife Habitat

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May 012015

Badger Hole Hollow is a cleanup project turned Wildlife Habitat Installation. This project is an Outdoor Classroom project: Orchard View School; Sunny Galbraith, teacher, and 7 of her Biology students. Location: Laguna Environmental Center. Date of classroom project: April 15th, 2015.

The Laguna de Santa Rosa Foundation operates the Laguna Environmental Center, or LEC, on Stone Farm, at 900 Sanford Road, Santa Rosa, California, 95401. This wildlife habitat installation borders the LEC’s (Laguna Environmental Center’s) Native Plant Nursery, which is used for the Foundation’s Conservation Program.

About 2 years ago, on October 3, 2013, a massive valley oak fell in Doyle Park, Santa Rosa. The City of Santa Rosa had sections of the tree hauled off to one of its wood “graveyards”. The Laguna Foundation coaxed Stone Horse‘s farmer, Stuart Schroeder, to use his implement carrier to bring sections of the huge Doyle Park valley oak to the Laguna Foundation, the purpose being to foster landscape rehabilitation to the Laguna Environmental Center’s fairly recent construction zone around Heron Hall.

“Just a little to the left and back a bit.” Doyle Park Heritage (valley) Oak section is added to the habitat landscaping of the LEC. Note the implement carrier, with its 4-chain hoist — a flywheel at the head of the metal frame’s roof turns pipes that winds those chains around the pipes. The chains shorten thereby lifting the load. Great way to lift a tree! And move it!

2013.

2015. These oak sections, although they will ultimately “return to the earth”, could look more naturally placed in the landscape. They will be repositioned to hide the human-made chainsaw cuts. And in doing so a wildlife habitat will be created.

Close-up of BEFORE. Two oak log sections with their chainsaw cuts facing each other.

A lot to prep before the students arrive. The larger section will be partially buried — the chainsaw cut will sit in a hole and the shredded, more-naturally broken end will twist skyward. One end will create den structure for subterranean animals and the other will provide perch-above-the-grasses for climbing animals and birds. Woodchip mulch is dumped against Trunk (the larger section) 2 weeks before installation date to wick water to the adobe soil below. Softening the soil with moisture will make the digging soooo much easier!

Woodchip mulch is piled up against Trunk (larger section) and watered to moisten the adobe soil 2 weeks prior to digging.

One day before installation date. Staff and an intern discuss pulling weeds. One staffer has a weed by the throat. This native plant landscape will some day be a native plant meadow; till then, weeding is an essential job. Note the soil bins in queue next to the oak logs — they will store soil as the hole for Trunk is dug. Bin 1 = top soil; Bin 2 = layer under the topsoil; Bin 3 = less rich sol, adobe clay; Bin 4 = heavy adobe clay. The bins were labeled as dug and stored to allow the correct bin/soil layer to be returned to the habitat installation at the right time. Preserving the soil layers helps disrupt the soil ingredients less, including critters and soil microbes. Nutrients and critters that were living in the topsoil remain in the topsoil. The same is true for the other soil layers.

A note labels Bin 3 to sequence when its soil will return to the installation.

The spade head marks the spot — we will bury our treasure (Trunk) here. The smaller oak tree section, which has been subsequently named “Crocodile”, has been moved out of the way. A cardboard barricade has been temporarily installed to throw dug soil onto; a pile will be created close by to be able to cover over Trunk/hole once Trunk is slid into position, that is, dropped into the hole.

Digging so that Trunk can drop into a hole. The soil pile will return over Trunk, then planted.

Trunk is coaxed via truck chain into its 4-foot hole rest.

Almost there — time to remove the lower chain bolt. Once the lower bolt was removed, the Trunk was edged vertically into the hole from the chain looped around Trunk’s “top” end.

The next morning — installation day for Badger Hole Hollow! The digging bar perimeter will help the students walk carefully around the native plants living alongside Badger Hole Hollow, or “BHH”. Trunk is far enough in the ground it will stay put, minimizing any danger issue. The smaller oak section, Crocodile, will be positioned by today’s Biology class students.

Julia, a student donating her time at the LEC, transplants native plants, like the California poppy (Eschscholzia californica) shown above, to a temporary mound of moist woodchips. The collected plants will be saved from being trampled during the installation and then will be replaced on or alongside Badger Hole Hollow as a finishing touch. If 1 out of 3 or 4 survive the transplant, at least there will be one more native plant to jumpstart the installation.

Orchard View students are on site. Red and blue irrigation flags were used to create easily visible walkways between the established (wanted) native plants.

Crocodile wrestling — students position Crocodile into a position that will maximize the wood hulk’s ground surface coverage (for animal shelter) and its landscaping beauty.

Students break up a stick pile 1) to get rid of the pile of sticks from the compost pile, and 2) to provide organic debris under the habitat installation’s soil planting. Microbes to crawly critters to critters that eat those lower trophic animals will call the small buried stick pile home, habitat.

A student breaks up sticks, then uses his body weight to compress the broken stick pile up against Trunk and Crocodile.

Soil is backfilled (background) and woodchips are mixed into the habitat to prepare for plantings.

Juncus, or California gold rush (Juncus patens), is planted in between and at the base of Trunk and Crocodile. The juncus, which love moisture, will be on and downslope of the soil/woodchip pile between the 2 oak tree sections.

Field sedge (Carex praegegracillus) plugs are planted in the surrounding area of BHH. –Per Wikipedia, “ [Field sedge] tolerates disturbed habitat such as roadsides and thrives in alkaline substrates.” In other words, field sedge is a good choice for our native plant restoration, and subsequent wildlife habitat creation, of this graded soil next to LEC’s road.

Fields sedge and juncus are planted on Badger Hole Hollow’s hill.

Badger Hole Hollow gets water. This outdoor classroom rocks!

Badger Hole Hollow wildlife habitat has been installed AND field sedge plugs have been planted up to the road’s edge.

A jack rabbit leaps (center of photo) above the landscape’s sedges and grasses as the project is cleaned up.

Badger Hole Hollow will rest now and enjoy the sunset.

Close-up of AFTER. All in all, Trunk and Crocodile have had a great day.

Will a badger come to live under or near Badger Hole Hollow? Perhaps, perhaps not, but in the meantime, the critters of the landscape have another option in the terraine.

The students of Orchard View School, teacher Sunny Galbraith, and Cordy and David and I had fun at this outdoor classroom Biology project. A thank you also to the Laguna Foundation’s staff, especially Wendy Trowbridge, Director of Restoration and Conservation Science Programs, and Brent Reed, Restoration Projects Supervisor. Thanks for the plants, Brent. Cool project!

Enjoy your wildlife habitat creations. Habitat it!

Tony

Pics from last month:

[To the Orchard View Students — Sorry I did not get last month’s photos out sooner. I must have had my drill set for REVERSE!]

Native Plants installed in Habitat Garden, March 2015

A Western Fence Lizard crawls into the sun from Compost Cricket Corral.

Cricket Compost Corral Gets A Habitat Blanket

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Mar 052015

Cricket Compost Corral is a wildlife habitat installation that was installed October 2014 at the Laguna Environmental Center. This post is about moving a garden resource (debris) pile to Cricket Compost Corral. The new compost will help jumpstart the compost pile and the wildlife habitat features of the pile. The new compost will help raise the soil level of the compost so that the compost will drain better, stay warmer, and work more efficiently. Also, the new compost resources will come with a rich biota of fungi, soil microbes, crawly critters, and perhaps animals of higher trophic levels.

The Laguna de Santa Rosa Foundation, operates the Laguna Environmental Center, on Stone Farm, at 900 Sanford Road, Santa Rosa, California, 95401. This wildlife habitat installation borders the LEC’s (Laguna Environmental Center’s) Native Plant Nursery, which is used for the Foundation’s Restoration Program.

“Cricket Compost Corral Gets A Habitat Blanket” is an outdoor classroom project — Science is just the beginning! The students of Orchard View School, substitute teacher Alison, and I had fun at this outdoor classroom Biology project. Teacher Sunny Galbraith worked logistics before installation day.

Before the students arrive — fenceline garden resource pile:

Foreground = Veggie Garden at the LEC. The resource debris pile to be moved is in the background, straight back off the garden’s corner, next to the fence, left of the propane tank.

Winter rains have greened the grass around the resource pile.

Everyone grab a tool. Let’s move this pile!

“Rusty” will help us move the resource pile across the LEC grounds quickly, saving a lot of wheelbarrow loads.

Gathering organic debris (horse manure and fallen poplar branches) to add to Cricket Compost Corral.

Using the gathered manure/branches to build up a side of CCC.

Farmer Stuart Schroeder, of Stone Farm, lends a tractor to add a layer of wood chips for the students to spread.

Logs are used to frame the new resources added to CCC. The wood frame will help keep the new higher soil level intact, wick water to the Santa Barbara sedge to be planted, and provide habitat for critters.

Moving the resource pile:

Students haul off the resource pile to the truck trailer.

A Pacific Tree Frog (Pseudacris regilla), green phase, hides in the resource pile.

Keep it Science — we listed all the critters we saw. The resource pile is a critter mystery pile.

Adding the resource pile to Cricket Compost Corral:

Wood chips are spread to make a rich base for the resource pile on Cricket Compost Corral.

Foreground, a student plants Santa Barbara sedge, a native, drought-tolerant plant that will hold the compost’s hill in place. Far right (back), students install driftwood to complete the frame of CCC.

Unloading Rusty the Trailer. About this time during unloading, a western fence lizard was found in the trailer and introduced into Cricket Compost Corral. You have a new home!

A bouquet of veggie garden sticks for Cricket Compost Corral.

One garden’s debris is another garden’s treasure.

Securing the end of CCC’s frame with driftwood held in place by palm tree frond wedges.

In goes a palm tree wedge — local, FREE materials!

A sledge to finish CCC’s frame.

Finishing touches on CCC gets a habitat blanket:

The veggie garden resource pile now sits on top of Cricket Compost Corral.

Tree limbs are staked into place to terrace plant Santa Barbara sedge along CCC’s front edge. The compost gets a lot of fuel from keeping the Nursery’s concrete swept.

More stakes.

Cleaning tools before our class is finished. Terrace planting of Santa Barbara sedge to keep the compost’s soil level from eroding. Ultimately, the wood will rot away but the sedge mound will hold the soil in place. The sedge will also provide habitat for the compost’s critters. Close up of sedge planting.A plug of sedge (center) sits in a soil-filled raised bed made by two tree limbs.Weeds in front. Sedge behind the terracing limb.A plug of grass with yarrow plants planted at the base of adjacent Log Pile Apartments.

Watered down and ready to call the job done.

A thank you to the Laguna Foundation’s staff, especially Wendy Trowbridge, Director of Restoration and Conservation Science Programs, and Brent Reed, Restoration Projects Supervisor. Cool project!

Enjoy your wildlife habitat creations. Habitat it!

Tony

Wildlife at Orchard View student-built habitats at the LEC

Western fence lizard in Log Pile Apartments.

Resting bird about to get company. Habitat is Garter Snake Ravine. Bird cam photo.

Violet Green Swallow perching westward. Habitat is Garter Snake Ravine. Bird cam photo.

Caught one! White Short Bill, male, seasonal outfit, unshaven. Bird cam photo.

Garter Snake Ravine — a Wildlife Habitat Installation

1- Residential Habitats -- Critters and Their Homes, 6-Outdoor Classroom, Blog Comments Off

Jan 282015

Students pull up Garter Snake Ravine’s barn owl perch using a block-and-tackle.

Garter Snake Ravine is a wildlife habitat installation that incorporates a deep hole cut into adobe soil, a water reservoir, a large-branches heap (BIG stick pile), a Fungus DreamWorld, and a Science Experiment.

As mentioned in Spore Lore’s post, Prep for Garter Snake Ravine, 1-3-2015, the adobe hole, AKA “Ravine”, was left full of water to soften the hardpan adobe soil in the bottom of the hole. Sure enough, a week later, we were able to dig the hole another foot deeper — that much more space/capacity for the new habitat installation. The deeper hole will also give the owl perch more vertical stability; the upside down poplar tree will be buried deeper.

A long-handled posthole digger at the ready in Garter Snake Ravine after a week of soaking the hole with water.

The dug-out adobe soil was used to raise the compost’s ground level to help keep the compost out of winter’s wet. Garter Snake Ravine is two doors down from Compost Cricket Corral; Log Pile Apartments is between them. So to review, in the photo above, the water is overflowing Garter Snake Ravine, flowing under Log Pile Apartments, and moistening the raised banks of Compost Cricket Corral BUT not saturating the compost pile because of the now raised soil level of the compost piles.

A tree has fallen! No one was there to hear it but the crushed fence leaves a reminder. The poplar tree split at its crown with the snapped-off trunk landing into the adjacent horse corral. Problem: tree in corral. Solution: we just found ourselves an owl perch.

A 16-foot section of this poplar tree trunk will become an owl perch in Garter Snake Ravine wildlife habitat.

Because the tree is a poplar, we want to use it in a way that it will not sprout, thrive, and eventually shade the compost piles which are west (shady side) of Garter Snake Ravine. Poplar (Populus) trees are similar to willow trees in that they are both riparian species widely used for stream/watershed restoration. Both Poplar and willow have high levels of rooting hormone. And that’s a problem here — the Ravine habitat will be a water-/moisture-filled vase, like that for table flowers, during the coming wet months. Solution: “plant”, or install, the poplar tree upside down to prevent the rooting process. And don’t forget the trunk stump. This hulk of poplar wood will add to the habitat’s hugelkultur mass. Also, heavy, bulky pieces of wood like this one and others will help stabilize the owl perch, keep it from falling. Note how a staircase of skids was used to roll the stump into the bed trunk. Great to have a helping hand.

The poplar trunk stump waits on the sidelines until the owl perch is placed into the Ravine.

Our initial desire was to raise an owl perch high in the sky to encourage barn owls to hunt and feed at the compost pile. A perch that the barn owls that live on Stone Farm can use. That pair of barn owls (Tyto alba) can sometimes be seen in the palm trees below the Office’s front porch. Hoo called in Rodent Management?

IPM, a Permaculture term, stands for Integrated Pest Management. Rodents can be pests around a farm and Stone Farm is no exception. IPM is a way to handle one of Nature’s jobs by Nature. Traditionally, by introducing, a cure animal. Problems arise when the cure-all species becomes a problem — no other species is well suited to control the alien plant or animal. Such is part of the reason that Native Plants and IPM are considered solutions to removing pests ecologically. Palm fronds are not accepted in the local Resource Center, which makes soil additives from the garden debris (resource!) brought to it. But the fronds will be an asset in the hugelkultur — critters will seek the nooks and crannies between the slowly decomposing fronds.

A bird cam is installed — the camera will be trained on the perch to view owls hunting and eating their meals.

Students create a small retaining wall made from stones and heavy clay removed from the Ravine’s hole. This berm will direct runoff water under the adjacent wildlife habitat installation.

The poplar owl perch is here! Students walk the perch up the woodchip pile to gain height advantage for installing the perch into Ravine’s hole.

Here comes the perch, heading for Ravine’s hole. Note the thinner tree limbs in the foreground; the tree section is being flipped upside down.

The poplar tree section’s thinner branches are tied together to better fit the upside down tree into the Ravine. Note the green rope crossing back and forth — the block and tackle is being threaded for pulling the tree vertical.

Students, on top of the woodchip pile, wait for the signal to assist the block-and-tackle’s raising of the owl perch.

Signaling to the rope puller, “Pull in the slack, batten down the hatches.”

“Pull!”, and up the perch goes with a little help from the top of the woodchip pile. Two safety lines were used in case the perch was accidently pulled past vertical. Note the safety line from the right-most student (right of the woodchip pile). The left-sided safety line is being held by a student standing behind and to the left of the woodchip pile.

The owl perch is edged into place. The poplar tree section has been up-ended.

Students stuff driftwood logs, the poplar stump, palm fronds, and smaller poplar braches (upside down) around the perch to stabilize it. Plenty for all hands to do now; we want to vertically secure the perch and remove the block-and-tackle lines and safety ropes.

Safety check! Lookin’ good; keep packing the hole around the perch.

Still more materials to pack around the perch as it approaches standing on its own, without stabilizing lines.

A breather while the owl perch is finalized. This outdoor classroom rocks!

Students are busy planting Santa Barbara sedge (Carex barbarae), programming the bird cam, and packing the Ravine.

Garter Snake Ravine wildlife habitat installation is completed. Note that the habitat has three major elements: a deep moist adobe hole that will fill to a small pond during the rains, a pile of branches and sticks, and an owl perch. That’s a lot of nooks and crannies for critters to hunt, hide, cool-down, and LIVE! in. First will come the wood-eating fungi and decomposer microbes, then higher trophic critters, then perhaps a mammal (an even higher trophic animal), like a skunk or a possum, that wants to reign over the habitat.

Garter Snake Ravine waits for a perching barn owl throughout the dark night.

Thank you for the wonderful pictures, Jenna.

Enjoy your wildlife habitat creations. Habitat it!

Tony