Central Pennsylvania Conservancy

CPC invites you to participate this month in the Partnership for Better Health's Match Madness campaign! Beginning today, your donation will be matched with funds donated by M&T Bank and the Josiah W. & Bessie H. Kline Foundation, and, 100% will go to CPC if you select us as your recipient charity. Donations must be made through the Partnership's donation page: https://bit.ly/36K8rZv As your local land trust, CPC has been active since 1982 with a mission to acquire, preserv...e, and protect land and natural resources in South-Central Pennsylvania. We actively steward 5 preserves and 30 conservation easement properties while initiating new protection projects each year to save critical lands from future development, secure open space and habitat, protect high-quality streams, preserve working farms and healthy forests, and open public access to nature for all. Proceeds from this campaign will support our spring launch of the Letort Spring Garden Preserve restoration initiative. We’re starting the first phase of ecological restoration to bring the site back to the flora and fauna that James LeTort may have encountered in the 1720’s. We’re rehabilitating the historic bank barn and springhouse listed currently on the National Register of Historic Places. We’re excited to keep expanding public access to the preserve and to add informative signs along the trails. Show your support for this work with a donation this month--we thank you in advance for your generosity! Here are a few more details to consider while you ponder a gift: *The easiest way to give is online at: https://bit.ly/36K8rZv *You can also mail in a check to: Partnership for Better Health, 274 Wilson Street, Carlisle, PA 17013. All checks must be made payable to Partnership for Better Health, noting Central PA Conservancy in the memo line of the check.

Pennsylvania's only heat-producing plant can now be seen melting snow near you! Skunk cabbage flowers metabolize stored starches made during last year's growing season to generate heat. This heat serves at least two purposes: 1) wafting stinky odors to lure flies and other would-be pollinators... 2) providing floral visitors with a heat-reward that ensures they can make the cold journey to another skunk cabbage and complete pollen transfer This unique flowering strategy is remarkable in that the flowers maintain a constant temperature of 72F despite fluctuations in daytime and nighttime temperatures--certainly hot enough to melt any snow that might otherwise prevent pollinators from visiting! Keep your eyes peeled for this phenomenon before all the snow disappears!

This late into winter most of us have the promise of spring on our minds. Although today's snowfall is sure to try our patience, it also provides more opportunities to get to know an otherwise obscure invertebratethe snow flea! Despite what the name implies, snow fleas are completely unrelated to the blood-sucking parasites that plague our cats and dogs. Rather, they represent a small subset of species within a much larger group of invertebrates known as springtails. Spring...tails, as the name suggests, have a spring-loaded, tail-like appendange that they use to hop from one place to anothermuch like the fleas that pester our pets. Snow fleas are distinguished from other springtails in that they produce a protein that binds to water molecules and prevents ice crystallization. This sort of home-brewed antifreeze allows these critters to take advantange of a warm winter's day; one where they can rehydrate on melted snow, congregate, socialize, and go about other important stages of their life cycle. Active in the upper soil layer year-round where they fulfill important roles in organic matter decomposition and nutrient cycling, snow fleas are most easily seen in the middle of winter when their dark purple bodies are distinctly contrasted against a snow-laden forest floor. From above they look like some sort of sooty deposit, yet their unsuspecting hopping movements become apparent upon closer inspection, and the name snow flea makes a lot more sense! A most peculiar wintry wonder that's sure to make you forget about spring, even if just for a moment!

Happy Belated World Wetlands Day! Although this day is often 'overshadowed' by Punxsutawney Phil, February 2nd also serves as a reminder to reflect upon and appreciate the inseparable link between wetland ecosystems and the paramount role they play in sustaining and nurturing life. Wetlands are among the most imperiled habitats on Earth yet they continue to be destroyed and degraded year in and year out.... The Letort Spring Garden Preserve was known as 'Great Beaver Pond' by colonists before it was converted to a watercress farm. Even though beaver are long gone and watercress persists along the edges of the stream, this wetland is on the rebound. CPC saved these headwaters of the Letort and stewards are dignifying it with restorative care. Muskrat, brook trout, waterfowl, and hundreds of flowering plants are just a few examples of the biodiversity sustained and nutured by this unique wetland habitatjust minutes away from downtown Carlisle. If you've been able to visit the Letort Spring Garden Preserve, share a photo of a discovery or experience there that sustained or nutured you. If you've yet to visit, check it out! We hope you can find your own special connection to this increasingly uncommon expression of nature.

Caddis crawling over snow at the Letort, morning after the storm. See Joe Baker's comment, below!!

Yesterday we stumbled upon a small population of native burning bush while documenting a new conservation easement in Franklin County! Also known as American Wahoo, this festive shrub is more commonly encountered in the Midwestern U.S. with isolated populations just peeking into Central PA's Ridge and Valley. Although the invasive (and less spectacular) burning bush was close by, thanks to this conservation-minded landowner, these plants will be protected from development and stewarded by CPC staff to promote their persistence on and proliferation throughout the property. With native gems this striking and vibrant, one can't help but wish Wahoo had been planted everywhere instead!

Central PA Conservancy is the honored recipient of Cumberland County Historical Society's 2020 William Foshag Preservation Award! The announcement was made at the Society's annual meeting this week. The citizens involved in CPC are honored to follow in the footsteps of Mr. Foshag, a man of expansive skill and remarkable principle who carefully stewarded The Historic Heishman's Mill on the Conodoguinet west of Carlisle. The award recognizes CPC's dedication to historic prese...rvation and literacy at the intersection with conservation. It honors the land trust's efforts to secure the former watercress farm south of Carlisle--a setting of profound significance--and to establish the Letort Spring Garden Preserve with respect for each element of our shared heritage. At the award presentation, Anna Yelk remarked, This preserve is indeed a local gem, but it's the people and partnerships that truly make it a special place. CPC’s site steward and land protection director, Ben Mummert, has devoted so much of his time and expertise to caring for the property, developing those partnerships, engaging volunteers, and spending hours of his free time managing it. This award honors his personal initiative and community spirit. #preservationhappenshere #SouthMountainLandscape With donor support and three new grant awards this year, CPC will rehabilitate the 1881 Melester Barn which, thanks to our partnership with the State Historic Preservation Office and Keystone Fund support, is now listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Additionally, CPC will be making access improvements, interpretative signs, and progress in restoring the ecological contexts James Le Tort may have encountered, there.

In response to the important roles women serve protecting the land that sustains us, the American Farmland Trust is partnering with conservation professionals from Penn State, the NRCS, and Conservation Districts in Adams, Dauphin, Lebanon, Perry and York counties to bring you a VIRTUAL Conservation Learning Circles series for Pennsylvanian Women in Agriculture. The virtual Learning Circles this Fall will be held on November 10th, November 17th, December 2nd, December 8th, an...Continue reading

Have you ever wondered whether climate action is happening in your local community? Meet the folks leading climate action in the Cumberland Valley on Zoom next Tuesday (Oct. 20th) and learn what is already being done, how climate actions can be expanded and accelerated, and how you can become involved! Registration for this free event is set to close tomorrow (Oct. 15th), and virtual seating is limited, so register for part 1 of this 3-part Climate Action Series now! Coordina...ted by the Cumberland County Planning Department in collaboration with Cumberland Conservation Collaborative, South Mountain Partnership, the Center for Sustainability Education-Dickinson College, and the Center for Land Use and Sustainability. https://www.tfec.org/climate-action-series-1/

Thank you for an accomplishment-filled DAY OF CARING yesterday! Who is saving and caring for the green places you love? Natural areas can't take care of themselves! CPC and citizens are cultivating a community committed to conservation--will you join us?