About Hellen Creek Forest and Wildlife Preserve

     Located on the upper reaches of Hellen Creek in Lusby, the Hellen Creek Preserve covers some fifty acres of marshes, forests, streams, and slopes. Together with the adjacent TNC Hemlock Preserve over 120 acres of the watershed are under permanent easement. As executive director of the owner of the Hellen Creek Preserve (Cove Point Natural Heritage Trust) I live on the property and monitor it.

     Part of this is the fun job of wandering through the woods checking for wildflowers and signs of animals. Other parts (cutting down blow downs blocking trails and driveways) aren’t as enjoyable. But I get to spend a lot of time outside and enjoy the benefits.

    Several years of habitat restoration and invasive removal work are starting to pay off. The deer exclosure plot planted along the streamside is showing progress this year. Several of the white turtleheads are healthy and the other wetland shrubs and wildflowers are also doing well.

The hemlocks on the property are not doing as well. During early rain and wind events several of the older trees have toppled. Damage done by the wooly adelgid continues unabated. We did have a visit from the employees of the Maryland Department of Agriculture and the Department of Natural Resources to assess the situation. In short many of the mature trees are in heavy cone production mode. This is a strategy often employed at the later stages of a tree’s lifespan. This encourages the production of young trees and we have been advised to take advantage of this phenomenon.

We were advised that a three step strategy should be employed. First we need to protect young trees from deer deprivation and competition form other seedlings. One deer exclusion plot has already been established and other woody plants pulled from the plot. Second would be injection of existing trees to protect the seed source. Third would be monitoring of the treated trees and treatment of emerging stock. If during this period a disease resistant strain is developed, the trust is agreeable to using this tool.

During the summer of 2009 we replaced several rails and posts on the stairs leading to Hellen Creek. Several locust trees cut on the property provided us with three new posts. Three more were provided from the property of long time volunteer Mel Longfield. A surprise greets us when we began working on the posts, he rails made a strange buzzing noise when we rapped on them. Carpenter bees have invaded several of the post drilling their perfect holes in all but two of the rails. These have been replaced and stained. Hopefully these new rails won’t be as tasty a s the last ones.

    We continue to await word whether TNC’s Hemlock Preserve will be signed over to our Trust. TNC, the county, and state have been working on this for nearly six years now. The biggest issue for the Trust is the difficulty in running efficient control programs for deer populations, invasive plants, and the health of our hemlocks when all of these issues have a refugee on an adjacent parcel.

    Our educational efforts in the past several years have focused on outreach efforts to aid Calvert County’s Green School Program. Programming and grant money have aided several schools the past three years. The Trst alos sponsored an intern for Calvert County government to work on a GIS program to aid in managing the resources of the county in an environmentally sensitive way.

     If you are interested in finding out more about the Trust please visit our website at www.covepoint-trust.org. To arrange for a visit to the Preserve please call me at 410-394-1300.

Our Board of Trustees consists of the following:

Ewing Miller, Chairman of the Board Washington, DC Michael Rudy, President Solomons, MD Michael D. Frederick, Treasurer Lusby, MD Michael E. Gardner, Vice Presidnet Lusby, MD

Robert J. Boxwell, Executive Director Solomons, MD Fred Tutman Upper Marlboro, MD Karen Meadow, Secretary Baltimore, MD Mildred Kriemelmeyer Waldorf, MD

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