07/19/2006

Woodbourne Forest celebrates 50 years

BY NATHAN MILNER , Wyoming County Press Examiner

 

DIMOCK TWP. - Woodbourne Forest and Wildlife Preserve in Dimock celebrated its 50th anniversary on Sunday with current stewards of the forest in attendance with visitors discovering the local wonder for the first time.

 

"It's like going to church," said Mary Spering, describing a walk through Woodbourne Forest.

The preserve is the last remaining portion of some 26,000 acres purchased in 1818 by Thomas P. Cope, a Philadelphia Quaker who summered in Dimock with his family. In the late 1800s, the family took up year-round residence at Woodbourne.

Growing up at Woodbourne, Francis R. Cope Jr. was an avid outdoorsman and devoted supporter of the conservation of wild lands. Francis organized educational programs at Woodbourne even before the area was designated a preserve. He led birding clubs on excursions through the forest and offered camping trips for young boys and girls.

Spering vividly recalled attending one of these programs at age 12 when Cope taught the children about pitcher plants floating on a pond. The vase-shaped plants contain a sweet liquid. When insects fly in to drink the liquid, the pitcher plant closes and swallows them.

In April 1956, Cope donated 478 acres of what is now Woodbourne Forest and Wildlife Preserve to The Nature Conservancy. Currently the preserve includes more than 600 acres of forest, swamp, meadow and stream.

Woodbourne contains nearly 125 acres of virgin or near virgin forest, uncut since Europeans settled in America. Some hemlocks in the forest are estimated at more than 350 years old. There is a record of a tree downed in the 1930s that had 427 rings.

Wildlife such as black bear, coyote, white-tailed deer, wild turkey, turtles, frogs and numerous species of birds all make their home at Woodbourne. Wildflower species include wood sorrel, gold thread and painted trillium; and tree species include eastern hemlock, American beech, red and sugar maple, yellow and black birch and black and red oak.

Visitors can explore Woodbourne Forest and Wildlife Preserve on its three hiking trails - Woodruff Hill Trail, Swamp Loop Trail and the newly constructed Cope's Ramble. Each of the trails are well tended and well marked with painted blazes on trees. Swamp Loop is marked with yellow blazes, Woodruff Hill with orange and Cope's Ramble with blue.

In addition to the new hiking trail, Woodbourne recently opened an observation platform on Cope's Pond in memory of Benjamin Stone, longtime member of the Woodbourne Forest steering committee.

Resident naturalist Dr. Jerry Skinner offers educational workshops for children during the summer at Woodbourne. Upcoming programs at Woodbourne include Stream Stomp on Wednesday, Aug. 9, at 10 a.m.; Old Growth Forest Ecology Hike on Sunday, Aug. 20, at 2 p.m.; a Cope's Ramble Hike on Saturday, Aug. 26, at 9 a.m.; and a historic stone wall walk with Ken Ely on Saturday, Sept. 16, at 1 p.m.

The preserve is located on Route 29, one mile north of the blinking light in Dimock.

For more information or to plan a hike, visit www.woodbourneforest.org or call Skinner at 278-3384.