Meadow restoration and more: HCT walk offers insight into Pleasant Bay Woodlands

While natural beauty and serenity are the stars at many conservation destinations, there can be a lot of fascinating stuff going on behind the scenes. That’s what we learned on a recent Pleasant Bay Woodlands Meadow Restoration Walk, led by Connor O’Brien, Director of Land Stewardship for the Harwich Conservation Trust (HCT).

This free guided walk is also scheduled for June 27th, July 18th and July 25th. Click here to register.

The splendid 49-acre property boasts scenic views, connected by a mile-long trail that passes through several intriguing ecosystems. Pleasant Bay Woodlands is located just west of Round Cove on Pleasant Bay, and O’Brien told us that this proximity made the parcel an important HCT acquisition in 2014.

“We acquired this property for the recreational opportunities, but primarily for water quality protection for Pleasant Bay,” said O’Brien. “When rain falls in places like Pleasant Bay Woodlands, it recharges the aquifer with clean, healthy water, and it also recharges the water that flows into Pleasant Bay.”

O’Brien also shared the intriguing history of the property. In pre-colonial times, Monomoyick people valued the Atlantic white cedar trees that grew on the land, using them as sources for indigenous shelters. The Kendrick family purchased the property from the Monomoyick Quason family in 1730, and in the years that followed, seven generations of Kendricks lived on the property.

Restoring a meadow

We ambled down a wooded trail that opened onto a glorious meadow. It was easy to think that such splendor had always been a permanent part of the landscape here, but O’Brien told us about the complex process that it took to create this wondrous ecosystem.

The meadow area had been pastureland for cows and sheep when members of the Kendrick family farmed the land. Some of it had served as a lawn for a house that had sat vacant and abandoned for many years before being removed so the site could be naturalized.

“We decided that we wanted to create a meadow habitat to provide a similar habitat to what it was when it was pasture land,” said O’Brien. “Open field habitat is decreasing on Cape Cod, a habitat that species like bluebirds, New England cottontails, red-tailed hawks and screech owls depend on.”

Bunnies and birds aren’t the only animals that benefit from meadow habitat. “We also wanted to provide native plant species for our native pollinators,” said O’Brien.

Creating a meadow required the removal of invasive plants and regular mowing. Invasive plants like bittersweet and privet proved to be stubborn adversaries. “HCT volunteers and AmeriCorps members spent many hours here pulling those up,” said O’Brien. “”It’s a work in progress, but we’re really proud of how it has come out so far.”

Milkweed for monarch butterflies

An important goal for the meadow project is providing habitat for monarch butterflies. O’Brien said populations of the beautiful pollinator had plummeted over the last few decades, due to habitat loss, the use of pesticide and herbicide, and climate change.

We learned that milkweed holds an essential role in the life cycle of monarchs. “Generally, they only lay their eggs on milkweed plants,” said O’Brien. “And monarch caterpillars only eat milkweed.

HCT began a milkweed planting program to stock the meadow. “Milkweed is kind of tough to grow from seed, so we had to do some experiments to get viable populations,” said O’Brien. “Once it’s growing, it grows really easily. It produces thousands of seeds and it also spreads by rhizomes, which means it sends out roots and sends up new plants.”

Fuzzy-leaved evidence of the effort was growing in the meadow. Three varieties: common milkweed, swamp milkweed and butterfly milkweed are gaining a foothold.

We finished the program with a leisurely hike through the forest, a nice time to reflect on what we had learned. Pleasant Bay Woodlands is a fascinating place, especially when you’re guided by an outdoor expert with the inside scoop!

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