Welcome Back, Erika Rowland!

The Board of the Greater Lovell Land Trust is delighted to announce that Erika Rowland will become the Executive Director of the GLLT, effective June 1. Many people already know Erika, who served as GLLT’s Executive Director from 2019-2023. Under her leadership, the GLLT acquired ownership of 1435 new acres of land for conservation, and protected another 566 acres of land using conservation easements donated by generous landowners. She led the GLLT to national accreditation from the Land Trust Accreditation Commission in 2022, shepherded the organization through the disruptions of COVID, and strengthened the GLLT’s finances and operations. She fostered good working relationships with local officials and with our neighboring land trusts and conservation organizations. Erika has a rare combination of skills. She is a strategic thinker, who understands the long-term issues of conservation in the face of our changing climate, but she also knows how to build and lead an organization on a practical level. 

In addition to her experience at the GLLT, Erika brings many years of experience in conservation organizations in Maine and elsewhere and has wide networks of colleagues in the land trust and conservation world. She has an academic background in conservation, with a Ph.D in Forest Resources from the University of Maine, and an MS in Quaternary Studies from the University of Alaska Fairbanks. Her field of study takes a truly long-term perspective on climate science, and her graduate work analyzed tree rings, plant pollen, charcoal fragments and other matter preserved in wetland sediments to see how vegetation changed in response to climate shifts over the past 5,000 years! In her current work, she brings her expertise in applied conservation to the problem of climate change resilience and adaptation on both local and regional levels. 

Erika lives with her family in Bridgton.  You’ll often find her exploring the woods and waters of Western Maine, enjoying running, hiking, kayaking, skiing, snowshoeing and other outdoor activities in our area.  She’s looking forward to coming back to the land trust: “I’m excited to return again to the GLLT and join forces with the truly wonderful staff, board and the many wonderful volunteers and supporters of the GLLT.”

Erika will succeed Rhyan Paquereau, who has ably served as GLLT’s Interim Executive Director since last summer. Rhyan will remain with the GLLT as Stewardship and Conservation Director. Many thanks to Rhyan for all his efforts and achievements in supporting the mission and vision of GLLT. 

Greater Lovell Land Trust Protects 237 Acres in Lovell

April 11, 2024

The Greater Lovell Land Trust has received a gift from a Lovell family that forever preserves 237 acres of land in the heart of the Kezar Lake watershed. Landowners Moira and George Yip and family have generously donated a conservation easement on land they have cherished for 40 years.

The Mill Brook Pond easement land is undeveloped woodlands lying between Sabbatus Road and Slab City Road in Lovell. It includes one shore of Mill Brook Pond, a large beaver pond, plus other streams, wetlands and forest lands. The land is important for its rich variety of wildlife and plant species.

Above: Mill Brook Pond. Photo by Moira Yip.

The family shares the land with more than 27 species of mammals, including otters, bobcats, minks and muskrats. They have seen 115 species of birds, including Yellow Billed Cuckoos, Scarlet Tanagers, Indigo Buntings, and Northern Shrike. The land hosts significant breeding areas for Wood Ducks, Tree Swallows, and Common Yellowthroats, and numerous species of amphibians, reptiles, mushrooms, butterflies and insects. In addition, it provides habitat for more than 123 species of wildflowers, including spikenard, swamp candles, cardinal flowers, and Allegheny monkeyflowers.

Above: Indigo Bunting. Photo by Moira Yip.

Below: River Otter. Photo by Moira Yip.

GLLT’s Interim Executive Director, Rhyan Paquereau, noted that the conserved land is a key part of conservation efforts to protect the waters flowing into Kezar Lake. “The easement property connects to the land trust’s 808-acre Heald and Bradley Pond Reserve to the north. Heald Pond flows out via Mill Brook, which itself feeds into Boulder Brook, which flows directly into Kezar Lake. With an additional property already under a conservation easement, more than 1100 acres along these waterways are protected forever.”

A conservation easement is a voluntary, legally binding agreement that permanently restricts the uses of land in order to protect its conservation values. The land stays in private ownership, and the landowner keeps many rights of property ownership. The landowner still decides what kinds of access are permitted on the land, and most conservation easements do not have full public access. It is an important way for landowners and for conservation organizations to work together to preserve environmentally significant places.

“I want to thank the Yip family for their important contribution to conservation in Lovell,” said Paquereau. “Their generosity will help make possible the kind of natural environment that makes Lovell such a special place for residents and visitors alike.”

The Greater Lovell Land Trust serves the communities of Lovell, Stoneham, Stow and Sweden, protecting over 7,500 acres of land located within the Kezar Lake, Kezar River and Cold River watersheds. Its preserves are accessible through almost 20 miles of trails and GLLT offers guided walks, talks, and events throughout the year. Please visit GLLT.org to view programs and events.

Wood Duck. Photo by Moira Yip.

What happens to wildlife when it floods?

What happens to wildlife when it floods?

Below are answers from our volunteer naturalists.

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“That's a really good question. It varies widely by species. If they can, animals move to higher ground, but underground burrows, or places like the inside of a beaver lodge (just above normal water level) have to be evacuated, which leaves the animals vulnerable to weather, and predators. Birds will shelter from the rain if they can, but they may need to dry out their feathers before they do much flying. Insects may hitch a ride on a floating log. And sadly, some animals may be unable to avoid the floods, and die.”- Moira Yip

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“Flooding (and droughts) have been a part of the natural cycle for eons. Plants and wildlife have adapted to these fluctuations without much harm. However climate change has shifted the amount and intensity of rain/flooding that may increasingly threaten wildlife. Two examples: 

1. Kingfishers generally nest in the sandy banks along streams that are soft enough for them to burrow deep and tall and steep enough to make it hard for predators to reach - regular intense flooding could destroy/ limit this kind of habitat.

2. Beaver lodges are designed with 2 underwater entrances, a shelf inside above the water line and an air vent. A sudden large rise in water level may overcome the shelf area leaving the beavers unable to use the lodge and out in the open vulnerable to predators. (I saw this happen to a lodge on the Cold River near the entrance to Charles Pond).”- Sarah O’Neil 

"It’s an interesting question because it’s a truly ecological one.  Perhaps the first place to start is to note that the effects of flooding on wildlife depend on both where and when the flooding occurs.  In areas subject to regular, seasonal flooding, such as major river floodplains and freshwater marshes, the fauna may be well adapted to changing water levels, and the health of the ecosystem may even depend on them to cycle nutrients, spread seeds, and provide seasonally available breeding areas.  On the other hand, in areas where floods are unusual and unpredictable their effects may be more deleterious, leading to many of the problems noted in what follows.

The timing of the flooding matters a great deal.  Most flooding occurs in the spring, especially in this area, when the snowpack melts and rivers and lakes rise. In other parts of the world and particularly in the tropics seasonal rain patterns may determine the timing of floods.  In our area, flooding in the spring, if it is more severe than normal, potentially has more deleterious consequences than flooding in the winter because it happens when so many animals are reproducing and when annual plants are beginning to grow.  Flooding can cause displacement of many non-aquatic animals, and even lead to breeding sites being abandoned.  For instance, during the high flooding of last spring an active fox den near the junction of the Charles River with the Old Saco had to be abandoned when the kits may not have been completely ready.  The small mammals of the flooded fields and meadows that the foxes preyed on probably were displaced as well, if they survived.  Ground nesting birds can be affected, including shore nesters like loons, if the water swamps their nests, as happened, apparently, to many area loons last spring.  Even aquatic animals can be detrimentally affected by spring flooding.  Fish egg laying sites can be disrupted by silt, for example.  Fish and aquatic invertebrates can be transported to areas where they may become stranded as the flooding recedes.

Floods in the winter time, like the one we are currently experiencing, may have less immediate impact on wildlife in part because most species are not in vulnerable stages of their reproductive cycles.  Many species living in wet or watery areas, such as frogs, turtles, snakes, and insects, have already taken refuge for the winter in locations safe from detrimental effects.  Large species, like deer and moose, have left the bottomlands and moved upland.  But of course, floods can affect the habitats along rivers, lakes, and swamps in ways that may degrade them for use by wildlife, uprooting vegetation, depositing silt and sand, causing erosion, even changing stream bed and river channels.  Flooding can also spread pollution, especially when human altered landscapes are affected. Flooding of road ways and urban infrastructure can wash salt, oil, and other chemicals as well as garbage and debris into waterways.  Flooding of agricultural lands can spread residues of pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers.

One species that is interesting to contemplate in the context of winter flooding is the beaver.  Most beavers depend on their dry, relatively warm lodges to survive the winter.  Are these refuges at risk from flooding?  The living chambers are normally above the water level.  But if that level rises?  Beaver lodges built on river banks and lake shores may be at risk in  this way, but those built in beaver ponds, bodies of shallow water that the beavers create by damming brooks and streams, may not be.  The water levels in those ponds and marshes are determined by the height of the dams the beavers build and maintain.  And like a bowl of water, the level can never rise higher than the rim."- Peter Ellison

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"There is also an immediate fight or flight response. As winds and rain increase, wildlife detect danger in the unsettled conditions and adrenaline kicks in. Adrenaline  is one of the emergency hormones that moves the body in a much faster response. Heart rate increases, respirations increase, and the muscles have much more energy and strength for emergencies. They flee the rising rivers and floods. They move to a new area that has less water and calmer winds."- Bob Katz

Be-Leeched!

Erika Rowland, executive director of Greater Lovell Land Trust, asked me a year ago to consider finding someone who could give a talk about leeches. And so the search was on. Back in February I found just the right person. At first he declined the invitation, but I enticed him with a place to stay thanks to GLLT members Linda and Heinrich Wurm (she asked that he not bring any live leeches with him) and through a couple of email exchanges we set up a date and time and accommodations. And so it was that we had the absolute pleasure of learning from Dr. Nat Wheelwright and his delightful wife Genie.

Nat is well known for the book he co-authored with Bernd Heinrich: The Naturalist’s Notebook. He’s also known for Nature Moments, including the one that cinched the deal for me: Swimming with Leeches.

Certain that not everyone would be fascinated by leeches, he suggested that he talk about other nature moments and so it began with a look at Bracken, a sometimes waist high fern with triangular fronds that provides a great place for children to hide, or when placed atop ones head, an insect distractor as they’ll go to the highest point, being the stem, and leave you alone. As Nat explained, it’s a prolific fern that mainly reproduces by rhizomes rather than spores. I can think of only a few occasions when I’ve spied the spores on the undersides of the leaflets . . . and believe me, I’ve turned many over in hopes of spying such.

We had about a mile-long walk along a woods road to our destination beside a pond, and were overjoyed that Nat showed off our favorite syndrome: Nature Distraction Disorder as any little thing captured his attention and he couldn’t wait to share it with us. Each time, we thought we knew exactly what he’d share, and then he’d add some tidbit we’d not realized or considered before.

Really, what more could one learn about an American Toad? Until we did. How to tell its gender! Grasp it by its underarms. If it makes a noise, it’s a male! Huh? Yup, because that’s where a male would clasp a female in amplexus and if he thinks another male is grasping him he needs to let it know it has made the wrong choice. We have a frog and toad safari coming up with a bunch of youngsters and this will certainly be on the agenda.

The closer we got to our destination, the more we began to spy Ebony Jewelwing damselflies. As Nat explained, living by the coast, this is a rare species for him, but in our region of western Maine, with so many lakes, ponds, rivers, brooks, and streams, we see them frequently.

What would we learn from him about this species?

Again, how to tell the gender. Male or female? What do you think?

See the second segment of the abdomen where the arrow points? That bulge under segment two is where the secondary genitalia are located. This is clearly absent in females. Therefore–this specimen was a male.

We gave him another way to identify the gender of Ebony Jewelwings: the male’s wings are solid black, while the female has a white psuedostigma toward the tip of each wing.

And notice the white at the tip of the abdomen? That’s pruinosity, which like dragonflies, occurs in mature damsels. Not a gender idiosyncrasy, but rather one of age.

It took us a wonder-filled while, but eventually we made it to the pond of our destination and several of us took off our hiking boots and splashed our feet in the water. To cool off on a hot summer day? Certainly a benefit. To attract a leech or two? Well, we tried, but there were no takers.

Interns Emily and Anna had been there the day before and suggested another spot that might lead us to the leeches we desired and so we walked back along the road and headed down another path to the water. But . . . there was another story to share first of Genie’s experience swimming with tadpoles one day and the demise of said tadpoles a couple of days later and a discovery of ranavirus, which kills frogs in a short time period. Nat did tell us that the pond where the discovery was made seemed to be recovering; maybe some frogs exhibiting a resistance to the virus.

One of the take-aways from this is to always clean your equipment, including trays and D-nets, between pond explorations so if one pond is affected you don’t accidentally spread the virus to another.

That said, we reached a shallow area of the water’s edge, and Moira, Nat, and I took off our hiking boots and socks and stepped into the water. So . . . what did it feel like? Mucky. And rooty. And did I say mucky. BUT . . . it was only a matter of minutes and a blood-sucking leech found my leg. We tried to capture it, however, it wasn’t ready to be the star of the show and quickly released itself. That’s not how it usually goes with such, and a shake of salt would have been necessary to get it to release. I should have been thankful.

Then we spied a much larger leech swimming about and I got out so others could get closer to the pond’s edge and see it. Moira stood still as it circled her leg over and over again.

At last, either she or Nat captured it and placed it in a tray for all to observe. At its longest stretch, it was about five inches, though sometimes it appeared to be only about an inch in length.

In awe, we watched it move gracefully as its body contracted and protracted around the edge of the tray. And then the moment of anticipation came. Time for an up-close-and-personal look.

By the line of spots on its back . . .

and orange belly, Nat identified it as the common and colorful Macrobdella decora—North American medicinal leech, apparently used for bloodletting, but not one that would harm us as we continued to witness.

The more time we spent with Della . . .

the more comfortable we became in its presence, and soon learned that it moves rather like a slinky and we needed to place one hand below the next to keep its rhythm going.

That said, it was rather disconcerting. I mean: leeches are to be feared. We’ve spent a lifetime honing that attitude.

But . . . after spending a little time with them, I realized I truly don’t understand their ecology, but I’ve certainly gained a new respect, including the understanding that they have a brain and a sucker at each end. There’s a whole lot more to them than meets our eyes–including the fact that they have ten . . . eyes, that is, if I’ve got my facts correct.

First, we thought standing in the water was enough of a challenge. And then holding the leech. But . . . Nat had one more challenge–let the leech crawl on your face. Have you ever? Genie was willing to give it a try, but it fell off.

Moira gladly also gave it a try, but it fell to the ground.

Nat, however, was the most successful . . . until we were all certain it was headed into his ear.

Did you know this about leeches?

• some families are jawless, some toothless, and some feed through a tube

• leeches swallow their prey whole, extract the bodily fluids, and spit out the crunchy-bits, rather like a carnivorous plant

• they prey on invertebrates, turtles, frogs, ducks, or fish

• they are eaten by crayfish, salamanders, birds, turtles, carnivorous aquatic insect larvae, and fish

There is so much more for me to comprehend, but what a great beginning. Today we were be-leeched at Greater Lovell Land Trust with many, many thanks to Nat and Genie Wheelwright for traveling to western Maine to share their nature moments with us, Linda and Heinrich Wurm for hosting the Wheelwrights overnight, and Moira Yip and Vanny Nelson for being today’s lead docents. (Vanny, a former intern, nailed the intro–Nat was impressed, as we all were. And they have a Bowdoin College allegiance.)