ECWA is teaming up with Jack Johnson on his 2010 To The Sea Tour and All At Once, a social action network connecting nonprofits with people who want to become active in their local and world community.

To celebrate this collaboration ECWA is raffling off two pairs of concert tickets - a $90 value! You can purchase raffle tickets online for $5 each. The raffle ends on August 18th and the drawing will be made on August 19th. Only one winning draw per person

Jack Johnson's charity is matching every dollar contributed to ECWA at the concert or directly to ECWA between now and October 15, 2010 (up to $2500). Please make a contribution to ECWA right now and your money will be doubled by the Johnson Ohana Charitable Foundation!

Please also consider becoming a member of All At Once.

Visit www.AllAtOnce.org to check out what you can do before, during, and after the show to get involved.

Please patronize these businesses as a way of thanking them for their support of ECWA. For more information on these sponsors and to see the list of all ECWA Business Sponsors please check our Business Sponsors page.

Green Mountain Coffee Roasters
33 Coffee Lane
Waterbury VT 05676
(888) 879-4627

All At Once
www.allatonce.org

Piedmont Restaurant
401 Foster Street
Durham, NC 27707
(919) 683-1213

West End Wine Bar
601 W. Main St.
Durham, NC 27707
(919) 381-4228

Many thanks go to Memorial Day hike leaders for a great day of heron watching!

Chapel Hill Bird Club members Judy and David Smith led the 7:30 hike, and the group experienced rich early morning birding at the rookery. The 9:30 group, led by ECWA Preserves Manager Cynthie Kulstad and NC Museum of Natural Sciences educator Kim Smart, enjoyed great heron watching and explored Glennstone Preserve’s flora.

Sarah Ovaska and John Rottet of the News and Observer participated in the 9:30 hike. Read Sarah’s article and view John’s beautiful heron photos.

Thanks again to Judy, David, Cynthie, and Kim for a lovely day at the rookery!

--- Leslie McClellan

Ellerbe Creek Watershed Association and Keep Durham Beautiful Welcome Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, Inc. to Durham

Vermont-based Company’s National Sales Meeting Included Clean Up at Durham’s Beaver Marsh with Hillside New Tech High School Student Installation of Green Roof Design for Site’s New Visitor Kiosk Assisted by the Goat Patrol

The Ellerbe Creek Watershed Association (ECWA) in partnership with Keep Durham Beautiful (KDB) welcomes Waterbury, Vermont-based Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, Inc. (GMCR) to Durham who committed over 100 staff members to a clean-up at the Ellerbe Creek Watershed Association’s Beaver Marsh, a multi-acre urban nature preserve in one of Durham’s most highly developed areas.

GMCR chose Durham for its national sales meeting May 24-27. As part of their commitment to positively impact local and global communities, GMCR staff ventured out to the Beaver Marsh Preserve to help restore the site’s natural habitat, create more public access to the preserve, and protect Durham waterways.

Purchased by ECWA in 2009, the Beaver Marsh drains into Ellerbe Creek, part of the Upper Neuse River Basin that feeds into Falls Lake, the drinking water source for over 425,000 Wake County residents. A hidden gem located between Club Boulevard and Interstate 85, ECWA’s Beaver Marsh is 32 acres of undeveloped land that includes a spring fed freshwater pond set in a 25-acre wetland area and seven acres of upland forest. The wetland provides a beautiful oasis of green in an otherwise highly urban area. The site has diverse native plants, over 75 species of migratory and resident birds, ten species each of dragon and damsel flies, five species of frogs and a large active beaver lodge.

GMCR staff helped remove non-native invasive plants, build a trail around the marsh, pick up trash and construct a visitor kiosk that will feature a new “green” roof designed by students from Durham’s Hillside New Tech High School. Hillside educator Matt Sears and his students will then install their roof that reduces storm water runoff, absorbs heat, and cools attic temps. The Hillside students have been invited to present their roof system at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology this June. While cleanup and building was underway, Durham’s 16–member strong Goat Patrol digested unwanted honeysuckle and poison ivy.

More information:

• Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, Inc.: www.gmcr.com
• Keep Durham Beautiful: www.keepdurhambeautiful.org
• Hillside New Tech High School hillsidentinventeam.wordpress.com/ or www.newtech.dpsnc.net/

See the article in the Herald-Sun HERE

See a collection of photos from the workday HERE
Photos by ECWA treasurer, Ted Compton

--- Katherine Meehan

Join Riverdave for an all day, adult nature exploration experience known as Tree Camp. Tree Camp is a land-based, environmental education program where you will have the opportunity to become familar with all 100 species of trees that are native to the Piedmont region of central North Carolina.

Tree Camp sessions are held at West Point on the Eno River park in North Durham each Saturday from 10AM till 3PM beginning April 17 and continuinuing through the end of August.

See the Tree Camp website for more details.

This hidden gem is located Behind Compare Foods and Big Lots, between Club Boulevard and Interstate 85. The Beaver Marsh is 32 acres of undeveloped land that includes a spring fed freshwater pond set in a 25-acre floodplain/wetland area and 7 acres of upland forest. The wetland provides a beautiful oasis of green in an otherwise highly urbanized environment. Located in one of downtown Durham’s gateways, the site has a diverse array of native plants, over 75 species of migratory and resident birds, 10 species each of dragon and damsel flies, and five species of frogs. In the center of the pond is a large active beaver lodge!

Read more from ECWA's Beaver Marsh Preserve brochure.
Please note that this brochure is a large (2.2MB) PDF file.

Click below to view the UNC-TV North Carolina Now segment about the work being done by ECWA to preserve and protect Ellerbe Creek. The show was part of their "Environmental Heroes" series. This video was produced by the Medical and Science Journalism Program of the UNC School of Journalism and Mass Communication along with UNC-TV. Many thanks to Dr. Tom Linden, Andrew Vanderveer, and the crew for all their work on this project.

-- Joanne Abel

A 0.7 mile stretch of Ellerbe Creek’s channel in the 17-Acre Wood Preserve is about to get a make-over. The stream channel is not in the shape it once was—literally.

In the 1950s, the US Army Corps of Engineers decided that straight streams with deep, U-shaped channels were most “efficient” for avoiding local flooding, so they straightened and deepened stream channels throughout the North Carolina Piedmont. These altered channels function very well as stormwater conveyance ditches, but they lose much of the stream’s ability to keep its water clean, provide a home and food for critters, and allow stormwater to soak into the ground to replenish groundwater. And those high, steep banks are unstable: fast-flowing water during storms erodes the bottom of the banks and causes sections to collapse.

Read more HERE

ECWAs own Kathi Beratan, of NCSU's Dept. of Forestry and Environmental Resources, was featured on the February 19th airing of "Shooting the Bull" with Barry Ragin and Kevin Davis on WXDU Radio. She talks about stormwater management in Durham, and gives a preview of her guided walk around the Avondale Drive beaver pond.

You can listen to the entire program using the audio player below or with your iTunes software (do a search for "Shooting the Bull") or by visiting Internet Archive.

A new city ordinance has raised awareness of the issue, and the cost of meeting state requirements. Stormwater management in urban areas is not simple, but it is essential for healthy streams and lakes, and a safe water supply. To help people understand the situation, ECWA’s water quality committee has prepared an overview description of the underlying causes and impacts of stormwater in Durham, and a systematic approach to stormwater planning that would help clean up Ellerbe Creek and restoring its ability to provide valuable ecosystem services.

-- Kathi Beratan

Read the entire document: A Systematic Strategy for Stormwater Management in the Ellerbe Creek Watershed.

In order to make everyone aware of the botanical wonders in the Ellerbe Creek headwaters, I've started a blog about Bennett Place, the 40 acre Civil War historic site that Ellerbe Creek - only two feet wide at that point - flows through. ECWA has a long history of working with Bennett Place staff to manage their property for all the unusual species that grow there. Cynthie and I are trying to continue that collaboration. The blog has four posts thus far, with photos and text, at BennettPlaceFlora.blogspot.com.

Please let me know how you like it. Comments and suggestions would be very helpful. I'm hoping to eventually get enough photos and text online that people can take a virtual tour of the watershed.

-Steve Hiltner

Visit Steve's Bennett Place Flora blog.

Not far from my house, in the heart of one of Durham’s older neighborhoods, is pearl mill branch. Its headwaters are nearby, and a mile or so downstream it joins Ellerbe Creek, the main waterway flowing through the city.

When I first discovered pearl mill branch, I knew little about it. A lover of nature but no naturalist, for years I walked or biked along the paved trail that follows its course, cocooned in ignorance.

This ignorance was blissful. My heart pumped at the sheer existence of the creek: I delighted, conspiratorily, in the way it forced itself - a small green concession - from the urban maw. Blessed be the waters, I sang as I meandered along its sides. And blessed too the contours of the land that bend the waters letting them flow, gurgle, and catch the light. And forget not the green jungle that tangles and thrives along its banks. Such was my gratitude for this little fragment of pulsating life: sweet, a little comic, but straight and true."

To read the entire essay, please see our Reflections page.

Land for Tomorrow (LFT) is a diverse partnership of North Carolina businesses, conservationists, farmers, environmental groups, health professionals and community groups committed to securing support from the public and General Assembly for protecting land, water and historic places.