Barton Arboretum

Wildflower Walk March 3, 2012

2012-03-03T14:22:00.006-05:00

At the bottom of this post there's an embedded video about edible weeds including wintercress which we were looking at this morning and which is abundant thoughout Medford Leas.

It was drizzling this morning and Jane Bourquin, the walk leader, and Maggie Heineman (that's me) were the only ones who showed up. Jane had scouted during the week and neither the skunk cabbage nor the bloodroot were in bloom. However Jane had seen Herb Robert in bloom. This page on Wikipedia has a short explanation and a photo. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geranium_robertianum A website in King County Washington has this to say on it's "noxious weeds" site.

Herb Robert
Geranium robertianum

Herb Robert escaped from ornamental plantings and thrives in forested communities as the dominant ground cover, displacing native and beneficial plants.

Herb Robert's 5-petaled flowers are in all shades of pink and sometimes white. Overall the plant is covered with short glandular hairs, giving the plant a sticky feel and a distinct odor (sometimes this plant is known as "stinky Bob"). Shallow, weak roots make this plant easy to pull although large infestations can be highly labor-intensive to remove.

I took a couple of photos. For size the closeup includes Jane's thumbnail, but one of the five petals had dropped off.

The Herb Robert was quite abundant down the firelane just a little past Parking Lot C.

Weeds were coming up through the mulch around the trees - there was a lot around the flowering crababble. Without flowers we had to do some studying to determine that the weed we were looking at was not chickweed but wintercress.

Chickweed flowers (Stella media) are easy to identify and now we know the difference between the leaves of chickweed and wintercress. Follow the link to mlra wildflowers site to see chickweed. Wintercress isn't on our site. It should be. Wintercress has a rosette of basal leaves which are unmistakable -- look at the base of the crabapple.

http://mlra.org/wildflowers/flowers/Stellaria_media.htm

Jane had brought a bowl of weeds with her -- along with the wintercress there was some Gill on the Ground. http://mlra.org/wildflowers/flowers/Glechoma_hederacea.htm

I took some photos of Jane's poster of edible weeds and while writing this blog, googling for wintercress, I came up with an interesting video of edible weeds -- including wintercress. This video is one of a series on edible weeds.

Ralph Berglund's Meandering at ML

2012-01-16T07:51:00.001-05:00

Ralph, who is a wonderful photographer, has a blog on which he recently posted photos of the ML arboretum. His post "Meandering at ML" includes the photo of the bridge and tells about his walk on the RR trail above Sharp's Run. His post "A Little Fog Before Breakfast" includes an early morning view of a section of the Red Trail in the area between Bridlington Way North and Wilkins Station Road.

The Mugwort is in bloom

2011-10-06T21:02:00.000-04:00

The mugwort is in bloom in the meadow at Lumberton Leas. There are millions of tiny flowers. Jennifer Bulava, the Burlington County Naturalist, told us at the Lumberton Community Center at one of her presentations about Plants and Pollinators, that plants which have very small plain flowers must depend on the wind to pollinate them. Insects and birds are not attracted as they are to bigger, showier and more colorful flowers. Plants like mugwort, therefore need to have lots of flowers to make sure that some of them get pollinated.

Lots of residents at Lumberton don’t like mugwort. Some consider it a non-native invasive weed. I’m not indigenous either; my family came from Europe like the mugwort. Mugwort’s OK with me. It’s green, I like the way it waves in the wind and it makes a home for the rabbits that eat my flowers. I like the rabbits too.

Laboring on Labor Day

2011-09-05T11:42:00.001-04:00

With one hour of labor, from 8:30 to 9:30 am, Linda Gorwood, Maggie Heineman,Tom Lang, Pete McCord, Trish Mori, and Miriam Swartz filled several trash bags with ragweed. It was a start in the race against the ragweed seeds which spread in September.

Irene Trail 16

2011-08-31T07:07:00.018-04:00

About 10 o'clock the Trails/Woodlands Group disbanded. Maggie then started an inspection of Trails 16 and the RR trail, the 2 trails that she monitors. On trail 16, not far from the entrance near the tennis courts, the trail was blocked by a fallen tree covered with vines.

After the tree was "untied" (the vines removed) as much as possible, the 2nd photo was taken, with the lopper hanging on the base of the vine where it was too thick to cut. Enlarge the photo to see the vine and the place where it was cut - just left of the capital C in "Cut."

It turned out that the tree was not dead. The small branches of the tree that were thin enough and near enough to be cut were removed after the photo of the untied tree was taken.

It's now an attractive gate to Trail 16 from the tennis court entrance. I hope it remains.

my beautiful "Japanese Gate" (now removed) click the pic to see it large

Irene - Sweating the Small Stuff

2011-08-31T06:30:00.001-04:00

Residents clear the paths as much as they can. Enlarge and look closely at the 1st photo and you can see John H sawing this fallen tree. John C. is holding the end with branches so it won't drop abruptly. After the tree had been cut, John C. put the top of the tree to one side and Carol, John H., and Maggie pivoted the heavy base of the tree so that it lay along side the path, not across.

There were many places on the trails where fallen trees would have to be removed by landscaping. Click photos to see them big.

Irene - Bridge across Sandy Run

2011-08-31T06:06:00.000-04:00

A "bridge" across Sandy Run had been dislodged. "Bridge" is in quotes because the bridges that the trails committee maintains are planks, chained to the ground so they won't float away in floods. In order to relocate the bridge the working group approached the run from different directions. John C. and Ruth were on one side of the run. Maggie, Carol, and John H. were on the other. As it turned out the water level was much lower than it had been when John made his observations the day before and it was not difficult to step across the run. In the 1st photo the photographer is on one side of the run while John C. and Ruth are on the other side, discussing strategy for shifting the plank -- which is heavy. The 2nd photo shows John H. crossing the dislodged plank and Carol in the foreground. The 3nd photo shows the plank back in place. Click photos to see them large.

Irene - Tree Across the Rancocas

2011-08-30T22:36:00.003-04:00

This fallen tree across the Rancocas would be a fun footbridge to Dark Waters if only we were a few decades younger. The Roots of this tree together with the top branches of another huge fallen oak block the Orange Trail.

The stump of the tree with the branches at the far end which mingle with the roots of the tree that's crossing the Rancocas.

Roots of tree that crosses the creek next to branches of the tree that broke leaving a stump

click the images to see them large

In the sky over Lumberton Leas

2011-08-15T15:09:00.001-04:00

On August 8th there was a perfect rainbow over Lumberton Leas.

Four days later, three hot air balloons flew over.

Farm Photos by Perry

2011-08-12T09:20:00.005-04:00

I'm thinking of a slideshow using Perry's farm photos. This might become the opener.

update August 30. The slideshow is now on http://mlra.org and will be the home page through the month of September.

Sweet Tooth Squirrel

2011-05-23T15:24:00.001-04:00

Lumberton Meadow Planting

2011-05-06T10:36:00.002-04:00

Miriam's report:

Dear Maggie,

Here is my report about the planting of the Meadow on Monday, April 25, 2011. Please feel free to edit the following and if Herb wants to use some part for the Chronicle its fine with me.

Thirteen residents whose homes bordered on the Meadow gathered on Monday morning April 25, to plant bulbs and flowering plants(mostly native) in our Meadow. Five, Pink Coneflower were planted in circles in 12 spots, six orange Butterfly Weed will make a beautiful display in late July and August and 6-7 ' tall Gateway variety of Joe Pye Weed will rise above the Mugwort to make a showing in August and September.

Flowers are now coming into bloom. Lots of purple Dame's Rockets are flowering in the north east side of the meadow.

I want to thank all of the following people who planted and adopted plants to water over the next few weeks: Carmelita Aseron, Judy Atwood, Dave Bartram, Linda Gorwood, Janet Gray, Maggie Heineman, Sue Kuhn, Eileen McConville, Trish and Geno Mori, Mary Noll, Rolfa Rodgers, Dave Swartz and Louise Tompkins.

Miriam

Siberian Wallflower providing food for a Mourning Cloak Butterfly, the only butterfly that lives over the winter in our region of the country.

Hummingbirds are back in New Jersey

2011-04-22T18:39:00.001-04:00

Tali Yeomans had told us to put out our hummingbird feeders around tax day, and so yesterday we did. This afternoon, we saw our first hummer. What a thrill, I'm never tired of watching them!

Wake Robin Hunt

2011-04-22T16:45:00.014-04:00

That Jane Bourquin is really something. We were on The Island - and off to the left of the (Yellow 12) trail there was a pretty good patch of White Trillium (Trillium grandiflorum) but no Trillium erectum, which is referred to as Red Trillium, Purple Trillium, Blue Trillium, or Wake Robin. Well at least it was obvious to everyone but Jane that all the flowers were white. Nonetheless Jane went tramping through the Trillium, careful not to step on any plant, and kept searching. In time she spotted a plant with a tiny bud, which was sort of dark. Jane announced that this bud would become a Blue Trillium. We marked the location with two crossed sticks (X marks the spot). We expect that Jane is right and that we'll see the Wake Robin next week.

The photo of the Red Trillium was taken by Jane a few years ago. The photo on the right of a patch of White Trillium was taken by Maggie today. -- click it to see it bigger. Jane explained that May Apple flowers always occur in the notch between two leaves at the top of the plant. If there's only one leaf, the plant is sterile.

click pic to see it large

Also in bloom: Lesser Celendine, High Bush Blueberry, Spring Beauty, Trout Lily, Dead Nettles, Ground Ivy (Gill Over the Ground)

Each of the links above goes to the flower's page on mlra.org -
For comparison, here is the page for the Marsh Marigold, which we did not see. We also saw a small white flower, the size of a Spring Beauty, but with six petals, not five. It looked somewhat like the photo of the Star of Bethlehem, but I doubt that's what it was. We also saw both yellow and purple violets. This page has the six varieties of violets which were identified by Rudy Salati. I think what we saw were the common yellow violet and the marsh violet. There may have also been field pansies.

Pebble Run Bridge, l to r: Jane, Cecile, Ro. Milly behind Ro

Lumberton Trails - April 18

2011-04-20T08:37:00.004-04:00

Ferry Tale

Art Hartwig was our leader and he had so much to tell us about the work of the trail committee past, present and future. I have added captions to the PHOTOS IN THIS ALBUM but they don't begin to tell the story. I think we should have a slideshow with a narrative by Art in one of our community meetings. Herb thinks there should be a photo essay in the Lumberton Campus Chronicle. Art thinks we should have have more small-group walks -- two or three persons with a leader. Art has a long story about the past and future of this raft. I can't begin to do it justice, so I won't even try. Do go through the photos slowly and read the captions.

The view from my kitchen sink at Lumberton Leas

2011-04-17T10:43:00.001-04:00

It's a pretty time of year to look out the window. The Bradford Pears are in bloom. Originally, I was very proud to have them in front of our house. Then at last year's Barton Arboretum Lecture, Doug Tallamy called them "Alien Ornamentals," and pointed out that they were invasive plants as well as being unfriendly to our local insects (and thus birds). At this year's lecture, Drew Becher (PHS President) called them "Cockroach Trees, " because they are among a small number of trees that are suitable for planting in urban environments (like cockroaches, they are hard to kill). So be it, they are here and I enjoy them.

Master Gardeners - Philadelphia Inquirer

2011-04-15T07:32:00.003-04:00

ARTICLE IN TODAY'S INQUIRER about Master Gardeners at Medford Leas - and weeds. There were many more photos -- big ones in the paper-- front page of the Home and Design section.

Wildflowers Walk on April 8

2011-04-09T12:07:00.002-04:00

We took Yellow Trail 12 to the Island looking for Trillium. Not yet, but plenty of Skunk Cabbage. It was a cloudy day so the Lesser Celendine was not open. We saw Spring Beauty buds but not full flower - which we had seen on Tuesday on Trail 13. The photo from the walk shows Jane pointing to the "State Champion" Butternut Hickory which was struck by lightning in 1997. CLICK HERE to see it big and read the sign insert.

Before the walk we spent some time learning to use Newcomb's Wildflower Guide. Irregular flower, opposite leaves, lobed = locator key 143. ahh- ground ivy - Gill on the Ground On another weed Jane showed us the long pointy seedpods which identify it as belonging to the mustard family. Herb Minkus had told us on Monday that it was Bittercress. -- CLICK HERE - look familiar? scroll down for a photo of the weed growing out of gravel. We saw plenty of both weeds on our walk.

Trail Walk on April 6

2011-04-09T11:29:00.000-04:00

Click here to START THE SLIDESHOW WITH THE 7 PHOTOS from the walk on Trail 13, led by Steve Denham. I never saw such large trees growing out of a fallen nurse log, and the culverts under the RR embankment were HUGE. Great views of the Sharp's Run floodplain at this time of year. We started the walk near the guest cottage at Bridge 6 - I thought that's where Herb said there was a Beaver Dam. No dam there, however.

Court Walk on April 5

2011-04-09T11:13:00.000-04:00

Click here for THE FIRST 19 PHOTOS IN THIS ALBUM which are from the April 5 Court walk with Herb Minkus. Next time I'll take notes - Herb please provide info to label the photos that have "Dunno" in them. I do remember a couple of things -- we have 600,000 daffodils, 80% (is that right?) of the pachysandra died last winter, and there was some sort of scientific experiment with residents wearing heart-rate monitors going thru the courts and sitting for a few minutes at various courts. Court seven was the most relaxing. I probably have that story completely jumbled. Herb, please explain.

Trail Maps and Aerial Views

2011-04-09T09:37:00.001-04:00

Lumberton Campus Trails - Aerial View

A couple of these have been posted before. I'm reposting because post titles are important in locating stuff. In fact that's why I'm going to be posting separately for each of the 3 walks this past week. A reminder: if you click on the pic it gets bigger. On some computers a 2nd click makes it bigger yet -- or to increase the size of pics or font use Control + on PCs and Command + on Macs.

Medford Campus Trails

Medford Campus - Aerial View

Climbing a Holly Tree - from Deb Lux

2011-03-30T19:15:00.012-04:00

Debbie Lux sent two photos of the Historic Holly. Of the one looking up, she wrote, "Thought it would be fun to imagine climbing a holly tree."

Arboretum Slideshow for Lois Forrest Tribute

2011-03-29T16:01:00.004-04:00

THIS IS THE SLIDESHOW which will be shown in the Theater on Friday as part of the "Tribute to Lois Forrest."

Tagged Trees in the Barton Arboretum

2011-03-25T20:39:00.003-04:00

Dave sent me a spreadsheet of the tagged trees in the arboretum. This database not only has the location, the common and latin names, but also a column for a photo url -- which lo and behold is a live link!! Cool. For the first item I typed in the url http://mlra.org and automatically it became a live link.

TAGGED TREES IN THE BARTON ARBORETUM

NATIVE PLANTS IN BURLINGTON COUNTY

Native Plants in Burlington County

2011-03-24T07:23:00.008-04:00

This is the homepage of the NATIVE PLANT SOCIETY OF NJ They have photo galleries of flowering plants by season, and "To submit your best photos to the Photo Gallery, send JPEG files via e-mail along with the scientific and common names and the location of the photo to webmaster@npsnj.org."

They also have spreadsheets of native plants, by county, as xls files. However, through the magic of google docs, I have made the Burlington County spreadsheet available to anyone who has THIS LINK. Scroll down and you'll see that I've red-bolded some of the names on the list. (just a few - will finish the job later) Red-bolded plants are those that are on Rudy Salati's DATABASE OF WILDFLOWERS at Medford Leas. As we take photos of wildflowers, I'll be replacing outsourced photos on the wildflowers website with out own - and in addition, if we have great photos that are on the Burlington County spreadsheet we could send them to NPSNJ.

Herb and Deb, I'd like to also mark in bold-red fonts the trees and shrubs that we have on campus. I can give you editing permission on the spreadsheet (my preference) or you can provide me with a list and I'll do the editing to highlight names of the native plants we have here.

The galleries at the NPSNJ site are flowers in bloom by season, fall foliage, pinelands, and Isle Royale. Most of the photos are from from H. Ling or M.Ling. Pinelands by M. Hogan.

Maggie (who accidentally signed in as Arboretum Blog Team)

Beavers at work in Sharps Run

2011-03-21T09:16:00.006-04:00

This morning's email from Herb Minkus:
"The beavers have been busy(once again),constructing dams on Sharp's Run. They are working on one under the bridge by route 70 and also behind the arts and social wing parking lot. I hope we can tolerate the damage and appreciate this industrious animal."

evidence of beavers

closeup of another tree

click the images to make them big - I think those are dams in the background of both pictures, but I'm not sure (sez Maggie).

Sharp's run is the creek that one crosses entering Medford Leas from Route 70. Go to the map in the previous post, click on it to make it big, then click again to make it bigger. Sharp's Run is labeled. You can locate it between the RR embankment and the guest cottage. Herb, can the dams be seen from yellow trail #13?

Wildflower Walk March 19

2011-03-19T17:31:00.011-04:00

Click the pics to see them big

Jane Bourquin and I went on a wildflower walk today. Jane will be leading walks the 2nd and 4th Saturdays of the month, and they'll be announced in the monthly calendar (this one wasn't).
First we went over Bridge#5 on Yellow Trail #12 to The Island (4 o'clock on the red trail)

Then we went north along the red trail and walked a short distance on Yellow Trail #11.

Along Pebble Run we saw a few Lesser Celendine in bloom. And many more (sort of a ground cover) that will soon be in bloom. Lesser Celendine was a favorite of Rudy Salati and of William Wordsworth -- HERE'S THE POEM BY WORDSWORTH.

However Jane dislikes it because it takes over and crowds out other plants.

This is a photo from Delaware Wildflowers site where the Lesser Celandine are crowding out Virginia Bluebells. The captions says "this plant covers acres of the Brandywine River floodplain."

We took another photo looking up Pebble Run toward Bridge #3 - I liked the Beech with the white leaves leftover from last year. Then we walked along the run up to the red trail and back to the car where we started -- near Bridge #5.

Click the map to see it big - then click again to expand it so you can read it.

Court 12 - Now It's Spring.

2011-03-19T16:59:00.001-04:00

Side by side - Court 12 in February and again in March.

Click pics to see them large

Photos by Jim Muir

Arboretum committee & signs of spring

2011-03-18T12:12:00.009-04:00

Click on the images to see them full size. Kitty Katzell sent these five images with this message:
"This morning, I went to the quarterly meeting of the Estaugh Arboretum Committee. Pictures 1 and 2 show people at the meeting in the Nature Center. I walked home from the Nature Center via Medford Leas Way and Medford Leas Way Extention, past Parking Lot B, and into Court 4 from Parking Lot A. Picture 3 shows the only daffodils I saw in flower along that entire route. After I turned onto Medford Leas Way Extension, I walked around the circle in the Memorial Garden, where I took Picture 5. The leaves around it resemble the leaves on a rhododendron, but the flowers were unfamiliar, and very low to the ground. [Deb Lux's comment says they are HELLEBORUS; she planted them about 6 years ago.] At Parking Lot B, a Magnolia tree's buds were bursting, and that's Picture 4."

#5 - Please leave a comment if you can ID this plant.

The morning after the mowing

2011-03-17T16:12:00.008-04:00

The morning after the mowing two geese visited. It was only a light rain during the night, but because of the grass in the gully the drainage had been slowed.

Starting a new cycle

2011-03-16T11:08:00.002-04:00

One of the pleasures of living at the Lumberton campus is watching the meadow change through the seasons. Now that the meadow has been mowed, we are looking forward to the end of winter's browns and the beginning of spring and summer colors.

Court 5 on Ash Wednesday

2011-03-09T16:43:00.001-05:00

Kitty Katzell took start-of-spring photos on March 9, Ash Wednesday. On the left are some catkins on her black pussy willow bush; on the right is a closeup of buds on the lilac bush at the intersection of Courts 5 and 6.

A month ago - Snow in Court 12

2011-03-09T16:27:00.005-05:00

Click on the image to see it full size

Jim Muir took this photo in Court 12 after one of the February, 2011 snowstorms. There are more snow photos at both the MEDFORD BLIZZARD SLIDESHOW - (2010 photos by Jim and Jeanette Muir and Margery Rubin) and the LUMBERTON BLIZZARD PAGE (2010 photos by Ulf Gummeson)

Bluebirds are back in the Lumberton meadow!

2011-03-09T08:04:00.003-05:00

This morning, I saw a male bluebird go in the nesting box to check it out. I hope he liked it!

Signs of Spring on the Trails at Medford Leas

2011-03-08T12:29:00.010-05:00

John C. took a group of residents on a trail walk in preparation to be trail guides for the Native Plant Society of New Jersey on Saturday. There wasn't much green coming out of the ground, but we did see Snow Drops on the side of Bridge #2 on the Red Trail, and some Skunk Cabbage in Sandy Run off of Yellow Trail 4.

A Harbinger of Spring

2011-03-05T18:24:00.003-05:00

A Skunk Cabbage pushing its way up near the Willow Trail at Lumberton.

The Willow Trail at Lumberton

2011-03-05T17:59:00.011-05:00

One of the highlights of the Willow Trail on the Lumberton campus, is a beaver lodge and dam which is located at the end of the trail. It appears that the beavers have not been doing any maintenance recently on either structure. There is a small break in the middle of the dam. This photo was taken at high tide (2:55 pm 3/5/2011), so the dam would appear to about 3 feet higher if it was low tide.

Spring Cleaning

2011-03-05T17:48:00.008-05:00

Miriam Swartz, our Lumberton Bird and Meadow expert, has advised that it's time to clean out our bluebird houses in the meadow. Here's a before and after shot.

The Wall of Ivy

2011-03-05T11:53:00.003-05:00

These photos don't look like much and that's the point. Debbie Lux doesn't think much of that bed of ivy along the wall. So watch for the coming transformation.

Click on any pic to see it big

When enlarged the photo above shows a little bit of the sloping triangular bed at the top of the wall. As of today, that bed is bare. Deb cleared it last fall and planted hundreds of bulbs. This new bed of bulbs can best be viewed from the hallway outside the Activities room or from the corner window of the coffee shop.

After seeing her photos here, Deb emailed,
"Hi Maggie, It's really going to be a popular site. I'm very interested in helping with pictures. I would like for you to add, Dwayne Mathews was a very big help in clearing up this area. He also power washed the walls and side walk after we added compost. Ivy could return, so I'll plant annuals until I'm sure it's gone for good. Thanks so much for a wonderful blog. I'll check it often. Debbie"

Hawk in the Lumberton Meadow

2011-03-04T21:15:00.005-05:00

Dave sent this photo explaining, "Here's an interesting photo from Lumberton. It's some sort of Hawk I saw in the meadow in late January, 2011."

[March 10 note: see Miriam's comment explaining why she thinks it's a Northern Harrier. ]

Sitting like Snoopy

This photo gives an opportunity to explain a couple of things about the blog. One - there's a place for comments below each post - to let us know what kind of a hawk this is, click below on the word "comments" and a dialogue box will open where you can write. Two - if you click on any photo in the blog it goes to a large version. So click the pic and the hawk will fill your screen. Use the back arrow to return to this page.

Dave Bartram LOVES this idea

2011-03-04T21:02:00.000-05:00

Dave replied enthusiastically to email asking him to be a team photographer. He wrote, "I just LOVE this idea. I've been working on the GPS tree mapping project with Russell and Herb Minkus. I've also been working with Gordon Clift to map the trails at Medford Leas. One of the things we envisioned was being able to highlight particular things and places, such as the Fringe tree and then share it with residents via the Internet. One of the things that I can add to this blog, as well as what you asked for is geographic information - either a map or a Google Earth overlay. So when you run an entry on the Fringe Tree, I could have a map or Google Earth view of exactly where it is. This would work better for things on the trail where it's not so obvious where it is. For example some special flower or tree or something. Anyway, I am very anxious to participate. ... This is a great, great idea. Dave.

Two favorites from mlra.org

2011-03-02T14:27:00.023-05:00

Afternoon Slosh Along the Kreibel Way

One day, in the summer of 2009, Medford Leas and area was blessed with a 4+ inch rainfall. Steve Denham writes, "Once I saw Kriebel Way, the beckoning of adventure did me in and I got my camera and away I waded. Bye the bye, the chirping, croaking, yelling, whatever, of the frogs was deafening." Steve has produced an OUTSTANDING PHOTO ESSAY with vivid descriptions and lovely photographs.

On a rainy day in 2005, Maggie Heineman took photos of the meadow. This photograph with a robin at the edge of the water and the reflection of a Lumberton Campus home was just pure luck. To see large versions of all the photos in the album "Lumberton Meadow in the Rain," just FOLLOW THIS LINK.

If you click the pics you'll see them full size. Use the back button to return to this page.

Lumberton Meadow in the rain

Happy Birthday Medford Leas

2011-03-02T12:39:00.004-05:00

Its an auspicious day to start this blog. It's the 40th Anniversary of Medford Leas.

Maggie Heineman and Kitty Katzell are the first two members of the Arboretum Blog Team and the editors of the blog. We have no experience with blogs. But we'll figure it out and start from here.