All posts by Jessica McDonald

Passing the torch

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Matt Blakeley-Smith

Matt Blakeley-Smith, Stewardship Director

Recently, Greenbelt’s Stewardship Program had a passing of the torch. Longtime Director and amazing leader, Jeff Baker, stepped down from the Director position into a part-time, non-management role and Matt Blakeley-Smith took the helm as Greenbelt’s second-ever Stewardship Director. An organic transition that supports exciting next chapters for Jeff, Matt and Greenbelt Land Trust. In these first few months, Jeff and the whole Greenbelt team will support Matt’s transition into the Director role. We’ve been in such good hands and will continue to be so.

After 11 years of leading Greenbelt’s innovative and impactful stewardship efforts, Jeff Baker is looking forward to a change that will allow him to spend more time with his children while they are young. “In the last decade, Jeff has nearly single-handedly built Greenbelt’s Stewardship Program into what it is today. Under his expert guidance, Greenbelt has successfully brought in over $4 Million in permanent stewardship funds for our properties, launched a region-wide restoration program, and established trusted partners across the Valley. We are thrilled that Jeff is staying with Greenbelt in this new role, continuing to lend his expertise to our growing team,” said Jessica McDonald, Greenbelt’s Associate Director.Quote from Michael Pope

This passing of the torch could not be better timed. “Fortunately, Greenbelt already had a great candidate in Matt Blakeley-Smith to take on the role of Stewardship Director. He’s shown himself to be passionate and innovative about caring for our lands—securing funding and restoring 1,000 acres of wildlife habitat and maintaining many more acres. He’ll bring many good ideas to the stewardship program. As a Stewardship Coordinator I look forward to working with our conservation easement owners and with our stewardship staff to make the program the best that it can be,” said Jeff Baker.

Matt Blakeley-Smith has been with Greenbelt for nearly seven years and brings to his work vision, passion, and commitment for protecting and restoring nature. Matt’s journey began studying biology in college because he was fascinated by microscopic invertebrates with scythe-like appendages, predatory plants, and redwood cathedrals. It didn’t occur to him—at that time—that biology jobs would be scarce once he graduated. “I feel so fortunate to work for Greenbelt doing what I love, “ said Matt Blakeley-Smith.

When it comes to stories of conservation, the media often reports on stories that feel otherworldly, either by distance or direct experience. “The Willamette Valley has its own majesty but we often take those things closest to us for granted. I want to highlight the exquisite diversity that surrounds us, but that may be just out of sight for many people. With the development pressure associated with Oregon’s growing popularity, it is essential to me to preserve what we can as quickly as possible,” Blakeley-Smith said.

When looking ahead at potential challenges place-based land trusts face, Matt thinks it will be important to also engage communities outside of Benton County, but within Greenbelt’s service area to develop our work in ways that are unique to each community, while sharing our core mission of protecting land and connecting people to nature.

“Willamette Valley ecosystems systems are damaged to the point that we can’t just let ‘nature take its course’ since too many pieces of the puzzle have been lost. Our goal is to actively manage the land in order to rebuild key relationships between species, with the understanding that there is no going back to pristine wilderness. Land trusts also have time on our side, so we can continue to adapt and restore the land for decades to come,” said Blakeley-Smith.

What drives Matt is the deep desire to see meadows filled with Camas and Shooting Stars where butterflies flutter in abundance and the Meadowlarks sing. He wants farm fields reclaimed by Greenbelt and that frame the Willamette River to develop into forests that can shelter a herd of elk and all other native creatures. And, he wants everyone to have access to the outdoors and abundant opportunities to enjoy nature in their own way.

“It is truly humbling to step back and think about the massive restoration initiatives that Matt has taken on with Greenbelt, including the complex planning to transform entire landscapes into functional floodplain forests and native prairies, building relationships with landowners and funders, and leading outreach programs that inspire others to become land stewards. There are few people as knowledgeable and dedicated to ecology as Matt, and we are all just fortunate to learn from him and have him step into this role as Stewardship Director,” McDonald said.

Greenbelt Land Trust offers deep gratitude to Jeff Baker for blazing the trail and a joyful welcome to Matt, stepping in to take the lead.

The Real Batman

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Bat night with Stuart Perlmeter

Bat by Bob Morris

An interview with Stuart Perlmeter who has worked with bats for nearly 30 years. During that time, Stuart has also run successful field biology programs for students from the Springfield School District in bat and watershed science research, as well as founding The WELL Project (Water and Energy Learning Lab), a science program that supports hands-on science instruction in the areas of water and energy science.

 

How did you get interested, then passionate, about bats?
I got interested in bats after reading Richard Dawkins book “The Blind Watchmaker.” In this book, one of his chapters focused on the evolution of bats. I was fascinated, got hooked and started reading every bat book I could get my hands on. Then took a two-week field workshop with Brock Fenton on bats and eventually did my Master’s under his supervision.

What is your background? Was it a straight path to bats or a winding one?
Not a straight-line path at all.  Worked for 4 years after high school then when I was ready attended the University of Maryland, then transferred to the University of Oregon. I finished with an undergraduate Physical Anthology degree with a focus on Primates. Then I worked for National Geographic on the mountain gorilla project with Dian Fossey after which I received a special education and a biology teaching certificates. Then bats caught my interest and I developed a program in conjunction with the U.S. Forest Service to have high school students collect data on bats all summer. Between 1992-1993 I moved my family to Toronto, Canada and completed my master’s in Behavioral Ecology at York University under supervision of Brock Fenton. Finally, I returned to Oregon and continued teaching Biology.

Tell us more about the high school student program you led. 
Once returning to Oregon after my Master’s, I continued the program of recruiting high school students to continue my bat research.  Jessica McDonald (Greenbelt Land Trust’s Associate Director) joined the program. The goal of the program was to get high school students interested in doing field research. Between 8-10 students were involved in the program each summer and the program was supported by a cost-shared agreement with the U.S. Forest Service. The members of the high school crew worked during summer months capturing, tagging and collecting data, not only for my Master’s thesis but the data they collected was useful on bat populations throughout the state. The type of data collected on bats was based on the needs of the U.S. Forest Service-species, roosting data, etc. The crew lived in the woods for much of the three months and returned only to shower, shop for food, and try to get some regular sleep. It was an amazing opportunity offered to high school students and, for the most part, they loved doing the work and spending time as a tight-knit group that had bats in common.

Tell us all about bats! What do they eat?
Some eat fruit, insects, pollen, nectar, other bats, birds, small mammals, fish, and frogs.

How do they hunt?
Microbats hunt using echolocation, while megabats use sight and smell

What are baby bats called?
Baby bats or pups.

Where do bats go during the winter and during the day?
In the tropics, they stay put year-round and just change diet depending on what available. Bats in cooler temperature zones of the world either migrate to warmer locations with food or go into hibernation for the winter. During the daytime bats either roost in the open in trees or in dark roost sites during the daytime. Roosts can include buildings, snags, caves, mine shafts, etc.

How many species of bats are in the U.S.?
About 50 species.

Are bats solitary creatures? 
Some species are solitary but many species form large colonies sometimes exceeding 20 million.

Are bats blind?
No bats are not blind, microbats have small eyes as their primary sense is echolocation, but megabats have well-developed eyes.

How old do bats live, on average? 
Some small microbats have been known to live for over 20 years.

What animals are predators of the bat? 
Other bats, owls and cats.

Given the state of the climate, are bats doing ok?
Like all other animals, they are impacted by climate change as their habitats change and the availability of food changes. They are equally affected by habitat destruction and the use of pesticides.

Thank you, Stuart! We look forward to the next bat night at Bald Hill Farm!

Restoring Habitat

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Vesper babies

Vesper Sparrow babies

“The Vesper-bird … from its evening hymn, or vespers.” – Wilson Flagg, 1858

This sweet and unassuming bird delights in dust baths; makes a home in open spaces like meadows, prairies and even along roadsides; and makes friends of farmers by eating insects and weeds that otherwise damage crops [American Bird Conservancy]. But, it is this grass-dwelling bird’s song that delights the hearts and ears of naturalists and ramblers alike.

“The Vesper Sparrow’s sweet song, a combination of clear whistles and trills, can often be heard at twilight — roughly the same time as Catholic vespers services, which earned the bird its name” [American Bird Conservancy].

With less than 1% of native prairie remaining in the Northwest due to human impacts like prairie conversions to large-scale agriculture and development, the Vesper Sparrow population is declining rapidly. This increasingly rare bird serves as a critical link in ensuring the diversity necessary for ecosystem health — a delicate ecosystem that all life depends on.

Greenbelt Land Trust has been working with Bob Altman, Oregon Vesper Sparrow expert with the American Bird Conservancy, at Bald Hill Farm and Little Willamette to gain a better understanding of potential limiting factors on Oregon Vesper Sparrow populations.

“With so few birds remaining, many in small and isolated populations, the Oregon Vesper Sparrow needs the immediate protection and conservation focus made possible through [Endangered Species Act] listing… Every year, more populations are being lost, and we are not seeing the establishment of new populations where habitat restoration has occurred” [Altman, Bob (2017, Oct 6). Vesper Sparrow. Retrieved from https://abcbirds.org/bird/vesper-sparrow].

Bob Altman

Bob Altman surveying Vesper Sparrows at Bald Hill Farm

Since 2017, Altman has been looking at a variety of factors for Greenbelt, including the survival and return rates of adults wintering in California; the number of eggs laid and the number that hatch; survival from hatching to fledgling; and the number of those that fledge, winter in California, and return to Oregon the following year. This critical study helps tease apart important factors in the declining population of the Vesper Sparrow.

Guided by questions that consider a multitude of possible ways in which the Vesper Sparrow may struggle to maintain its population opens doors for exploration. Where is die-off occurring? Are Vesper Sparrows laying too few eggs to maintain population? Are eggs being eaten by predators like Coyotes or trampled by cows in pastures? Are Vesper Sparrows struggling due to scarce food sources or decreasing quality or access to habitat?

Greenbelt’s work in protecting and restoring the land is strategic and intentional. We develop our conservation priorities around building a connected, resilient landscape that supports native species with a focus on increasingly vulnerable species, like the Vesper Sparrow.

For this little brown and white bird and her delightful song — Greenbelt’s stewardship team gives focused attention to the characteristics of existing nesting sites and habitat preferences in order to regenerate the land and provide a more resilient habitat for the Vesper Sparrow to flourish.

Pointing the Way

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Michael Pope is someone you can always find in a crowded room. His tall frame rises above others, his long legs the bane of existence for us short-people, who implore Michael to ‘slow down’ as we walk to the sandwich shop or up the trail. But Michael isn’t one to slow down. He’s always moving, energetic and excited by the vision of a new connecting trail, bringing together the puzzle pieces of a regional partnership, or finally completing the installation of a horseshoe pit at Bald Hill Farm.

He points the way,

 

leading the charge,

aligning people together

towards a common goal.

Forward, moving,

onward

in friendship and humor

to the next chapter.

We’ve all benefited from Michael’s sense of direction and his willingness to ‘steer the ship’ for Greenbelt Land Trust. Our trajectory of growth and work is tied to his tireless momentum and drive forward.

After nine years at the helm, Michael has decided to follow a new adventure in life … and while he will be missed mightily, we know that he has set a chart forward for us all. Now … if he’d just slow down enough for us all to catch up!

Surveying Turtles

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Western pond turtle

Photo by Elizabeth Sollie

During the month of July, Greenbelt surveyed freshwater turtle nesting to determine the locations of nesting areas at three of our conservation areas along the Willamette River. The information gathered from these nesting locations will guide the management and enhancement of nesting areas.

During the survey, we found two species of freshwater turtles on these sites: one of the West Coast’s only native freshwater turtle, the Western pond turtle, and the non-native Red-eared Slider. These turtles—who love to sunbathe on logs—dig their nests on land near marshes, streams, rivers, ponds, and lakes and choose flat, open, sunny spots or in places that are positioned to the south with sandy, gravelly soils.

Native Western pond turtles are under threat by the invasive Red-eared sliders who compete for habitat, food and nesting sites, in addition to predation by “raccoons and invasive bullfrogs and fish” [Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife].

Greenbelt typically locates nests by finding eggshells after the nest has been dug up by predators. Intact nests are much harder to find. Over the last two years, we’ve found 25 Western Pond Turtle nests and four Red-Eared Slider nests.

Thanks to Lisa Millbank, for in-the-field surveying and to our land owner partners. This survey work was made possible by grant support from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife and the Center for Natural Lands Management, and technical assistance support from the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Resources:
Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife (2019) Turtles [online], available from: https://myodfw.com/wildlife-viewing/species/turtles [accessed 9th August 2019].

 

Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife (2019) Invasive Species Fact Sheet [online], available from: https://www.dfw.state.or.us/conservationstrategy/invasive_species/docs/red-eared_slider_fact_sheet.pdf [accessed 9th August 2019].