My first bird (for me, mostly trees for birds) walk - Burnet Woods

The Universe recently called me to engage with Burnet Woods: (1) getting to know the trees and other beings there, and (2) in active dialogue with the Cincinnati Parks Board and other humans to hopefully try to see how beautiful it is without being augmented by brick, mortar, and pavement for certain human pursuits rather unrelated to nature. Please see my previous blog entry Burnet Woods and Recent Development Proposals for background.

I have yet to follow through on item (2) above, but yesterday, I showed up for a bird walk sponsored by the #PreserveBurnetWoods organization. I thoroughly enjoyed meeting the six other wonderful people in our group, and heard many different birds that were expertly identified by them from sounds and distant sightings. My new friend Anne Oliver had a marvelous Swarovski spotting scope on a stable lightweight tripod, and managed to train it on most of the birds that we met. I got a great view of a few. I can't say if they were more shy than usual that morning, but I was unable to get photos of any. I have come to the conclusion that I need a longer focal length telephoto lens for bird photography.

What was pleasantly surprising to me is that this group of longtime birders were perfectly willing to talk in detail with this newbie about the trees that these birds call home, either on a year - round or a "vacation - time" basis. It shouldn't have been surprising, for I am realizing that naturalists like birders understand a sacred Lakota native concept very well: "Mitákuye Oyás'iŋ", which literally translates as "All are Related". We can't love the birds without loving and caring for the trees. So with the glass that I had, I chose to go for easier targets on the few images that I caught. I intentionally post links to Flickr in here so that I don't have to compromise on resolution. That's particularly useful on the fisheye wide-angle shots. You can click on the caption hyperlinks to view on my Flickr site page, and then click once more with the magnifying glass pointer up on Flickr to zoom in and take a closer look at these beautiful old trees! Many thanks to Brian Wulker for identifying the trees for me. I hope you enjoy looking at their images here, and perhaps find time to meet them in the flesh!


Sun rising on western shore of the lake



A rather majestic white oak



Hackberry tree view 1



Hackberry tree view 2

The Enchanted Forestland of Wisteria

Between July 9th and 16th, my wife, Sharon and I had the blessing of attending the Starwood Festival at the Wisteria Event Site and Campgrounds in the Appalachian foothills of southeast Ohio. The Starwood Festival is an interesting event in terms of the people and workshops, but this blog post focuses on the story of the grounds; the land, and the rich depth of life that I discovered there.

What is Wisteria? It is a a nature preserve, a venue for private and public events, and a campground.  It is more than that, however. Wisteria's true uniqueness arises from the vision of its resident shareholders. They see this 620 acre parcel of land as a sacred living entity, and many of them devote their lives to lovingly tending it and healing the damage that was done to it in the 1950s, which is where I will begin the historical background. In the ‘50s the area that is now Wisteria was rich with coal and its hillsides were strip mined. With the view of natural resources as existing to exploit for corporate profit and consumption that was very prevalent at the time, the land area was left in ruins after about ten years of mining.  Locals who lived in the area during the time have described the area as being covered in rocks and devoid of any life. Soon, erosion began to occur alarmingly close to the main roads in the area. The state of Ohio implemented coal taxes, and administered "reclamation" of the land. Over $1 million was spent on this work.¹ Fast forward now to the mid 1990's. I was unable to locate any details on exactly what the state - administered reclamation program that occured in the 60's did for the land, but founding shareholder Charlene Suggs stated in an interview with Southeast Ohio Magazine: “When we came here it was a field—there was nothing—we had the remnants of the logging roads that we threw gravel on and used, but everything we did—every time we had an event,we just piled that money back into the land, and after a while it should give us dividends. We’ve been free labor because that’s the only way we could afford it,”.¹

Charlene Suggs and her husband at the time, Todd Alan, together with 20 other like - minded individuals, established the business entity known as Wisteria in 1996. Unlike so many corporations over the year which have tapped a land resource for the profitable festival business, the shareholders of Wisteria have a less common mission and vision. As hinted at in Suggs' quote in the previous paragraph, the goals of the shareholders and their event business are about healing this beautiful land from the strip mining destruction sixty years ago rather than being concerned with profit - seeking ventures.¹

I was fortunate enough to seek out and participate in two Starwood workshops led by author and teacher Adam Davis. You can learn more about Adam's work here. He was the first to tell me some of the story of the land of Wisteria, and point out the amazing resilience of the trees and other vegetation that have grown up over the reclaimed ruins that were so evident just a little over twenty years ago. Here are a few photographs of the "classroom" where I sat with other people in Adam's first workshop on how to learn to live in greater harmony with nature:





It would be after this workshop with Adam, on my own private wanderings, that I felt the sacred life in Wisteria in a very visceral way. The trees spoke to my soul and provided me with some needed emotional healing as I walked among them. The longest trail that I covered was roughly two miles long. The images that I have shared in this post were from the woodlands connected to the Wisteria campground and event site. There are over 200 acres of of undeveloped greenery and wetlands at Wisteria that are designated as a permanent nature preserve, "allowing reclaimed strip mine areas to heal as naturally as possible." This nature preserve is presently not open to event visitors, however, the Wisteria site says that there are plans to build a few longer trails for select visitors.²
I look forward to it! I felt the ancient story in the trees and the rocks, and realized that the unnatural disaster visited by humans on this place in the '50s was just a blip in that ancient story.











I arose from our campsite pretty early each day, and sometimes meditated from inside the woodlands, seeing the rising sun as the forest floor and the trees did.





I want to leave you with an image of a striking American Beech I came across on one of the trails I traveled. At the lower left is the larger of two broken limbs, and you can see the limb stub pointing slightly to the left off the stump of the tree. The scale of this tree and that limb here are deceptive as I was using an ultra wide - angle lens which makes things appear smaller than they are. The broken limb on the ground is roughly the size of a small RV. That isn't a new wound; there was a fair amount of decay at the break. Despite that huge, now - missing limb, this beautiful Beech shows great health and vitality in her canopy. 



I was left with the feeling that whatever we humans do on this planet we call home, Mother Nature is going to be alright. I'm not as sure about humankind. I think that we are not as resilient as she is. It is my hope and prayer that we will learn to receive and appreciate her unconditional love for us a little better, and recognize that we have a choice to live in harmony with her.

1 http://southeastohiomagazine.com/2017/05/01/wisteria-reclaims-corporate-buisness-model-abanonded-mine-land/
2 https://www.wisteria.org/about-us/nature-preserve/

Burnet Woods and Recent Development Proposals

The urban core of many American cities is being revitalized, thanks to the trend of many millenials to eschew suburbs, and live as efficiently as possible. This certainly sounds attractive to me! As I approach empty nesting, I find myself drawn away from suburbia toward urban living. Mostly, I crave the spiritual and cultural diversity that can be enjoyed in a larger population center like Cincinnati. I don't like the idea of continuing to be separated from this diversity by fifteen miles of traffic - jam prone interstate highway. My wife and I chose a certain Northern Kentucky suburb primarily for its high quality public schools when we moved here fifteen years ago with three children. We also wanted affordable living space. The youngest of the three is within a year of high school graduation, and now the size of our living space is not nearly as important. We are planning on selling our suburban home, and moving much closer to the spiritual and cultural energy center that draws us. Among the top candidates for us are the Clifton and Northside neighborhoods of Cincinnati, OH.

Although I crave the culture of a true urban center, I don't think that I would feel whole without ready access to green spaces with mature trees! It sounds like a complete conundrum: a choice between concrete or earth under one's feet and a canopy of trees over one's head. This isn't always the case. Cities that had most of their growth in the American postwar era often have only small parks that never really get you out of sight of a street. For American cities that grew significantly in the 19th century, it was different, with large wooded areas preserved and protected from commercial development. The first example I can think of for a large green space in the middle of a city is Central Park on the island of Manhattan, New York City. Another great green space is Burnet Woods, in Cincinnati's Clifton neighborhood.



In 1872, Robert W. Burnet and William S. Groesbeck leased 170 acres of their land to the city of Cincinnati and this land became known as "Burnet Woods". The University of Cincinnati relocated to the southern portion of this original land area, and after another UC expansion in 1950, Burnet Woods Park was left with its present 90 acres, enclosed by Clifton Avenue, Ludlow Avenue, Bishop Avenue, and Martin Luther King Drive.¹

Burnet Woods is a unique urban greenspace that is very important to a large number of migrating birds.It has been an urban migrant trap for a large number of bird species for many years. This has been documented in more than ten years of formal bird inventories during spring migration. As a result, the National Audubon Society has designated the park a special category Important Bird Area.²



On May 21st, in a public meeting attended by about 160 residents, the Cincinnati Park Board unanimously approved a motion to call on its staff and stakeholders to come up with a vision and plan for the park to, as board member Jim Goetz put it, "activate it, preserve it and bring in people." More than thirty speakers offered split opinions as to whether development of the park to offer "attractions" is in order, or preserve this precious urban habitat with no further development.³

There are two proposals on the table with the Cincinnati Park Board, both from non-profit organizations. One proposal is for the Camping and Education Foundation to build a 2500 square foot "Living Building".⁴ I could find no further details on this proposal, but it is ironic to me that an organization that ostensibly promotes camping with educational programs wants to cut down trees, raise a building and put in a parking lot next to this in the place of actual natural greenspace.

The second proposal involves clearing trees to a far greater degree. The Clifton Cultural Arts Center is looking for a new location after their lease was terminated in March, 2017 by the Cincinnati School Board. The CCAC's proposal is for a 25,000 to 35,000 foot building, and presumably, a proportionally sized parking lot.⁴

I believe that I speak for many in the area when offering the opinion that there is much more at stake here than making this park popular with humans and encouraging commerce. First of all, we are ALL stewards of the trees, and the bird populations that seek refuge in them. But if we cut down most of our area trees, there is a direct health impact to humans, as well. Cincinnati certainly has enough motor vehicle traffic that on very hot, humid summer days, we end up with air quality problems due to CO₂ emissions from motor vehicles combining with the atmospheric conditions. Trees breathe in that CO₂ which is harmful to us, and convert it into oxygen which is life - giving to us. I can't imagine why we would seriously consider compromising this rare treasure of 90 acres of forestland in the middle of our city.

If you agree with me, please make your voice heard by signing the petition here: https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/preserve-burnet-woods?source=facebook& 

[All photos in this blog entry were taken in Burnet Woods by Brian Dotson on May 27th, 2018. All rights are reserved.]

1 https://sites.google.com/site/ucwalks/points-of-interest/burnett-woods
2 https://www.audubon.org/important-bird-areas/burnet-woods
3 http://wvxu.org/post/cincinnati-park-board-discusses-future-burnet-woods#stream/0
4 http://wvxu.org/post/living-building-and-arts-center-burnet-woods#stream/0