Tuesday, August 6, 2019

Renovation, restoration bring renewal to Audubon refuge

            The word caratunk in the Algonquin language means “where the rivers meet.” It’s an apt name for Audubon’s very popular wildlife refuge in Seekonk, where Cole Brook intersects with an unnamed stream amid ponds, forests, meadows and wetlands. The Caratunk Wildlife Refuge has experienced a number of improvements in recent years, making it an even more valuable site for environmental education, wildlife watching, or a quiet hike.
            In July, the property was ablaze with wildflowers in the meadow just beyond the parking lot. Asters, milkweed, black-eyed susans and many others fought for space among flowering shrubs and berry-covered vines while a dozen pairs of purple martins were busy raising their families in the gourd houses that serve as the centerpiece of the first field.
House wrens, eastern bluebirds and tree swallows appeared to have come to an agreement to share the numerous traditional birdhouses scattered around the property, but
Hikers traverse Caratunk (Glenn Osmundson)
they weren’t quiet about it. Each twittered and warbled as they staked a claim to one house or another and defended it vigorously while racing about finding food for their growing young. Butterflies and dragonflies made their presence known as well, as did several large bullfrogs at Muskrat Pond – a reliable place to observe river otters – and uncounted noisy catbirds. A green heron flew overhead and landed out of sight in a wet corner of the property.
            Nate Chace has been visiting Caratunk at least a couple times each month for many years to hike and commune with nature. A member of Audubon’s board of directors who has been involved in hiking and trail work his entire adult life, Chace appreciates the easy access to the property from his home in Riverside and the extensive trail network through varied habitat. But he also recognized that the trails could be somewhat confusing, and he occasionally bumped into worried hikers who had been wandering around aimlessly trying to find their way back to their vehicles.
            “The trails were a bit of a mess,” he said. “One day I talked to a guy in the woods who said he liked to forge his own trail, and later that day I saw two women who said they only walk in the field because they get lost when they go in the woods. It was obvious that something had to be done about the trails.”
            Chace wasn’t the only one who recognized the problem.
            “We just had too many trails, many of which cut across sensitive habitat like out in the bog, and sometimes people got turned around and easily confused trying to find their way,” said Scott Ruhren, Audubon’s senior director of conservation.
            “Certain trails became trails not because we planned it that way but because some groups always hiked a particular route, and sometimes side trails were created and it all became confusing,” added Executive Director Larry Taft. “Nate convinced me that we needed a simpler system – a well-marked and very obvious trail system – and he took it upon himself to make it happen.”
            It took him about a year, but with the help of fellow board member and cartographer Terry Meyer, Chace laid out a simple loop trail that begins and ends at the parking lot, then added several side loops that take visitors to notable features of the property, like Muskrat Pond and a hemlock grove.
No new trails were blazed in the process, but several old ones were closed and are being allowed to fill in with native vegetation. A new trail map was produced as well, and several signs were installed at trail intersections indicating “you are here” and providing GPS coordinates.
            “I wanted people to be comfortable walking in the woods. That was my goal,” Chace said. “I wanted people to enjoy a brand new experience and feel good about it, especially those who have never been here before.”
             The Caratunk Wildlife Refuge was voted Audubon’s favorite refuge – by far – in a 2012 survey of Audubon members. Its popularity is due in part to its location close to the metro Providence area, enabling a large segment of the population to only have to travel a short distance to enjoy its trails and programs. The four parcels that make up its approximately 200 acres were acquired between 1969 and 1986, most of it donated by Charles G. Greenhalgh. Even though the property is across the Rhode Island border in Massachusetts, then-Audubon executive director Al Hawkes recognized that its location was ideal, especially since the only other public refuges Audubon owned at the...

Read the rest of the story in the summer 2019 issue of Audubon Report.

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