Well, a lot. This summer, Canyon Crew includes five full time students, as well as our Wise and Glorious Leader, Zac Perry, and we still don’t have enough manpower to do everything that we want to do in the Canyon. Here’s a snapshot of what we do on a day-to-day basis:
Most of the time, we’re… well, weeding. The Canyon is full of invasive species that migrate from people’s yards and gardens, and if we didn’t cut them back, the Canyon wouldn’t be much more than mounds of English ivy, deadly nightshade, garlic mustard, clematis, reed canary grass and morning glory – probably not what you want to look at while taking a leisurely walk, and certainly not what qualifies as a healthy, balanced ecosystem. Through the efforts of past generations of Canyon Crew, there are far fewer of these invasives in the Canyon today than a decade or two ago. For perspective, English ivy at Olde Reed grew large enough to climb on:
(Don’t do this at home, kids. English Ivy, for all its ability to take down the biggest of trees and conquer whole hillsides, is still a remarkably brittle plant.)
Things are a bit better now, but most weeding is still pretty tedious. Teasing morning glory out from around, under, in and on top of native plants can be a remarkably time consuming process, especially since you want to avoid damaging the plants that the morning glory clings to so tightly:
Himalayan blackberry is one of the more belligerent species we attend to – not just for its large thorns that can cut right through leather gloves, but also the large, difficult-to-remove root systems. Showing off a recent kill:
Garlic mustard is another obnoxious plant to remove, especially since we have to carefully, physically remove it from the Canyon as it can and will reseed everywhere if we don’t. (Most plants we can simply drape from trees until they dry out and die, and then we spread them on the ground again to rot so that mor desirable plants can utilize their nutrients.) Garlic mustard also has the nasty side effect of killing off other surrounding plants via toxins in its root system, so it’s always a high priority for removal when we find it. Though, it also makes for a tasty salad or pesto, as the name might imply, so it’s not all bad.
Clearing out the fish ladder from debris is another important daily task – especially when we have beavers trying to make Reed Lake larger and more lake-like:
Canyon Crew attends to other things as well. With the new performing arts center being built, a lot of ground is going to be torn up – including swales full of mature native plants. Canyon Crew went through the swales and pulled out many native plants to replant in the Canyon, including lupines, native irises, sedges and native roses. It’s hard not to like a job that entails driving around a truck full of flowers!
We grow our own plants as well, of course. We harvest seeds from lupine, rushes, grasses and other plants in the Canyon and germinate them in our very own greenhouse to plant during events such as Canyon Day. Baby plants can be remarkably adorable:
We get some pretty interesting trash in the Canyon, too – and sometimes, said trash requires some pretty creative methods of removal. Grappling hooks, for instance:
The tasks of Canyon Crew changes from day to day, week to week, season to season, year to year as the Canyon changes and grows. If you see us at work and don’t know or understand what we’re doing, feel free to ask – it’s your Canyon too!
