Back to the Red Stick

Today is my last day at Crosby. I just received a phone call from "The Picayune Item" who will be doing an article in Sundays paper on the gum pond. Between Moss Point and Picayune I am becoming a regular small town celebrity... watch out Denham Springs here I come. Looking back at the past four months it has been a wonderful experience. I've met great people in and out of work. I sold my boat "The Bass-Turd" to my buddy Jon and we went cruising on the Pearl River Wednesday for my last ride in the turd. He is now updating the name to "The Dirty Old Bass-Turd". The arboretum will always be a special place for me. I will leave you with a picture of a young longleaf pine and see you in a couple of months.

Presentation on the Pavilion

The twin states landscape architecture conference (MS & AL) ended its ceremony with a tour of the arboretum. We also put our final boards for the gumpond project on display. We presented it to some of the board members and anyone else who was interested. We are going to submit the project for the ASLA student awards and the Wayne Grace student design award (CLARB).

On a different note. Sara's wedding was absolutely amazing. I was pretty tired during the presentations yesterday because of it, but am so glad that I made it.

Bob's intro to the project













Master plans













bride and groom in in the barn

Crayfish

I helped some researchers from the US Forest Service collect "crayfish" for a genetic study. They were wondering if we had them on site near the pitcher plant bog because that is where the species in question resides. I told them that I had plenty of mud chimneys where I have been working so they came over and set some traps. I was a bit suspicious of the traps and sure enough, they did not yield one crawfish. They came back in the morning and I soon realized why they would rather catch them in the traps! We dug them out of their holes by hand. We collected within the woods where I am working then I took them out to a bog site the arboretum owns about 10 miles away and collected a few more. It was really nice to take a break from the pond and get my hands dirty in some biological research. Quite different from Mr. Tietje's collection methods!

Charrette in Starkville

This past weekend I made a trip up to Starkville, MS where we conducted a charrette detailing the design of the gum pond in attempt to make it more site specific. It was a really great trip.

The weather was perfect so I took my time getting there. I stopped at the Southern Miss campus which was very nice and then ate lunch at the Chicken Basket in Meridian (great plate lunch). When I made it to Starkville I explored campus on my own for awhile. It is nice but is very sprawled with tons of lawn to be maintained. Sasaki has recently been hired on in master planning efforts. I then made it to the Landscape Architecture buildings. They are actually in the School of Agriculture whereas we are in the School of Art and Design. I met some of their students and we compared schools for awhile. Studio spaces were similar except they share spaces between grade levels. I then met up with Sadik Artunc the LA Director whom I would be staying with. He gave me a guided tour of the campus then we met up with all of his professors at a local beer joint. After a couple of rounds Sadik, Bob (professor I am working closely with), and I headed out to grab dinner. The dinner was a really amazing experience as we discussed business and sorts. I was sitting among two very wise LA's. The charrette Saturday went well so we are closer, but have still not reached a final resolution of plans for the pond.

1 of very many stacks of vegetation









I built this fence, which is at the entrance of the children's garden with repurposed pines



Charrette workspace complete with breakfast and lunch

...Timbeeeer

Ironically enough, I have been timbering a pine forest for an ecologically based project! The common goal for the master plan of the arboretum is to represent the different ecologies and plant communities of the Pearl River drainage basin. A few of the areas/exhibits already on site include the longleaf pine savanna, magnolia-beech upland, pitcher plant bog, and cypress hammock. I am developing the new exhibit which will be the gum pond. Once completed, the area will support a plant community that strives in semi-annual flooding events, which include dominant species of swamp tupelo and water tupelo. I have been hand clearing the slash pine, wax myrtle, and big-leaf galberry within the proposed area so that we can better analyze what is happening with the existing swamp tupelos.

Whereabouts

Hey who is located in New Zealand? ... and also, don't forget about Kurt Lowe. He is doing the Colorado thing.

Burn Baby Burn (this is for John)

Today we began the prescribed burnings on site. They are a maintenance routine done about every other year to recreate a longleaf pine savannah fire that would occur naturally by lightening. I was supposed to be working on the pond... but I couldn't pass that up the opportuninty, so I found some time to help out with the fire!

Pin Location Complete

I've completed finding the pins around the proposed gum pond (600' x 600' area). Next I will be working on a tree clearing plan trying to decide what factors on site might change the design of the trails and pond shape. Bob Brzuszek (MSU LA Professor) and a graduate student class are coming down to the arboretum next weekend to do some site analysis and inventory work as we will eventually be doing a design charette.