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Restoration of North Star’s fen shows promise
The fen at North Star Nature Preserve in 2022.
In the 1950s, a rare old-growth wetland near Aspen began slowly dying. Thousands of years in the making, the “fen,” as such wetlands are known, was succumbing to the forces of humankind – namely, an intentional effort to drain it for agricultural purposes. Two years ago, Pitkin County Open Space and Trails stepped in to alter its fate.
OST ag specialist extends his services to county residents
Drew Walters collects soil samples for lab analysis.
Something’s eating your asparagus, and it isn’t you. Invisible forces are destroying an elderberry bush, while everything around it flourishes. Half of an evenly irrigated pasture is dotted with desiccated grass. The other half is fine. What’s going on?
A tiny squirrel helps shape the forest
A pine squirrel on alert. OST photo
Fresh snow muffles my footsteps on the less-traveled paths of Smuggler Mountain Open Space. It’s a place of quiet winter reverie. That is, until the silence is shattered by a burst of staccato chatter that could, as they say, wake the dead.
