Skidmore offers North Woods tours

Part of community day for trail maintenance

Skidmore College will offer two educational tours of its North Woods on Saturday, September 13. Open to the public, the 90-minute tours will depart from Falstaff's pavilion, located at the north edge of the Skidmore campus, at 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. In the case of heavy rain, the tours will take place the following day.

Also scheduled for the weekend is a program of trail maintenance and repair, designed to improve conditions for hiking and to prevent erosion. The work will be done by community volunteers rallied by local resident Ken Ivins, the commissioner of finance for Saratoga Springs, in collaboration with students and faculty from the Sustainable Skidmore program and the college's Environmental Studies Program and Biology Department.

The trail workers will build stairs in steep areas, create channels for water runoff, place stepping stones where trails intersect streams and pools, and other tasks. They will also pick up trash and assist with a general clean-up of the woods.

Lumber and other materials for the projects have been donated by Allerdice Building Supply.

"Anyone who has walked in the North Woods knows that this area is a wonderful resource for the community," said Ivins. "I'm pleased that we have local volunteers willing to help preserve this special place."

Skidmore's North Woods, a 250-acre tract extending north from the main campus, is home to numerous native species, including migrating songbirds and 33 types of ferns. With southern oak, hickory, and northern hardwoods as well as ponds and marshes, the woods support a biologically diverse animal and plant population that is important to faculty and student research. Much of the area is available for public use.

"As open green spaces disappear and as our climate warms, it becomes increasingly important to conserve our community's North Woods and the opportunities presented there to be with nature, our senses fully open, listening and appreciating," Said Sue Van Hook, senior teaching associate in biology at Skidmore. Van Hook, editor of an illustrated field guide titled Treasures in the North Woods, will lead Saturday's morning tour.

Said Kim Marsella, Environmental Studies Program coordinator at Skidmore, "The geographical make-up of the North Woods provides a significant amount of buffering capacity against acid rainfall for the Loughberry Lake reservoir, the drinking water supply for Saratoga Springs." Marsella will lead the North Woods tour on Saturday afternoon.

For further information on the tours and the North Woods, contact Bob Kimmerle, director of community relations at Skidmore College, 518-580-5744, bkimmerl@skidmore.edu.