Thurston Nature Center Committee

              May 21, 1996 meeting minutes, 7:00 PM

Attendees: Bill Ackerman, Jim Breck, Elsa Stuber, Diana Dyer, Tim Markel, Mel Larsen

1. The final meeting of the school year will be June 11 (7:00p.m. at the Thurston School library).
2. Regarding the Masters Projects in UM SNRE: Some of the students plan to do some data gathering this summer. The majority of the work will be done during the fall of 1996.
   • The Masters students can be reached at 763-4231 or thurnatctr@umich.edu
3. The purple martins and many other birds are now in the nature center. Spring peepers, chorus frogs and toads have been heard calling from the TNC.
4. The turtle talk by Jim Harding of MSU went well on April 25, 1996. There were approximately 72 people in the audience. Expenses were $50 honorarium and $25 travel expenses ($0.25 per mile). Jim said he would be willing to come back again to talk about snakes or amphibians.
5. The Thurston Nature Center is on the Thurston School World Wide Web home page, http://www.nceet.snre.umich.edu/Thurston.html. Jim Breck has added the information from Mike Conboy's updated TNC brochure. The website also includes meeting minutes.
6. The prairie burn was successful on May 5, 1996 thanks to the many people who helped organize and carry out the burn. Approximately 25 people showed up for the burn.
   • One neighbor asked if there might be a native flowering tree which could be planted in the prairie and still be compatible.
   • On May 6, 1996, Mike Conboy cut the brush, including autumn olive, that did not burn on the prairie lot. Mike and his wife also put up a holder for the brochures they had printed. The school has extra copies of the brochure, and Elsa Stuber has extras to place in the holder during the summer.
7. The spring work day on May 4, 1996 went well with much help from parents, students, teachers and neighbors.
8. Beth Caldwell led wildflower walks on April 20 and May 4. Unfortunately, the spring flowers were quite delayed this year.
9. The Clague School science classes of Dick Pierce and Dave Szczygiel cut buckthorn that had been labelled by Mike Conboy. The classes have been visiting the TNC and temporarily brought some animals to the school for observation. They had a garter snake, a couple of turtles and four toads (which laid eggs in class). The class will be using a boat on the pond to take samples.
10. There was a comment that to control spreading plants and vines, it is sometimes possible to cut the plant and then coat just the cut tips with weed killer. This decreases the growth by about 75%.
11. Next year: Jim Breck will be the committee chair again; Tim Markel will be the vice chair and treasurer (Tim will brief the PTO on this years spending and projections for next school year); Mel Larsen will coordinate special projects; Bill Ackerman will be the secretary; Elsa Stuber will be the newsletter coordinator (newsletter is being planned as part of the local homeowner association newsletters).

Respectfully submitted,

Bill Ackerman