Natural places, sustainable practices

Natural places, sustainable practices

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Weaverling Spit Ivy Eradication PDF Print E-mail
Projects - Community Support

by Nancy Neyenhouse, Community Grants Committee Chair

I left Seattle as a few clouds covered our almost forgotten blue sky. Once I hit the convergent zone around Everett, it was rain the rest of the way to Anacortes.

beforeivy
Area of Weaverling Spit before English ivy removal
That’s where I met up with Natural Resource Technicians Jennifer Weeks and Todd Woodard, and the Samish Indian Nation’s Natural Resources Director, Christine Woodward. Through grant requests from the Samish Indian Nation, the Mountaineers Foundation has funded two consecutive years of an English ivy removal project on the Weaverling Spit in Fidalgo Bay. This six acre patch of land jutting into the bay was returned to the Samish Indian Nation in the mid 1990s after it had served for decades as a summer cabin venue and even had its own dance hall. 
afterivy
After English ivy removal
As chair of the Community Grants Committee I was intrigued by the 2008 grant request as the project directors designed the removal to be done using labor from the Whatcom Alternative Corrections center. After spending three hours with Jennifer, Todd, and Christine, I learned that the Weaverling Spit Restoration project is one of many projects the Samish Indian Nation is involved with throughout the Fidalgo Bay/Anacortes area.But, back to the ivy…

 

The Mountaineers Foundation’s 2008 and 2009 grants were awarded to support the removal of ivy from the Weaverling Spit, the only remaining unarmored shoreline left in Fidalgo Bay and an important cultural site for the Samish Indian Nation. When the project began, ivy fully covered two acres of the six acre spit with a thick mat, choking out native understory plants and climbing up and threatening 200-year old Douglas Firs. Small cabins built over the years were totally engulfed by the ivy. A hard working corrections crew removed a whopping 27 tons of ivy over 12 work days during those two years.

foxglove
Foxglove returning to the understory
Native plants such as foxglove, miner’s lettuce, ocean spray are making their way back to the spit; eagles, otters (a pair lives under one of the old buildings still left partially standing), and a coyote are part of the new landscape.There are still pockets of heavy ivy infestation that will need to be dealt with. The ivy pull had to be halted as a large midden was found and disturbance of the soil covering the midden will need the Nation’s approval. Ivy re-growth will also need to be attended to over the next few years but this is a project that the Foundation can be extremely proud to have funded.

 

Please visit the Natural Resources tab at samishtribe.nsn.us for more information about this and other successful projects both in progress and completed by the Samish Indian Nation.
 

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