Even though Head of School Jessica Bagby sent out an email informing members of the ECFS community about the impending construction of a fence, among other security related notices, many were surprised when they arrived at school and saw a large black fence surrounding the property.
“The day I learned about the fence was the day I looked up and saw it physically there. I was sitting at my office working and I saw the fence go up,” said Science Teacher Palma Repole. “I ran upstairs to Howie Waldman and I told him where the fence was. He said he heard about it but he thought it was down near the street.”
Unlike other members of the community, when Waldman and Repole stepped outside and looked at the fence, they were thinking of the little patch of land near the security booth in between the high school and middle school that the fence cut right through.
“When I first came to Fieldston the school really used the campus for education. We were outside all the time, studying trees and birds. It became harder and harder to do that as construction built around the school,” said Repole. “Every time we turned around, there was less and less biodiversity on campus. This little spot was really the last natural patch we had for observation.”
Repole and Waldman took many classes, including ecology and Freshman biology, to observe the rotting logs and organisms, including Red-backed Salamanders, woodpeckers and beetles, that naturally exist in the area. “We had asked facilities over the years to not plant anything here. To let the leaf litter decompose, to leave the logs rotting so that we had something to look at. So that’s it, this was the last spot,” said Repole. “It’s slim pickings because about five classes have to use this tiny patch.”
Even though the fence cuts through the land, most of the organisms will survive. “The issue is, how do I maneuver 20 freshmen around a fence?” Repole said. “So people will be basically standing on top of each other and on top of the materials and organisms that they’re trying to observe.”
The natural biodiversity on campus has been affected by renovations before. The newly paved driveway demolished naturally growing flowers in the area. “The last remaining patch of Trout Lilies, a beautiful, native wildflower, was largely destroyed. I don’t know if there is any remaining rootstock to bring the patch back,” said Waldman.
After he was made aware of the inadvertent effect of the new paving on the driveway, Teddy O’Rourke, Manager of Operations, reached out to Waldman in an effort to avoid disrupting biodiversity on campus in future renovations. “After I explained what had happened, Ted O’Rourke asked me to make a wildlife or nature map of campus so that future projects can be planned to minimize future impacts. It’s been a bit cold for me to finish it, but I hope to have the map for Mr. O’Rourke soon,” said Waldman. “I hope we will be able to prevent significant habitat destruction going forward, and protect our nonhuman natives from local extinction.”
The fence will certainly disrupt observation for science classes who studied the biodiversity outside Repole’s office, but hopefully biodiversity will be preserved during campus renovations in the future.
