TWO PONDS IS GROWING - JOIN IN YOUR REFUGE ACTIVITIES
Normally you would receive our newsletter only once a year, but with so much happening, so to speak, we want to make sure all of the wonderful people who love and support this unique project will be in the know about the momentous happenings this year. Read on!
Annual Meeting, March 10
First, we want to express our thanks to the many of you who were able to attend the Annual Meeting of the Two Ponds Preservation Foundation in March at the Standley Lake Library. Two special items were on the agenda. One was the display of the absolutely marvelous painting done of and for Two Ponds by Byron Wight, a US Fish and Wildlife Service volunteer. This beautiful painting of the wonders of nature seen at the Refuge will be used to beautify, instruct, and inspire. For now, Ranger Dave Jamiel will see that the painting is fabricated and put into a special wayside display for visitors to Two Ponds. If you did not see it at the meeting, you can look forward to seeing it in the future.
The second special agenda item, and the major event of the evening was a slide presentation by Sigrid Ueblacker of the Birds of Prey Foundation. She showed slides of the work she has done saving wounded raptors from across the country for the past 30 plus years. Her many years have earned her the recognition and funding to have a huge special caging built on Boulder Open Space land. This enables her to house all the birds in one place. Several thousand wounded birds have been healed and returned to the wild following her care. The few the she cannot release become educators for the many audiences Sigrid addresses.
Arvada Pride Day, May 15
By the time you get this newsletter, approximately a dozen volunteers will have spent a busy morning doing extra cleanup jobs and maintenance projects for our Ranger, Dave Jamiel. The City of Arvada will make sure the trash is picked up, and will have served a wonderful barbecue and given away many door prizes donated by local people and businesses. If you have not had the chance to work with Dave, it is worth the experience getting to know this dedicated leader of our. Also, you get a special time to be in the Refuge when there are not many people around, but lots of animal life is at hand for you to appreciate. It's something we do every year about this time.
Here's June's Big Event - Mark Your Calendars Now for June 5!
June 5 will be a special dedication for the opening of the 20 additional acres that were recently acquired from the Lutheran Medical Foundation. The celebration will be a time to reflect and enjoy this new land, making our Refuge bigger on a permanent basis and adding to our important wetlands conservation and education movement. As part of the day's events there will also be a three-mile walk to the Majestic View Park to celebrate National Trails Day. There will be several informative displays and representatives from North Jeffco Parks and Recreation, the EPA, the Colorado Division of Wildlife, the City of Arvada, the Colorado Wildlife Federation, and GOCO (Great Outdoors Colorado). Many people have been instrumental in acquiring this wonderful place for all of us to enjoy and learn about the environment.
The hours will be from 10 to 2 on Saturday, and many volunteers will be needed for water stations, showing people to the Refuge from the parking lot at 80th and Kipling, etc. Call Dave now at (303)289-0471 to be a part of this big day. If you can't volunteer, come and celebrate with us.
REFUGE ETIQUETTE
It comes to our attention that some people have engaged in activities in the Refuge which are counter to our education and conservation goals. Those include: setting off rockets, letting dogs run free, and even training dogs to hunt, all of which disturb the wildlife.
Please do not approach strangers, but try to spread our message to others you know and gently give them our message about not disturbing the wildlife. Two Ponds is a refuge for wildlife, and not a park.
AND NOW FOR THE REALLY BIG NEWS
It has been a goal to have a parking lot within the north boundary of the Refuge. For the safety of our growing numbers of visitors, especially school children in the WIN-WIN (Wonders in Nature, Wonders in Neighborhoods) program - over eight hundred last year - we need to be able to unload them closer to the main gate. Now plans are underway to have a parking lot installed, tentatively scheduled for completion by the fall of 2000. (Have any of the rest of you noticed how hot that walk from 80th and Kipling can be in the summer months?)
OTHER TIDBITS - A college student is considering doing a wildlife study on the Refuge grounds
By the way, do you know that Dave now has 80 per cent of his time dedicated to Two Ponds and only 20 per cent to the Rocky Mountain Arsenal? That was reversed when Dave first came, but his diligence and ever expanding sphere of influence in our projects have earned him more and more time with Two Ponds. You can see the results in the many projects he has completed and been the inspiring force behind. When you see him, please give him your thanks for what he does for the Refuge.
Two Board members, Ranya Kelly and Janet Torma-Krajewski, are now studying plans to make permanent markers for our donors over the years...
Finally, the smile of the month from Ranger Dave:
We have been able to obtain some materials from the old Ridge Home grounds. This effort was engineered by Board Member Ranya Kelly and her Redistribution Center. Among the recycled materials is a small permanent canopy that has been installed near the main gate and kiosk. In the weeks of very wet weather, Dave noticed the first goslings being raised this year, and where were they standing on a rainy, gray day of April with their proud mother? Yes, under the new canopy! Dave hopes that the picture he took will be a good one.
Other pictures of Two Ponds can now be found on the following EPA web site: http://www.epa.gov/region08/cross/wetland/wetlands.html