The Silver Maple Forest (Belmont Uplands)

1
The Silver Maple Forest (Belmont Uplands) The
Impact of Development

• Charles J. Katuska, MFS,PWS
• Consulting Ecologist
• The aesthetic, wildlife, watershed protection,
  and wood production values of these (suburban)
  woods will increase in every future decade -
  Lloyd Irland

2
What Is It ?

• The Belmont Silver Maple forest is a mixed
  association of various wetland and upland plant
  communities on about 15 acres.
• Silver maple (Acer saccharinum) dominates the
  central core of the site.
• Unusual, relict forest community in this context

3
The Belmont Silver Maple Forest
ARLINGTON
Route 2
Little Pond
Acer saccharinum
BELMONT
CAMBRIDGE
Little River
4
Silver Maple (Acer saccharinum)

• A native floodplain tree species with specific
  autecological values -
• Provides an important wildlife food resource
  (newly broken buds) at a critical time of the
  late winter
• High value food source for beaver, second
  only to alders
• High value for cavity-nesting wildlife
• Shallow fibrous root system well adapted to
  reducing erosion and stabilizing soils

5
This well-grown, diverse, and regionally uncommon
forest stand exists in a unique context
6
Locally Unique Forest Context (USGS GAP Analysis
for Biodiversity)
Menotomy Rocks Park
ARLINGTON
Spy Pond
BELMONT UPLANDS
LITTLE POND
Cambridgepark
City Infirmary
BELMONT
CAMBRIDGE
Fresh Pond
7
The Belmont Silver Maple Forest

• Forested land always provides value to the urban
  environment
• Maintains and improves
  air quality
• Maintains and improves water quality
• Reduces volumes of stormwater runoff
• Provides important wildlife habitat
• Recreation
• Aesthetics
• Educational Value

8
The Belmont Silver Maple Forest

• Provides additional site-specific functions and
  values here -
• Serves as an important core habitat
  adjacent to Little Pond and the Alewife
  Reservation
• Size and Shape
• Land Cover Type
• Relative Seclusion in Context
• Provides a significant reserve within a
  network of other habitat patches for the
  continued preservation of area-sensitive species

9
Now, the Belmont Silver maple Forest is the site
of a substantial development proposal -
10
How would the Development (commercial or
residential) of the Silver Maple Stand affect
Forest values ?

• Add pollutants and additional stormwater volume
  to an already stressed receiving water system
• Directly eliminate core wildlife habitat and
  reduce the quality of remaining habitats
• Reduce air quality in the immediate area and
  contribute to local/regional air quality problems
• Eliminate the opportunity for recreation in the
  development area itself and reduce the quality of
  the recreation experience in undeveloped portions
  of he site
• Eliminate the locally unique and regionally
  significant floodplain forest aesthetic experience

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Final Considerations

• The environmental values of the Belmont Silver
  Maple Stand are not solely related to wildlife
  habitat or the protection of its surrounding
  wetlands.
• The development of the Belmont Silver Maple Stand
  will substantially eliminate its forest values
  and will degrade the forest forested wetland
  values of the remaining land and the adjacent
  public open space.
• Potentially significant forest values do not flow
  to the community under current private ownership.