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| Helen Roth with her electric chainsaw used to remove brush and trees to restore her upland pine habitat. |
The Florida Land Steward Partnership is very enthusiastic and pleased to honor Ms. Helen Roth, the Florida Land Steward Landowner of 2015. Helen and her property were featured in the Fall/Winter issue of the Florida Land Steward Newsletter. The following is a recap with some additional photos from her Forest Stewardship tour in April 2015. Spring Canyon LLC is a 100-acre
Gadsden County property owned and managed by Helen, her husband Tom, and many energized and passionate friends and volunteers who share her passion for the land and its unique vegetation and wildlife. This beautiful property is home to
steephead ravines and longleaf pine-wire grass sandhills.
Helen has traced the history of the property
through property records and aerial photographs back to 1926 near the end of
the turpentine era. In 1960, the land was donated to the First Baptist Church
of Greensboro. The church put in a dam
on Crooked Creek to create a small lake in the center of the property. Fire was
excluded from the uplands during their ownership.
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| Shortly after a prescribed fire, following brush and tree removal. |
Helen’s brother, Mark Bane, bought the
property in 1993 and began working with the Forest Stewardship Program in 1994.
He harvested the hardwoods from two of the three upland areas and applied
prescribed fire to one of the areas before he passed away in 2005 and the
property passed to Mark and Helen’s father. In 2008, Helen and Tom purchased
the land from her father and entered Forest Stewardship Program. At that time,
the one upland area that had been cleared and burned was in good shape so
became Helen’s reference area for what the rest of the uplands should look
like. In the areas that that had been cleared but not burned, natural
regeneration of longleaf pine had occurred, but the encroaching hardwoods were head
high. Helen was able to get a contractor to come in and conduct a prescribed burn
in 2011. She quickly learned that the fire helped control small hardwood saplings
that were invading the uplands, but it did not control the larger hardwoods
enough to open up the habitat.
Helen’s goal for the property is to restore and maintain the
longleaf pine-wiregrass uplands that will ultimately maintain healthy steephead
ravines and provide good wildlife habitat.
In 2012, Helen entered the Working Lands for Wildlife Program operated
by the Natural Resources Conservation Service.
The Working Lands for Wildlife Program is focused on creating and restoring
habitat for gopher tortoises. Helen was
awarded a contract for 26.5 acres of brush management and prescribed
burning. The upland sandhills were
divided into 3 treatment areas and work on clearing brush and trees up to 6
inches in diameter began in the summer of 2013.
Using a battery operated chainsaw, she and a volunteer cleared the first
8.5 acres by October of that year. By
January 2014, they had cleared another 14 acres. In March 2014, the first burn on the three
upland areas was conducted and Helen became a certified prescribed burn manager. The final 4 acres of brush management was
finished in August 2014.
Since the completion of the brush management, there has been
a noticeable increase in the number of gopher tortoises and fox squirrels using
the property. New burrows are appearing
and inactive burrows are being re-activated.
The endangered Gholson’s Gayfeather (Liatris
gholsonii) is one of many wildflowers exploding across the now open
sandhill habitat, and the wiregrass has begun to recover after years of excessive
shade and fire exclusion. To say the
transformation has been spectacular is an understatement. One has to see the property to believe the
change.
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| Helen Roth sharing experiences and information with fellow landowners at her April 2015 Forest Stewardship Tour. |
Helen loves to use the property to educate other landowners
and those interested in Florida’s natural areas. Over the years she has led tours for the
Florida Forest Stewardship Program, Florida Native Plant Society and the North American Butterfly Association and the Florida Trails Association.
She has been visited by a number of university professors and
researchers who have come to study the plants, wildlife, and ravines on her
property. Much of what she has learned
about the plants on the property she learned from members of the Florida Native
Plant Society. She labels plants as
people identify them so she is able to observe them throughout the
seasons. This is a great way to learn
how to identify plants whether in flower or not. Her philosophy has been that you need to
learn the plants on your property so you know which ones are most vulnerable and
need protection, and which ones are invasive and need to be removed to protect
the native habitat. She encourages other
landowners to get involved with their local native plant society chapter and
begin learning the plants on their property.
The more you learn, the more you will enjoy your property.
Helen's passion and hard work to restore her Spring Canyon property is an inspiration to all of us. Hats off to Helen, the 2015 Florida Land Steward Landowner of 2015!
