Those present: Claude Eans, Steve Thrasher, Vince Perrotta, Heather Montgomery, Ginny Brace, Jim Arnold, Keith Schoonover, Tom Anderson, Mike Kay

1. Call to order: Mike called the meeting to order as Keith was running a bit late. Keith later made it official by calling the meeting to order.

2. Treasurer’s Report: Tom advised that the June interest had not been posted yet. Tom mentioned that he wrote a check to pay for room rental at Linganore High for the Neighborhood Green program last month. Heather and Tom will figure out the remaining income and expenses associated with the program and will report back at the next meeting. (It seems like all the members have motorcycles now. Perhaps we should form a club and get matching leather jackets? How about tats or skull rings?)

3. Logging Site Exams: No plans were submitted in advance of the meeting but Mike anticipates having a plan submitted for the pine thinning at Stronghold’s Cook Farm on Sugarloaf Mountain Road.

4. Neighborhood Green: Heather reports that we are in the process of conducting 60 site visits and a number of potential projects have been identified. Heather accompanied Larry and Melissa on a landowner meeting which involved the planting of a significant buffer while her meeting with Mike had to do mostly with water runoff issues. Mike has inquired whether the Healthy Forests/Healthy Water initiative can partner with Neighborhood Green to fund projects that lie outside the Linganore Watershed (where there is presently no funding available) and is awaiting a response. Heather mentioned that Neighborhood Green may be expanded to act as an umbrella program for other restoration programs in the county and mentioned that the $.01 per property storm water runoff surcharge for Frederick County residents is being earmarked for funding these projects.

5. Boy Scout Program: Claude reviewed his discussions with his Scouting contacts, the agenda he created, and the proposed tree identification list with members and there was much discussion on all these points. Claude also mentioned that his contacts mentioned that they are going to try like mad to get 100 Scouts lined up even if it means opening the program to participants outside Frederick County. Following the discussions the following decisions were made:

   • Heather will create a tree id guide for the course and we will provide copies to specific groups to review before the training.

   • We should ask the Scouts to form a specific number of groups i.e. (10) which we would plan for. That way we can produce say 10 guides for the entire group vs. 100 for each student.

   • We all thought Claude’s guide was excellent and we can utilize it for the program. Mike and Hailu will do the Duties of the Forester and Watershed Management sections. Keith and Steve will do the wood section. And we will determine who will be doing the Tree Identification and Ecology sections.

   • Heather has a canned program for Forest Ecology which she will forward to our group.

   • We will conduct a Dry Run of the program at the Walkersville Watershed on Monday, July 29 at 6:30 pm. Please meet at the Church parking lot on the Corner of Daysville Road and Chestnut Grove Road. Please review Claude’s course outline beforehand.

6. Nature Notes: Ginny mentioned that we are just able to keep our heads above water with Nature Notes articles so we brainstormed some ideas for articles, including: glow worms, lightning bugs, London plane trees, what makes different size holes in the ground, mile a minute, and June bugs. Please send Ginny other ideas as they occur to you. Obtaining the idea for a column is one of the more difficult aspects of writing these columns.

7. Big Tree Program: John Bennett asked Tyson to see if we could come up with photos and credits of the Big Trees that were measured over the last couple of years. Tyson got back to Mike afterwards to advise that there are many of these photos on the website already and it might be as easy as contacting Lynne or Michelle to see if they can determine who took the photos.

8. Web Site: Tyson is keeping things up to date and yes there are photos of these big trees already on the site.

9. Other Business: Mike wanted to advise members that Regional Forester Bob Webster retired from the Forest Service at the end of June; and, Central Regional Forester Wayne Merkel is acting as the intern Regional Forester until a permanent replacement is found.

It is reassuring that there are some constants in life…paying taxes, sun setting in west, Mikey heading to Canada in August, etc.. With that in mind it is once again time to take our summer siesta, extended break, holiday, missed month, all star break, and skip the August meeting. You’ve heard of the Baker’s Dozen well this is the Forestry Board Dozen (11 meetings). As such there will be no regular meeting in August.