From the tiny blue-fronted dancer damselfly (Argia apicalis) perched on a twig to a fledged, first-year bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) returning to its parent-less Haul Road nest, 25 people from Good Shepherd Catholic Church’s Care for Creation group enjoyed many of nature’s delights on a June 15, 2024, walk led by three FODMers and National Park Service ranger, Daniel Brier.
On April 11 and May 15, 2024, FODM volunteers collected sediment samples from the bed of the unnamed stream that flows through Mount Vernon Park, Westgrove Dog Park, River Towers Condominium properties and into Dyke Marsh. FODM started monitoring this stream in 2016 in partnership with the Northern Virginia Soil and Water Conservation District (NVSWCD).
On May 19, 2024, National Park Service George Washington Memorial Parkway staff opened the rebuilt, 1,070-foot-long bridge 23 in Dyke Marsh, east of Tulane Drive.
In 2022, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) proposed to build a six- to seven-foot-high wall with removable “aluminum stop-log closures” at the street intersections just west of the George Washington Memorial Parkway.
Turtles are slow, unseen by people most of the year and often trivialized in cartoons, but “turtles provoke a sense of wonder and amazement,” said Dr. Matt Close who gave a Zoom presentation to 67 enthusiasts on May 15, 2024.
On April 22, 2024, ten dedicated volunteers and two National Park Service staffers planted 150 native black willow tree (Sali nigra) stakes in the hydric soils of Dyke Marsh.
On April 17, 2024, FODM volunteers and National Park Service (NPS) staffers surveyed the 18 pumpkin ash trees (Fraxinus profunda) that we have been protecting in Dyke Marsh since 2015.
On April 4, 2024, FODM principal investigator Larry Cartwright shared FODM volunteers’ 30 years of observations of breeding bird activity in the Dyke Marsh Wildlife Preserve at the National Park Service’s 2024 Spotlight on National Park Resources in the National Capital Region.
Trees are intriguing in all seasons, FODMers learned on a March 10, 2024, walk led by retired state forester Jim McGlone.
Northern Virginia’s tidal, freshwater wetlands, like Dyke Marsh, have several types of native plant communities, 50 FODMers and friends learned on March 3, 2024, in a presentation by Nelson DeBarros.
The late Dr. Edmund O. Wilson wrote that “the diversity of life forms, so numerous that we have yet to identify most of them, is the greatest wonder of this planet.”
A 2023 FODM-funded study of three beetle families of George Washington Memorial Parkway (GWMP) properties is a testament to the pursuit of that wonder.
Over 400 people were captivated by beautiful raptors on November 4, 2023, when the Friends of Dyke Marsh and the National Park Service hosted Secret Gardens Birds and Bees at Fort Hunt Park’s Pavilion A.
