V o lu me T h i rt y T wo , N umber 3
March 2018 MARCH CAME ROARING IN on schedule and on script for once this year with a nor’easter that brought down trees and power lines and left behind unexpected inches of heavy, wet snow. Richard Stephens, out with his camera early in the morning after the storm had passed, captured this typical scene on North Ithan Avenue. Within Beaumont, Grounds Director Mark Hritz and his crew manned snowplows and blowers to keep streets, sidewalks and driveways clear. As the snow melted away over the next few days, revealing again the first green shoots and early blossoms of spring, one could imagine them thinking, “OK, that was the lion, now please bring on the lamb!”
Underground ‘slow-draining puddles’ are planned to help control rainwater flow
Attention Gardeners: a passionate legacy has begun to bloom
By Irene Borgogno for the Green Committee
By Joe Peduzzi, President & CEO
Pond Lane residents are accustomed, during rainstorms, to the sight of ankle-deep water rushing down the lane toward the Pond and presumably from there out to sea. Less obvious have been Beaumont’s step-by-step efforts to capture this water and direct it into the ground, where it can serve useful purposes and even, perhaps, eventually, spare the shoes of pedestrians crossing Pond Lane in the rain. A continuing effort to establish rain gardens (see November 2017 BN) is one such step; installation of some modest but high-performing holes in the ground is another such step now being planned. Sometime this spring, the first two “groundwater recharge systems” will be installed, one near the Health Center garden and another off Middle Road near the A-1 entrance to the Austin garage. Other sites will be identified as the year progresses. What is groundwater recharge? It is the movement
The first educational presentation to be made possible by the John Gregg Memorial Fund will take place March 22 at 4:30 p.m. in the Beaumont Room, open to all residents and the Grounds staff. “Berries, Bark and Buds—Plants for Four Seasons of Interest” will be presented by Kathleen V. Salisbury, director of the Ambler Arboretum at Temple University and adjunct instructor at the Temple Department of Landscape Architecture and Horticulture. More than 90 contributions, totaling more than $15,000, have been received to date since the John Gregg Memorial Fund was established within the Beaumont Fund. The donors have been family members and friends who wanted to honor John Gregg’s memory in general and in particular his love of gardening and his “Courtyard Garden,” about which he was passionate.
PUDDLES continued on page 7
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