April 2025 Bioblitz

Join the 2025 NPSNJ BioBlitz: Celebrate Native Plant Month in New Jersey!

This April, the Native Plant Society of New Jersey (NPSNJ) invites you to participate in our annual BioBlitz. Together, we’ll document the diverse plant life across the state.

What is a BioBlitz?

A BioBlitz is a collaborative effort to record as many species as possible within a specific area and time frame. Our focus is on New Jersey’s native and non-native plants throughout April 2025.

How to Participate:

Join iNaturalist:

  • Sign up at iNaturalist.org.
  • Familiarize yourself with the platform by exploring its features.

Join the Project:

  • Search for “Native Plant Month 2025 – NJ” on iNaturalist or go to this link.
  • Join the project to contribute your observations.

Document Plants:

  • Throughout April, photograph plants in your area—parks, backyards, or any natural setting.
  • Upload your observations to iNaturalist and add them to the project.

Why Participate?

Your contributions help scientists and conservationists understand plant distribution and biodiversity in New Jersey. It’s a chance to connect with nature and support conservation efforts.

Friendly Competition

Compete with your family, friends, and other NPSNJ members to see who can get the most observations, and the most observations of unique species.

Resources:

  • iNaturalist Tutorial: Learn how to make observations using the iNaturalist mobile app.
  • What is a BioBlitz?: Discover what a BioBlitz entails and how you can contribute in this video from the Los Angeles Museum of Natural History.

Safety Tips:

  • Be cautious of ticks and other wildlife.
  • If documenting endangered species or private locations, use the “obscure” feature to protect their exact locations.

Chrysler Herbarium Spring 2025 Personal Bioblitz

As NPSNJ members, you are also welcome to join the Spring 2025 Rutgers Personal Bioblitz which runs from March 1 to May 15. Whereas NPSNJ’s April Bioblitz is only for New Jersey, the Rutgers Personal Bioblitz cover the whole world. See here for more information.

Let’s make both BioBlitzs (BioBlitzen?) a success by capturing the rich plant life of New Jersey. Happy observing!

Applications for 2025 Mini-Grants are now available!

2025 NPSNJ Grants

The Native Plant Society of New Jersey welcomes new project proposals for mini-grants for 2025. All applicants must be residents of New Jersey and members of the Society. Non-profit organizations may join as non-profit members or apply through a member sponsor.
The application deadline is 10:00 AM on February 3, 2025. Approved applications will be announced at the NPSNJ Spring Conference on March 1, and all applicants will be notified by March 3.
Mini-Grants

NPSNJ is offering grants of $500 or $750 to local volunteer organizations, schools, individuals, and groups working to create native plant gardens and wildlife habitat in open community gardens and public green spaces; engaging in conservation or restoration; or engaging in education and outreach about the native plants of our state. To submit for consideration you or your non-profit must reside or be based in New Jersey, must be a current member of NPSNJ, and your project must be based in New Jersey.

Fill out this form to apply: NPSNJ 2025 Mini-Grant Application

NPSNJ’s Summer 2024 Newsletter is Available

The Native Plant Society of New Jersey is excited to announce the release of our Summer 2024 newsletter. This edition is packed with informative and inspiring articles, including a message from our President, updates on grant awards, highlights from our Independent Garden Center (IGC) initiatives and more. Read it on our newsletter page.

2024 Minigrants Announced

In May, NPSNJ awarded grants to projects throughout the state that support our mission of promoting the appreciation, protection, and study of New Jersey’s Native Flora. We awarded two Conservation Science Grants of $2,000 each to the Friends of Foote’s Pond Park in Morris County and to the Wild Woods Restoration Project for a project in Bergen County. Also awarded were 21 mini-grants of $500 or $750 each.

The Friends of Foote’s Pond Park will use their grant for their ongoing efforts to restore biodiversity and native habitat to Foote’s Pond Wood in Morris County. The grant will be used for a patch reforestation project that will establish all layers of a future oak-hickory forest. The work in- volves clearing the forest floor of invasives in canopy gaps left by dead ash trees, densely planting native forest layers, and protecting new plantings from deer.

Wild Woods Restoration Project, a nonprofit lo- cated in Salisbury Mills, NY, and active throughout the Hudson Valley region, will use their grant for a new partnership with the Closter Nature Center. The project will restore the woods at the Nature Center while building volunteer capacity to assist managers of public lands with natural resource restoration efforts in the Bergen County area. Ulti- mately, the project will create a corps of volunteers for future restoration projects.

Over 40 individuals and organizations applied for grants in the 2024 cycle. A committee of nine NPSNJ members, representing chapters throughout the state, evaluated the proposals on the basis of awareness (will the project reach a new audience for NPSNJ’s mission?), investment (will the funds be used well?), use of native plants, and sustain- ability (will the project be completed and main- tained?). Final consideration was given to geographic diversity and whether the project was located in an underserved community; a majority of awardees are located in such communities.

— Elaine Silverstein, NPSNJ Vice President of Chapters

A full list of awards follows:

Conservation Science

Friend’s of Foote’s Pond WoodMorris County
Wild Woods Restoration ProjectBergen County
Mini-Grants
Firehouse 6, Chelsea District, Atlantic CityAtlantic
Jared Rosenbaum, RootedWarren
Meditative Gardens of CollingswoodCamden
Riverview neighborhood, Jersey CityHudson
Cape May Science CenterCape May
Tulpehaking Nature CenterMercer
Union Public LibraryUnion
Atlantic Highlands Historical SocietyMonmouth
Somerset County Master Gardener Teaching GardenSomerset
Sunset Lake Neighborhood AssociationSomerset
Potters Park, Spring Lake BoroughMonmouth
Janis E. Dismus Middle School, EnglewoodBergen
Red Dragon Canoe Club, Edgewater parkBurlington
Skylands Unitarian Universalist FellowshipHunterdon
Borough of Rutherford Green TeamBergen
Somerset County Master Gardener Teaching GardenSomerset
Boyd McGuinness Park, Jersey CityHudson
James J. Braddock Park, North BergenHudson
Hammonton Green CommitteeAtlantic
Washington Park, Jersey CityHudson
Brookdale Park ConservancyEssex

Advocacy Alert: Check Your Town’s Tree Removal and Replacement Ordinance

The Advocacy Committee of the Native Plant Society of New Jersey (NPSNJ) has learned of an important issue that has been receiving little public attention.

What’s Happening

New Jersey towns are now required to pass ordinances governing tree removal and replacement per municipal stormwater permits (MS4).

Guidance is being relayed via a model ordinance developed by the DEP, but this guidance doesn’t address the use of natives rather than non-natives, exotics or invasives, nor how to develop a sufficiently broad list of allowed replacement species.

The Context: New DEP Requirements

The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (NJDEP) instituted a new requirement in November 2022 that all NJ municipalities adopt and enforce a community-wide ordinance covering tree removal and replacement, if they didn’t already have an ordinance that met the requirements. This rule is part of NJDEP’s efforts to manage stormwater runoff, particularly in the face of climate change. The tree ordinance is required as part of the permitting process for the discharge of stormwater from municipal storm sewers.

To assist municipalities in this process, the NJDEP issued a model tree replacement/removal ordinance, which is available on the NJDEP website. Unlike some of the other model ordinances, the model tree removal and replacement ordinance developed by the NJDEP is not required to be adopted as is. It was provided as a template that municipalities could use to meet the requirements of the permit. Municipalities can develop their own ordinance or use/update existing tree ordinance to meet the permit requirements.

The essence of these ordinances is that anyone who wants to remove a tree, even from private property, must replace it with a tree of a similar trunk diameter or multiple smaller trees. (The ordinance includes a locally developed list of replacement trees as Appendix A.)

The Unintended Consequences: Ordinances That Limit Tree Species

Each municipality must include this appendix listing trees that are acceptable as replacement trees, or at a minimum listing trees that are not acceptable. Lacking sufficient knowledge about ecology, many municipalities are developing extremely short lists of acceptable trees—often as few as a dozen—that do not allow for broad biodiversity and may even include trees that are not suitable for the ecoregion. In some cases the lists include exotic and invasive species.

The New Jersey Association of Planning & Zoning Administrators (NJAPZA) is providing additional information via a webinar series for planners and others who are assisting in the preparation of these ordinances. In these sessions discussion encourages biodiversity, but also focuses on non-native species often considered better at surviving urban/roadway (street tree) environments.

We thus encourage members of NPSNJ to check their municipalities’ tree removal and replacement ordinances, looking for the following concerns:

  • Narrow lists of approved replacement trees. Is the list of approved replacement trees (which normally appears in an appendix) broad and inclusive enough? Does it represent the diversity of tree species that are native to your area? Does it include species for different conditions within the municipality, such as upland areas, flood zones, swampland, or dunes? Does it include exotic or invasive species that should not be allowed?
  • Considerations to allow removal of invasive species. The model ordinance regulates the removal of all trees. Does your town’s ordinance have any special consideration for removing invasive species of trees? One simple solution is for the ordinance to allow for invasive species to be removed, without restriction.
  • Size considerations for planting tap-rooted replacement trees. The ordinances will require that removed trees be replaced with trees of a similar caliper or by multiple trees of smaller caliper. However, many oaks, and other trees that grow a tap root, will be healthier and grow faster if they are planted when very small. Exceptions should be made to allow for the size of replacement trees to be small when planting tap-rooted trees. Consideration could also be given to providing credit for trees planted during a period of time prior to removal in anticipation of future tree loss.

If your town’s tree removal and replacement ordinance is lacking, we encourage you to contact your local officials to ask them to amend it.

Listed below are resources to help identify appropriate trees for your municipality or ecoregion:

The due date for towns to adopt these ordinances was recently extended to May 1, 2024. Many towns have already completed the process, but ordinances can be amended at any time. And of course, if your town has not yet finalized its ordinance, you can provide input to help them get it right the first time.

Learn more! The New Jersey Association of Planning & Zoning Administrators (NJAPZA) has organized a series of three free webinars on the tree ordinances. The recordings of session one can be found here:

Session One recording (password: Session#1)

Session Two recording (password: Session#2)

Learn about Beech Leaf Disease with Ecologist Jean Epiphan

Jean Epiphan, Agriculture & Natural Resource Agent (Assistant Professor) of Rutgers Cooperative Extension in Morris County spoke to the Somerset County Chapter about Beech Leaf Disease which is ravaging New Jersey’s beech population. This talk covers the ecology of beech, their importance in our state, and what attributes and ecological services are under threat. The basic pathogenesis will be reviewed. Then the talk focuses on steps land managers and homeowners can make to mitigate negative impacts of BLD including treatment options, cultural practices to reduce stress in beech trees, and vital steps to prepare for losses of beech canopy such as mass underplanting of indigenous tree cohorts, and management for their success. 

She is a Licensed Tree Expert LTE#692 and Certified Arborist ISA NJ-1247A. Ms. Epiphan has her BS in Forestry and MS in Ecology. She has many years of practical experience working in developed and ornamental landscapes and strives to design and manage them to improve environmental sustainability as well as ecological function. 

Meet NPSNJ’s 2025 Incoming Officers

Every year, at the annual meeting, the NPSNJ membership votes on a slate of officers for two-year posts. This year, we have a number of positions and some shuffling around on the board. We are delighted to announce the slate of officers as follows.

Laura Bush, Recording Secretary

20-year career as a science editor and writer

Member of NPSNJ since 2020

Co-chair of the NPSNJ Advocacy Committee

Currently, filling in frequently as the Recording Secretary

Michael Jacob, Corresponding Secretary

Member of NPSNJ since 2018

Previously served as Membership VP 

Co-leader of the Southwest chapter, Co-chair of the Webinar committee, Co-Webmaster, Quartermaster

Lifelong gardener awakened to native plants after reading Nature’s Best Hope; since 2017 has transformed his property into a Homegrown National Park and squirrel haven

Active with his local Environmental Commission and Green Team and regional coordinator for the Rutgers Environmental Steward program.

Randi Eckel, Vice-President, Membership

Elected president of NPSNJ in 2022

Board Entomologist since 2017

Founded the mail-order native plant nursery Toadshade Wildflower Farm in 1996, with a particular focus on education and the fascinating ecological diversity of the natural world

Involved with NPSNJ for many years as a member and speaker

Serves on the board of directors of the New Jersey Planning Officials; chair of the Frenchtown Planning Board

Bob Swain, Treasurer

Founding member of NPSNJ

Treasurer of NPSNJ for 16 years.

Serves on the board of the Society for Ecological Restoration/Mid-Atlantic Chapter 

Lifetime member of the Society of Wetland Scientists 

Active member of the NJ Forestry Association, Land Improvement Contractors of America, International Society of Arboriculture, and Soil and Water Conservation Society

Kazys Varnelis, President

PhD. in History of Architecture and Urban Development. Taught at the Columbia Graduate School of Architecture, Preservation and Planning.

Historian, writer, and artist 

Beginning in 2016, started to re-envision his property in Montclair as a demonstration of a woodland garden in suburbia

Joined NPSNJ in 2017
Founding Co-chair of the Advocacy Committee, Co-Webmaster since 2022, elected Vice-President, Membership in 2023