The Changing Face Of Connecticut’s Environment

By Jan Howard

Changes in the environment and, as a result, the changes in vegetation, can occur in numerous ways: through ecological forces, animal life, and by design or by accident by man.

John Pawloski, a resident and former teacher in New Milford, presented a slide talk, “The Flowering of Connecticut: Past, Present and Future,” for the Newtown Historical Society May 14 at the Newtown Meeting House. Mr Pawloski traced the evolution of plants in this area up to the present time.

The Past

“The earth is in dynamic change,” Mr Pawloski said.

Three hundred million years ago, Connecticut was under water. Fifty thousand to 100,000 years ago, Connecticut was covered by ice.

“There were no hills,” Mr Pawloski said. “There was just a solid mass of ice that had scraped the vegetation away.”

When the ice melted, plants started to encroach upon the land. Animals came, such as mastodons, wooly mammoths, and others. “The plants that evolved were tundra plants, dwarf, because of the short growing season,” he said.

Such plants exist today on Mt Washington in New Hampshire. “The plants there are remnants of what lived in Connecticut in the post ice age,” he noted. “They are found in hidden, protected areas away from the wind.”

As the climate here warmed, vegetation changed. “Alpine plants couldn’t survive,” Mr Pawloski said.

Evergreens were coming in, and eventually hardwood trees, such as birch, maple, beech, hickory, hemlocks, elms, tulip poplars, and white woods. “Connecticut was the northern extent of the tulip poplar and sycamore,” he said.

There were three major ice advances in the ice age, he noted, but what caused them is uncertain.

“Many things can cause fluctuations in the climate,” he said, such as volcanism and massive forest fires, which block sunlight and bring about cooler temperatures, and human intervention.

“We are the only animal to change the environment,” Mr Pawloski said. “We are a big consumer of the environment.”

He described the impact of the first settlers, who cleared the forest for wood for fuel, houses, and for farming. “This took a tremendous toll over several hundred years,” he said. Native Americans were more conservation minded in use of the forests and land, he noted.

Plants brought from Europe and developed as native plants started a problem that still exists, he said.

The industrial age brought about mass production to satisfy the massive number of people, Mr Pawloski said. The discovery of iron in northwest Connecticut brought about the burning of tremendous quantities of wood for charcoal for use in smelting operations.

The Present

“There are a lot of plants out there,” Mr Pawloski said. “Seventy-five to 80 percent of Connecticut was deforested at the beginning of the 20th Century. There is more wood in Connecticut now than 100 years ago. Every year there is more wood grown than is consumed. We need wood. If we selectively harvest, we won’t destroy the forests.”

However, the growth of the forests blocks certain plants from growing, he noted. “Sunlight is needed for plant growth.”

Some plants have been very good about adapting to Connecticut’s environment, he said, such as orange hawkweed and the multi-flora rose. The rose, he said, “is a nuisance. It is a very competitive plant.”

He said that in the natural succession of plants, some plants would be forced out over time. Certain plants are rare or becoming extinct because of natural events, such as changes in climate, volcanism, fire, and erosion, and through man’s activities. Mt St Helen is being watched to see what plants will return. “Animals and plants began to return after the ground cooled,” he said. “It’s greening over.”

Mr Pawloski said man can control what happens to the environment. “We need to mine materials and pump oil out of the ground, but we have to extract the material with the smallest amount of damage.” What is changed environmentally should be restored, he said, using as an example a copper mine in Wisconsin. After three years of mining, the area was restored, and the company still made a profit. “This has to happen more,” he noted.

Highway construction is necessary to move people, he said, but should be done with the least amount of impact on the environment. Building houses can destroy vegetation. “With environmental impact statements, we see less destruction now. We must move with an eye toward preservation.”

Man is not just destroying the land with machines, but with lack of thought about what is being brought from other areas, such as gypsy moths, which were brought from Europe and have spread across the country. “The gypsy moth is voracious,” Mr Pawloski said. However, a spray has been developed that attacks them.

  Care has to be shown in spraying against the West Nile virus, he said. “Spraying is not the answer. It will just create a super-strong mosquito.” At the same time, the spray may endanger seagulls, eagles, osprey, falcons, and other birds that inhabit wetland and seashore areas.  “We need to use natural controls.”

 Because of international mass transportation and with it the movement of diseases from other countries, there has been impact on vegetation in this area. Outbreaks of fungus have affected certain trees, such as the American chestnut, which is almost extinct. The Dutch elm disease wiped out elm trees all over New England, and a more recent disease is having an impact on maple trees.

Critical habitats need protection. “Some plants only live in particular environments,” Mr Pawloski said. If they are destroyed or modified, the vegetation will become extinct. Steps are being taken to protect beach areas, tidal basins, trap rock ridges, and bogs, he noted.

Twenty-five percent of the plants in our area are alien, he said. A program is underway to eradicate purple loosestrife, which is very competitive and drives out natural plants. The tall reeds that grow in swamps are not native to Connecticut and can take over an area, he noted.

Endangered Plants

There are 205 endangered plants in Connecticut, Mr Pawloski said, some of which have only one or two existing in the state.

Some endangered plants are swamp rhododendron, wild azaleas, golden seal, trailing arbutus, wild bleeding hearts, dogwood, fringed gentian, painted trillium, native cactus, lady slipper, princess pine, Hartford fern, royal fern, walking fern, and water shamrocks. 

Mr Pawloski said transplanting certain plants, such as the lady slipper, is usually not successful because without certain bacteria, they won’t thrive. “If you dig them up, the conditions in your garden can’t support the bacteria, and the plant will die.”

Why should these plants be preserved? Mr Pawloski said there are three reasons: they may be an undiscovered source of food or medicine; the plant is a unique genetic source; or the plant is an integral part of a balanced ecosystem, a system that could be destroyed.

He said the monarch butterfly feeds exclusively on milkweed. If milkweed were to be destroyed, the butterflies would also die. The century plant is pollinated by one species of wasp, he noted. “If one dies, the other will die. It is so specialized that with only a slight change in conditions, the genetic source is gone.

“Once a plant is extinct, it is gone forever,” Mr Pawloski said.

To preserve an endangered species, preserve habitat, don’t pick or transplant, educate others, and understand what’s rare and endangered, he said. “The key is education.”

Among critical habitats are coastal sand beaches, black spruce bogs, high summits, trap-rock ridges, flood plains, and old growth forest.

The Future

What will the future bring? “Who knows,” Mr Pawloski said. “Connecticut has been stable for 200 million years.” However, it was inundated by glacial ice at one time. “So many things can happen. The continents are moving. Two million years ago, Connecticut was tropical.”

A lot of what happens depends on people, Mr Pawloski said. “The larger the population, the greater demands on the environment. Acid rain is natural, but has been added to by us.”

Additional acid rain would help plants that like an acidic environment, to the detriment of others, he noted.

“A nuclear holocaust, out of all the potentially destructive forces, would cause the most danger,” Mr Pawloski said, because it would cause genetic alterations.

Mr Pawloski holds a master of science degree in earth science education. He has also taught archeology, geology, and wilderness studies, and has worked as an archeologist.

He is the recipient of the Russell Memorial Award for outstanding contributions to Connecticut archeology as well as the Outstanding Conservationist Award from the Federated Garden Clubs of Connecticut, the Governor’s Environment Award, and several teaching awards.

Mr Pawloski is currently serving as director of the Connecticut Museum of Mining in Kent.