DIG IT HAVE A PARK CRANBERRIES

[JeffD]

DIG IT HAVE A PARK CRANBERRIES
[parody of a 60’s song]

Su-u-u-u-u-u-un streaming down through the trees
Dig it have a park cranberries
Can you dig it?
A-a-a-a-a-a-a place where they grow cranberries
Dig it have a park cranberries
Can you dig it?
And every th-ing is real
You can hear it
Everything is real
You can see it
So re-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-eal So real So real So real So real So real
Whew!
I-can-dig-it-she-can-dig-it-he-can-dig-it-we-all-can-dig-it
In the heart of
The Pine Barrens, baby!

B-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-rds flying high over the trees
Dig it have a park cranberries
Can you dig it?
A-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-and there are frogs and other former endangered species
Dig it have a park cranberries
Can you dig it?
And every th-ing is real
You can hear it
Everything is real
You can see it
So re-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-eal So real So real So real So real So real
Whew!
I-can-dig-it-she-can-dig-it-he-can-dig-it-we-all-can-dig-it
In the heart of
The Pine Barrens, baby!

L-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-and that was kept pristine
Dig it have a park cranberries
Can you dig it?
A-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-and they grew cranberries and cut trees
Dig it have a park cranberries
Can you dig it?
And every th-ing is real
You can hear it
Everything is real
You can see it
So re-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-eal So real So real So real So real So real
Whew!
I-can-dig-it-she-can-dig-it-he-can-dig-it-we-all-can-dig-it
In the heart of
The Pine Barrens, baby!
I-can-dig-it-she-can-dig-it-he-can-dig-it-we-all-can-dig-it...

 

[JeffD]

Garfield Demarco, who sold the 9400 acre tract of land in the heart of the Pine Barrens, http://www.njconservation.org/html/pressreleases02/Demarco-new.html
which may be turned into a public nature park, talks about the cranberry ghost town of Friendship. http://www.southjerseynews.com/issues/november/m111703c.htm

Now a ghost town, it is a memorial to those productive Pineys who worked hard and roughed it in the boonies away from the convienences of civilization. Today, now part of the Wharton State Forest, the public reaps the benefits of those who toiled and took good care of the land in Friendship. I've visited the area a few times. Much of it is scenic, and, but for a few nearby impassible gaps, there are trails that take you through the woods and meadows and along the water that moseys through Friendship. Some of the passageways though and slightly higher than the bogs, which stay dry most of the time, are the fruit of Friendhip pioneers. Beavers have set up camp in areas in around the Friendhip bogs. There are also some areas in this former cranberry, blueberry, and lumbering town, that have become degraded, brown zones so to speak. I found trash and evidence of an old fire around an old make-shift shack in one area. Maybe it was a crack house.

I've seen the 8 ton granite memorial to blueberry growing in the area. The railroad tracks, remains of houses and other structures allow visitors to stop and think about this town called Friendship.

As the article points out, since the town was abandoned, it has started to become degraded, becoming a wasteland. The President of the NJ Nature Conservancy said the DeMarco tract of land the Conservancy bought is pristine. Let's just hope that the NJ Nature Conservancy takes as good care of the land as DeMarco Enterprises did. Although, like Friendship, the land will not be used to produce goods for market but will be dedicated for passive recreation, it still is a good idea to work the land, harvesting trees and perhaps some other productive uses to help pay the bills and wisely manage the land. My caveat about the Nature Conservancy is Emile Divito, who is associated with the Conservancy. Dr. Divito is an extremist environmentalist, who doesn't believe in actively managing land but just roping off land and letting nature take it's course. He would like to see wildfires just, in his words, rip through the woods to thin the forest.

A few years ago I emailed a columnist who implicated the National Wildlife Federation, and other environmentaists, in attempts to unilateratlly and secretely influence U.S. Forest Service policy. I told her I was suprised that she wrote that about the National Wildlife Federation, as I knew them to be a reasonable, level-headed environmental organization. When I was an environmental educator in the Pennsylvania State Park system in the late 80's and early 90's, I used the National Wildlife Federation's RANGER RICK educational materials for my environmental programs. The columnist replied that every environment group has a radical element to it, and that it's generally just a matter of time before the extremists take over. This is what happened to the Sierra Club and Greenpeace. I just hope this doesn't happen to the New Jersey Conservation Foundation, as it seems to be a reasonable, sensible conservation organization.

 

[JeffD]

The plan for the New Jersey Conservation Foundation to acquire the DeMarco property seems to be moving right along, meandering almost imperceptably at times, like a Pine Barrens river. http://www.southjerseynews.com/issues/december/m122803f.htm

It is good that this scenic, rural gem that you pass as you head south on route 563 from Lebanon State Forest, along the eastern edge of Wharton State Forest through DeMarco country -- corridors of pine interperced with opens by the bogs and meadows of the cranberry fields.

Interesting is the talk about keeping up the payments on the property and concern for logging and MORE cranberry growing. Logging and cranberry growing is included in the Pine Barrens Management Plan, the goal of which is to maintain the flavor of the Pine Barrens. I worked in a park where farming was part of the park's history, so the park had an agreement with farmers to farm the land, about half the original farming acreage. The farmers were required to use ecologically sound practices on the land, such as contour farming, strip cropping, and crop rotation. Based on the way the DeMarco land was left, if the quality of this stewardship is maintained, it should remain an ecologically sound, scenic place the public can enjoy. Some areas in the public forests in New Jersey that were more or less abandoned fell pray to vandals and other barbarians.

The Audubon Society gets funds to maintain its Rainy Preserve wildlife refuge in Louisiana by allowing drilling for gas and oil. Drilling on a wildlife refuge? Why not? It works for the Audubon Society. Why wouldn't logging and cranberry growing work for the New Jersey Conservation Foundation.

http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/williams061803.asp