Portland Parks and Recreation recently negotiated with a landowner to place a conservation easement on a treed Baltimore Woods’ hillside at N. New York. The site includes a small house at the top of the hill at 6816 N. New York and is zoned for multi-family development. The property is flanked on each side by city-owned land. The Friends initiated contact with Parks when the house first went on the market to point out a possible conflict if a developer bought the property. A larger structure could bisect the woods and affect the view from the future trail. To protect both Baltimore Woods and the regional npGreenway Trail, FoBW is…

The largest, oldest and most remarkable oak in the Baltimore Woods corridor came down in a thunderous crash during a gust from an early September windstorm this fall. Strong winds caught the giant’s branches, some as big around as a grown man, and pushed them and the mighty trunk over taking with it a large utility pole, nearby trees and all the electrical power in the nearby condominiums. Neighbors reported what sounded like a bomb going off and a shaking of the ground. The impact has been literally shattering not just in terms of the crash, but also in the minds and hearts of all us “Friends” who work to restore Oregon oak…

Check out our story in the St Johns Review Newspaper!   Secret woodland important to St. Johns heritage, Trail and Baltimore Woods Corridor By Barbara Quinn When I first moved to the St. Johns neighborhood nearly 30 years ago, it was like a territory that time forgot. Not only in the sense that there was a vintage Sprouse Reitz, 88-cent store, drug stores, even one with a working soda fountain, all of which were deja vu, but also because there were hidden pockets of wilderness scattered in unexpected places. For instance, there was a field full of wild lupine on Columbia Boulevard not far from Pier Park blanketing acres between…

Friends of Baltimore Woods Native Plant Sale a Success – With a little Help from Our Friends By Caroline Skinner   OK, it was a lot more than a little help from our friends that got us through another FoBW native plant sale so smoothly on March 31st. A core group of us, including co-chairs Kelly Derr and Susan Gere, plus Mark Hill and me, spent many evenings during recent months meeting around Mark’s dining room table nailing down the event details. Thanks to a nifty “how to hold a plant sale” document done by Sylvia Allen, we seemed to hit on all the key points as our sale date…

Spring 2018 Newsletter Our Spring 2018 Newsletter is here! Catch up on our events & progress, learn more about our partners, and the plants & trees in the Baltimore Woods, and as a special treat for this edition–a poem written by our very own Caroline Skinner! Read the full newsletter here, or check your inbox if you’re on our newsletter list. We send this newsletter out quarterly, and always welcome submissions from the community. Please share with us your volunteer experiences, photographs from walks, observations about the flora and fauna, interesting information, and poetry! Contact us here.  Our next Newsletter will be out in the summer. Contents: FoBW Annual Native…

Our Winter 2017 Newsletter is Here! Welcome to the Winter 2017 edition of the Friends of Baltimore Woods e-newsletter. It’s time again to share news of our ongoing work to bring a native oak woodland to the riverbank in St. Johns. We invite your feedback and participation. Contents: Urban Weeds Class Helps Educate Neighbors SOLVE and Friends of Baltimore Woods — An Ongoing Partnership SOLVE Beach and Riverside Cleanup PBS Engineering & Environmental Takes on Peavine — and Wins! Tough and Tenacious Native Plant Seed Mix Yes We Have No Ivy Day A Note from the No Ivy League The Trail of Discovery in Portland’s Harbor Least Wanted Invasive Species…

Our Fall Newsletter is Here!   Welcome to the Fall 2017 edition of the Friends of Baltimore Woods e-newsletter. It’s time again to share news of our ongoing work to bring a native oak woodland to the riverbank in St. Johns. We invite your feedback and participation. Don’t forget to register for our Urban Weeds Workshop on September 16th! Only 9 seats left as of this evening. Register here. What’s your best thing? We are still looking to fill some important volunteer roles, and build our active members. Whatever you’re good at, however much or little time you have to give, we can put your particular interests and skills to…

Our Summer 2017 Newsletter has arrived! In this issue we celebrate our successes at recent events this spring, highlight some great programs and FoBW events happening this summer, and share useful information about June Beetles and the escaped herbaceous annual, “Balfour’s touch-me-not”. We are also reaching our to our members to help us fill some much needed volunteer roles. Details on these roles are in our newsletter. We hope to hear from you! And last but not least, our Summer Work Parties in the Meadow are in full swing! Work Parties are happening every Thursday in June, July, and August, from 7-8pm. It’s fun and easy! Meet us at the…

Our spring newsletter has arrived, and is filled with lots of goodies, plus details on our upcoming Native Plant Sale! Contents: FOBW Native Plant Sale! New Trees on the Block January Weed Removal Work Party So Many Books, So Little Time Good-bye to the Book Sale Native Plant Appreciation Week What’s so Great about Native Plants? Or… What’s Not to Love? Weed Watch: American Pokeweed Butterfly Release Called a Success Dig In Trains Stewards Spring 2017 Event Information Newsletter Spring 2017 Edition

Greetings everyone! Our Winter Newsletter is ready, filled with recent news and all the progress we have made over the fall. Also highlighted is our upcoming Book Sale which happens on Saturday, December 3rd. Newsletter Winter 2016 Edition