Community Service Day and the Institute for the Environment

On May 13, Saint Michael’s College employees gathered in Alliott to embark on the college’s annual community service day! Every year after the undergraduate student body heads home, employees come together to support the community, bond with other employees, and take a break from routine. The Institute for the Environment is fortunate to have employee groups help in the maintenance of some of our outdoor spaces on this day. This year, one group headed over to the Natural Area, while another group headed to the Farm. The Natural Area group, led by Natural Area site manager and biology professor, Declan McCabe, got down and dirty to work on trail maintenance. Here’s a peak at their day, as told by Professor McCabe: “After a quick stop in Cheray for wading boots, we gathered in the Natural Area Teaching Pavilion. We unloaded lumber and assembled four new eight foot treated-lumber sections of walkways to cross a swampy area of the Jeff Vincent Trail. We reset existing sections that had been lifted and rearranged by floodwaters. The beavers, in their wisdom, decided that the wetland needed to be deeper, and so we added some six-by lumber to both to raise the walkway and provide anchorage. We anchored the lumber by driving 4’ rebar through the lumber into the underlying substrate. All of the bridge sections have been secured to these pieces using 10” TimberLOK® screws.

Already the newly assembled walkway has been slightly flood tested when the gage station on the Winooski River peaked at 11’ and water backed up through the beaver pond, into the wetland, and over the walkway. All sections remained in place! With our currently saturated soils, we are just a summer storm away from a more significant flood and I am confident that our work will pass muster. Participants handled sledge hammers, cable cutters, cable crimps, rebar, screw guns, and a lot of lumber. Our group included employees from many corners of campus and a sledge hammer wielding student! Work of this scale requires either a contractor or a small army of committed volunteers. We went with the latter and we are extremely grateful for all of your energy, enthusiasm, and commitment to the Natural Area and to Saint Michael’s College.”

The other group of employees adventured to the SMC Farm, led by Farm & Food Program Manager, Christine Gall. The team was able to support the harvest of spinach, arugula, baby kale, and rhubarb for the St. Michael’s CSA members. On top of that, they repotted dozens of baby tomato plants for the 2025 growing season! Lastly, they undertook the arduous task of edging one of the farm beds, shoveling and weeding an entire area so that it was prepped for the summer farm crew to begin their work the following week. In addition to harvesting, the volunteers also washed and packed the produce to be delivered for the CSA. This employee volunteer team was an awesome help, filling in the gap between the semester student employees and the summer students! It was doubly fun for the volunteers who are members of the CSA to take part in the harvest of their weekly produce!

Edits & Contributions  from the Leahy Graduate Assistant Team