Magazine Beach

Catch the cherry blossoms at the park this week. This first hot summer-like night, the park was filled with users: playing baseball, picnicking, drumming and relaxing. The river breeze refreshes. What a great place to cool off!

Saturday was spectacular and 80 volunteers, including Troop 56, Forward Financing, the BU Forensics Group, the Boston Kiwanis Club and Cambridgeport neighbors were there picking up sticks and trash and preparing a flowerbed for a wildflower meadow. Thanks to all volunteers and to the CRWA, CRC and DCR for organizing this annual event.

And then the Cambridge Wildlife Puppetry Project brought Kids, Bugs, Art to the park, where children delighted in making bumble bee puppets, engaging in a nature scavenger hunt and talking with naturalists about the wonders of the park.

It just happened to be the most spectacular day we’ve had this spring and many were out savoring the day. May this be the first of so many more!

After years of having a cracked and sinking slab/foundation for their scull (boat) storage, the Riverside Boat Club replaced it this spring. What better way to celebrate the new slab than with a semi-formal SLAB party with good food, good cheer and dancing. The sculls will move back into the boathouse this week. Look for them out on the river.

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After

Other Signs of Spring
Central Cambridge Youth Baseball has kicked off their season with practices at the park and the soccer fields are also in use with soccer and frisbee players.

The Charles River Conservancy organized the first park cleanup of the season on Saturday. Students at Camp Kesem at MIT raked leaves and picked up sticks. Thank you!

Camp Kesem at MIT did a park cleanup April 22

And the warm sun is drawing out terrace wall sitters as well, passing the time watching the river, the rowers, the geese…

Coming up this Saturday at Magazine Beach:
Charles River Earth Day Cleanup, 9-12 noon (rain or shine).
Kids, Bugs, Art, 1:30-3:30pm (rain date and time: April 29, 4-6pm)
Come join in the fun!

Jean Devine and Barbara Passero of Meadowscaping will give us a wildflower garden in May. Paul Kelley of Mass Audubon and his Nature Heroes will help water it.

A lot is going on at the park today… The founders of Meadowscaping for Biodiversity met with representatives of the City, Mass Audubon and me to discuss how best to bring their wildflower garden to the park in early May. Look for 4-year-old asters, bee balm, blazing stars, blue vervain, coneflowers, coreopsis and more beside the eastern swale come May. The goal is to move them into the swale once we conquer the phragmites. In the meantime, black tarps will remain there, discouraging the hardy phragmites from reappearing.

The bathrooms in the Magazine are taking form.

And DCR is putting in the ADA-accessible path to the Powder Magazine. The bathrooms at the Magazine have been framed out and the place is abuzz with electricians and plumbers. The magazine will be fully renovated by early this summer!

For some, however, there is no time nor change, only contemplation…

Before

After

This morning sixteen volunteers cut down the hedge where the canoe/kayak launch and outlook will go–just in time. The female red-winged blackbirds are just returning to the park, weeks after their mates, and will soon set up housekeeping. The goal of today’s cleanup was to remove the hedge BEFORE they nested at the site. (These bushes will be dug out, but later.) Never fear, most of the hedge is still up. Look for shorebirds–killdeer, snipes and American woodcocks–coming soon. They are usually here by now, but their migration has been delayed by the bomb cyclones.

Many thanks to Riverside Boat Club, the CRLS Charles River Cleanup Project and to Cambridgeport neighbors for coming out to help today. Thanks are also due to the Charles River Conservancy for loaning us their tools and to the City of Cambridge for hauling the brush away.

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Tuesdays, February-June, Paul Kelley from Mass Audubon brings Morse afterschool students to explore the park as Nature Heroes.

The Nature Heroes program at Magazine Beach was created to provide students from Morse Elementary the opportunity to make connections with a nearby green space. Topics we are going to cover include plants and pollinators, water quality, and predator prey relationships. One of my favorite quotes is; “In the end we will conserve only what we love; we will love only what we understand; and we will understand only what we are taught.” (Baba Dioum, 1968.)  

 Through exploring Magazine Beach, learning about its past history as a powder magazine, and creating fun, new memories, students will develop a sense of place with Magazine Beach, empowering them to conserve its beauty and importance as a habitat for wildlife. My hope is that those who attend this program bring their friends and family out to Magazine Beach, and other green spaces in Cambridge, to spread the knowledge and love of such amazing nature in an urban setting. It’s all right there and all you have to do is look for it!

–Paul Kelley, Habitat, a Mass Audubon Sanctuary

Note: This program is funded by the CRWA’s National Fish & Wildlife Foundation grant. Its goal is to improve watersheds and cultivate stewards of them.

A hawk appeared out of no where, within 25 feet of our Nature Heroes as they explored the park.

Interested in nature at the Park? See our spring edition of Nature Notes @ Magazine Beach.

Also… HELP! We Need Volunteers to Cut the Hedges at the New Canoe/Kayak Launch at Magazine Beach Park THIS Sunday, April 8, 9am-12noon

We’ve got to cut down the hedges ASAP at the site of the new, expanded ADA-accessible canoe/kayak launch & outlook BEFORE the red-winged blackbirds nest there. (Construction will probably begin in May, but the birds will begin nesting soon.)

PLEASE join us. We’ll have tools, water and some work gloves. Please bring work gloves (if you have them) and a snack. We’ll be meeting at the current boat launch at the end of the Cottage Farm Plant parking lot—the most eastern parking lot at the park.  Questions? Email or call Cathie of Magazine Beach Partners at 617-460-2716 or cathzusy@gmail.com. THANKS in advance.

Take a walk. There’s snow and lots of it, but spring is on its way: the willow is greening and trees are preparing to bud. A wasp nest is visible (no longer hidden by leaves), the Powder Magazine has icicles, and a snowman awaits–at the park entrance at Pleasant Street.

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DCR’s Peter Seweryn, who’s overseeing the renovation of the PM.

The stone face has been cleaned and repointed.

Plumbing lines are being installed.

A new water line to the building has been added.

Straight from DCR’s Peter Seweryn, who is overseeing this work:

The Interior Rehabilitation of the Powder Magazine continues to progress, with tradesmen currently working on the building. To date – the interior stone face has been cleaned and re-pointed, electrical work started, a new water line to the building was added, and the plumbing lines are currently being installed. In the coming weeks, we will see the floor refinished, bathrooms framed out, and 85% of the electrical work completed. After the interior work wraps up, we will have a new ADA path installed to the Powder Magazine. We are shooting for a May 1st wrap up of work to the building, and then some general site clean-up (turf restoration, seeding) to follow.

 Also, take note: the old broken wading pool is now gone! Thank you, DCR!

The broken wading pool is gone! The area will be reseeded soon.

Sen. Boncore, Rep. Livingstone, DCR Comm. Roy &Magazine Beach Partners’ board members Cathie Zusy, Peter Klinefelter and Brian Conway at yesterday’s State House event

January 11 at the State House, Magazine Beach Partners was honored, along with volunteer groups from across Massachusetts, for partnering with DCR. DCR awarded us with Partnership Matching Funds to mount interpretative signs at the park and build an outlook, for river viewing. DCR matched Cambridge CPA funds 2:1 for the signs and community dollars (raised by the MB Comm. of the CNA and MBPs and donated by YOU) 2:1 for the outlook. Many thanks to all who have contributed. DCR can’t make much needed improvements at the park without us!

2018 will be a big year at Magazine Beach as we move from planning to implementing Phase 2. The canoe/kayak launch and outlook is our first “little” project. Also in 2018, we’ll be celebrating the 200^th anniversary of the Powder Magazine. Information about that to come…

Needed: More $ for Canoe/Kayak Launch

In January DCR will send the Canoe/Kayak Launch & Outlook out to bid–the first “little” phase of Phase 2 improvements. This will be the first public boat launch on the Cambridge side of the river. It’s at the end of the Cottage Farm Plant parking lot, beside the BU Bridge.

Project Scope: The project includes an expanded and upgraded ADA-accessible kayak and canoe launch, an adjacent river observation deck, and boardwalk structures improving pedestrian circulation through the area.

Funding to date: The City, State, Cambridge Redevelopment Authority and community have all contributed to this, but we remain short. In late December DCR has just pledged to match contributions to Magazine Beach Partners 1:1. Please contribute TODAY! (Remember: Gifts are tax deductible.)

How to donate: Write checks to Magazine Beach Partners, Inc. and mail them to Marge Amster, Treasurer, MBPs, 10 McTernan St., Cambridge, MA 02139 OR contribute on Paypal. (Note: We’re still setting up our MBPs Paypal account.  You can donate to the CNA here and the money will go to MBPs.)

THANK YOU! For a list of our 2017 Accomplishments, please scroll down. Happy New Year from Magazine Beach Partners!