By JAN LARSON McLAUGHLIN
BG Independent News
Patrons of the Slippery Elm Trail are treated to a bit of wilderness as they pedal, run, or rollerblade on the 13-mile paved pathway between Bowling Green and North Baltimore.
But this summer, the wilderness got a little too wild for those using the trail.
“The vegetation has really been growing,” Wood County Park District Director Neil Munger told the park board on Tuesday. “Bikes can’t go through without dodging limbs.”
The park district suspects two reasons for the overgrown nature.
“The weather conditions are just right for growing,” with plentiful rain and hot sunny days, Munger said.
And since the park district hasn’t hired seasonal workers due to COVID during the last two summers, the growth just got out of control.
Jeff Baney, assistant director of the park district, said trees and vines along the entire length of the trail have been a challenge this summer.
“It’s encroaching from the sides,” Baney said. “It’s encroaching from above.”
“Things are growing so fast,” he said.
And trail patrons quickly tired of ducking vines and branches.
“Early in the season, we had a lot of complaints,” Baney said.
Even after dedicating weeks of staff hours to trimming the trail, it was difficult to get the vegetation under control, said Rob Brian, operations manager of the park district.
“We’d chop it back and then we’d come back a couple days later, and it was right back where it was,” Brian said.
Munger agreed.
“They spent weeks down there working, and you couldn’t tell they did anything,” Munger said.
So Munger proposed to the board that the district purchase an excavator sickle mower. The district had enough left over after a new pickup truck bid came in at nearly $6,000 less than the $40,000 budgeted by the board.
Brian described the equipment as a giant hedge trimmer.
Munger said the equipment can also be used underwater to cut vegetation in ponds.
“I think this would be a great thing for us,” Munger said.
The board agreed, and voted to purchase the sickle mower.
Also at the meeting, the park board discussed the site of their meeting on Tuesday – the Doug and Mary Ellen Pratt farm on Hull Prairie Road in Perrysburg Township.
Denny Parish, the only park board member who was on the board when discussions took place with the Pratts about donating their land, talked about the vision for the property.
Munger mentioned that when discussions began with the Pratts about their land, there were no homes in the area. The farm is now surrounded.
“This is an oasis among unbelievable residential dwellings,” Parish said.
The vision for the 80 acres of farmland includes a large pond, with hills made out of the soil dug for the pond, and lots of trees and trails.
There will be no softball diamonds, no soccer fields, no towering lights, no playground equipment – just wide open natural spaces.
“What we do best,” Munger said.
“That’s a vision the five of us previously had,” Parish said of the former board members. “I think it will be inundated with people on a constant basis.”
“This is going to be a wonderful, wonderful addition to the park district,” Munger said.
