Planting Trees for Tribs at Fern Tor

The Hudson Estuary Trees for Tribs sign in Marist College's Fern Tor nature preserve. Photo by Emma Denes '25

When wandering through Fern Tor, you can find the markings of Hudson Estuary Trees for Tribs along the forest floor.

In 2020, campus environmental stewards partnered with the program to plant native trees and shrubs in Marist College’s nature preserve, with participants considering the efforts a major success.

“It has the proximate purpose of protecting the local body of water, but then, since it is a tributary, it’s ultimately going to help with water quality in whatever major river is nearby. For us, it’s the Hudson,” said Dr. Richard Feldman, associate professor of environmental science and chair of the department.

At its roots, the Hudson Estuary Trees for Tribs program works with public and private landowners to plant native vegetation alongside tributaries (the streams and creeks that feed lakes and rivers). Proposed streamside projects must fall within the estuary’s regional boundary, and once accepted, all shrubs and trees are provided on the house — make that on the forest.

“You have to plant them, you also have to maintain them. And so, it’s trying to make that approach to doing the right thing a little bit easier, giving an incentive to people,” said Beth Roessler, stream buffer coordinator for Hudson Estuary Trees for Tribs. 

Originating primarily from the state’s Saratoga Tree Nursery, these native vegetative stream buffers serve multiple purposes. They improve water clarity by reducing soil erosion and decreasing the chances of eutrophication, which can cause excess nutrients to possibly trigger blooms of harmful algae. Without stream buffers, soil sediment can pose greater risks to aquatic wildlife, according to Dr. Feldman.

“A number of fish prefer gravelly bottoms and sandy bottoms, and when sediment gets on top of the eggs, they literally can suffocate because they need a fresh flow of water to get the dissolved oxygen into the eggs,” he said.

Initially, Dr. Feldman aimed to bring Trees for Tribs to Fern Tor not so much to control soil erosion, but to increase native plant diversity in the preserve, including to counter the invasive presence of Japanese knotweed. When Roessler visited Fern Tor in August 2020, she recognized the dual benefits of both buffering the stream shorelines and diversifying the plant composition. Concurrently, she appreciated the inherent value of hosting Trees for Tribs in a collegiate environment.

“It was really exciting to see the energy from that in the students,” said Roessler. “Education is one of the things that we look for, not necessarily formal education like at Marist, but getting volunteers involved, getting the community involved and trying to spread that message of how important those stream buffers are.”

Although Marist students outside the environmental program might be unfamiliar with Fern Tor, the preserve also fulfills an informal educational purpose for anyone who wishes to take advantage of it.

“It’s just a really nice place to get away from everything and go into nature,” said Aiden Howard ‘27, the Fern Tor steward.

Back in the fall of 2020, Dr. Feldman recruited two environmental science students to plant the selected flora — from silver maple to elderberry — with assistance from volunteers, such as his first-year students. The planting process involved using tubes to safeguard the trees from deer browsing and synthetic mulch to protect them from weeds.

One of those first-year students was Matt Devine ‘24, who took part in the original plantings. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic at the time, the college instated an academic schedule that required students to attend classes on Saturdays, something that Devine didn’t always enjoy. But Dr. Feldman’s class in Fern Tor was the exception. 

“This was one of the few Saturday classes I was genuinely looking forward to,” said Devine via email. “It was a unique experience — rather than listening to a lecture, we were able to make a difference by planting trees.”

Even afterward, Devine kept returning to the preserve. “Being a non-environmental major, I wasn’t super familiar with Fern Tor prior, but decided to come back on my own multiple times after this,” he said. 

To this day, Dr. Feldman keeps an inventory of the plantings, and Howard assists with determining which tree tubes can be removed. “Once the trees grow too high, you need to take the tubes away, so they don’t get dependent on hanging on that. That is one of my jobs,” Howard said. 

From her perspective, Roessler also expressed her pride in the program. “I was really glad that, in addition to all the work that they had done so far, Dr. Feldman and the students were putting in this extra work to take it to the next appropriate step,” she said. “I think, in many ways, they were doing all the things they were supposed to do, and I was happy to be a part of that process.”

Going forward, Dr. Feldman hopes Trees for Tribs succeeds in the long-term, at Marist and beyond, as both students and the saplings they helped plant continue to grow strong. 

“I’m hoping that it might be a site that the DEC [Department of Environmental Conservation] wants to use as a good example of the success,” said Dr. Feldman, “both for Trees for Tribs and these other supportive programs of providing trees for educational purposes and seeing how it hopefully plays a role in a larger ecological restoration over the decades.”