Giving Rye: Meet the Friends of Marshlands
Giving Rye is a new occasional feature highlighting non-profits and community groups in and around the City of Rye. Today meet Clare Francis of Friends of Marshlands.
Name: Clare Francis
Organization: Friends of Marshlands, Inc.
Your Role: President. My role is to facilitate our mission by working with board members to introduce new projects and work on ongoing assignments. Everyone has their role to play. I participate in events and tours to connect with people in the county parks system and similar organizations. I also introduce people to Marshlands by giving group and individual history walk and talk tours. With the introduction of our new website soon, we will have more capability to network.
MyRye.com: Tell us your organization’s mission.
Francis: Friends of Marshlands, Inc. is a nonprofit volunteer organization that supports the Marshlands Conservancy, a wildlife sanctuary and nature preserve owned and operated by the Westchester County Department of Parks, Recreation and Conservation. We are dedicated to promoting the protection, preservation, and enhancement of the Conservancy, fostering a deeper understanding of nature, and working to sustainably mitigate the effects of climate change.
How long have you operated in Rye?
Francis: Friends of Marshlands was founded in 1978, six years after Marshlands Conservancy opened. We will be celebrating our 50th anniversary in 2028. The Conservancy is located at 220 Boston Post Road in Rye, NY 10580.
We work in collaboration with the Nature Center curator, Michael Gambino, and the Westchester County Department of Parks, Recreation and Conservation, which owns and operates 50 County parks comprising 18,000 acres. We are linked with other Friends groups in the Countywide parks system, including the Friends of Edith G. Read Wildlife Sanctuary, also in Rye, and Hilltop Hanover Farms, which provides some of the native grasses and seeds recently planted at Marshlands.
The Westchester Parks Foundation also provides additional volunteers needed to carry out some of our projects and are a source of additional funding.
What programming or work in Rye is Marshlands best known for?
Francis:
- Marshlands Summer Nature Camp. Marshlands is well known for Marshlands Summer Nature Camp, year-round school and community group activities, and weekend programs, for which Friends provides supplemental funding. In recent years, The Friends of Marshlands has provided scholarships for summer campers, bought supplies and materials for summer camp activities, and paid for equipment such as sturdy open sided tents that provide shade on hot sunny days and protect campers from rain.
- Ongoing Curator Specialist Education Courses. Friends also funds opportunities for our curator and assistant curator to attend educational and professional, collaborative programs. Recent examples are the Online Winter Tree Identification program with Eagle Hill Institute and attendance at the Meadow Management Symposium, Best Practices for Biodiversity and Beauty, at Stone Barns NY.
- Habitat Restoration Projects in the Forest, Meadow and Salt Marsh. The Friends of Marshlands has implemented new conservation programs that help to increase the biodiversity of our forest. In recent years, this habitat has been threatened by deer over browse and climate change. This year, 120 native understory shrubs, 100 fern plants and 500 sedge plugs were planted in forest plots by the Friends of Marshlands and volunteers from the Westchester Parks Foundation. Friends of Marshlands was awarded a grant through “Partners for Plants” by the Garden Club of America which covered the cost of the plants. These plantings will encourage the return of the insects and larval caterpillars that coevolved on these native plants over the millennia, which then provide food for birds and small mammals.
Looking forward to 2025, what will be your top initiatives?
Francis: We will be funding ongoing projects.
- In spring we will be funding mostly through a grant, the 2nd year of the goats grazing in the Meadow project.
- We will be working on updating the copy for our new website, adding new articles written for us by specialists on specific topics.
- We will be Funding a 3-D Map installation for the Nature Center.
- We will be applying for other grants to help fund new projects.
Tell us about the population you serve and how they can get involved with your programming and services.
Francis: Marshlands is not only popular and beloved by local residents from Rye, including couples, families with young children and groups of friends, but also with visitors from all over the county, all over the U.S. and from all over the World. The population is diverse drawing from avid birders, photographers, hikers, walkers, runners, and tourists. Many who grew up here as children, but moved away, come back here to remember fondly their childhood spent at Marshlands. During the pandemic about 29,000 people visited Marshlands Conservancy.
Local residents can support our organization by visiting Marshlands to see this magnificent Conservancy, and reading about the five different unique habitats on our website. Then they can become informed members!
There are many volunteer opportunities, including removing litter, maintaining trails, removing invasive plants, planting native shrubs, rebuilding wooden bridges and seats, building and putting up bluebird boxes, Brown bat houses, or bug hotels, and other activities as determined by curator Michael Gambino, who works with Mary Benjamin, volunteer coordinator for the Westchester Parks Foundation.
You can fulfill your community service hours while learning more about the history and habitats of the conservancy. The volunteers are a group of individuals of all ages, backgrounds, and walks of life, who have a love and appreciation of nature and the unique history of the conservancy.
Are you a 501(c)(3) non-profit with tax exempt status?
Francis: [Yes, a], 501(c)3 nonprofit with tax exempt status, all volunteer organization.
Looking back across 2024, what were your organization’s top achievements?
Francis: Our top achievements this year were funding by grant and donations the purchase of understory native shrubs for the forest, in addition to hiring the company Fat and Sassy Goats for the experimental project to evaluate this sustainable method to help eradicate invasive Mugwort. These projects are a first for Friends of Marshlands and a first for Westchester County Parks, Recreation and Conservation who gave us permission to carry out these projects for which we are very grateful.
In spring, in an effort to establish a sustainable, non-mechanical approach to meadow management and better control the spread of invasive species, Friends of Marshlands funded 30 “Fat and Sassy Goats” to graze one acre of the Marshlands Meadow for ten days within an electric fence. The goats munched on the dense stands of invasive Mugwort (Artemisia vulgaris), allowing air and sunlight to reach the seeds below, encouraging native grasses and wildflowers to return. This was the first of a 3-year experimental application needed to re-establish native plants in the Meadow.
Friends of Marshlands has arranged for Dr. Dorothy Peteet, a paleoecologist, and one of the world’s foremost experts on marshes, to make a study of the Marshlands salt marsh, with permission of Westchester County Parks, Recreation and Conservation. With a colleague and one of her students, Dr. Peteet will take core samples to determine age, depth and composition of the salt marsh this winter. This information will be used to support Long Island Sound Future Fund grant applications. Dr. Peteet is conducting a study along the Hudson River, and in New York City. She is written up in The New York Times article “Armed with Saran Wrap, She Sinks in the Muck to Save the Planet” by Christopher Maag, dated August 1st, 2024.
How can local residents support your organization?
Francis: Our programming work is funded by annual membership donations, grants and bequests. We have a fundraising mailing at the time of our annual meeting. All donations are tax exempt as permitted by law. Membership runs from January 1st-December 31st. If you join after October 1st your membership runs through the following December (i.e. 15 months). We have membership at all levels. You can pay by check, make a payment online through PayPal, or scan our QR code.
What Rye residents and area businesses have been the longest and steadiest supporters?
Francis: David Parsons and his family have been the longest and most steadfast supporters of Marshlands Conservancy, even before its inception as a county park in 1972. In 1905, the Parsons family preserved the future Marshlands Conservancy by refusing to allow The New York and Port Chester Railroad to cross their land even as the rail bed had already been laid across the Jay estate, owned then by the fifth generation of the Jay family, thus preserving the area now called Marshlands Conservancy. In 1978 David Parsons’ aunt, Fanny Wickes Parsons donated 27 acres of their land, known as Parsons’ Pond and Parsons’ Island to Marshlands Conservancy
Tell us about you.
How long have you been in your current role?
Francis: I have been president of the board for almost 3 years.
Is the role full time or part time? Paid or volunteer?
Francis: It is a part time volunteer job, though sometimes it feels full time. But I have been involved with Marshlands Conservancy since 1995. I no longer have an official day job, but I am involved with other activities also.
How would your friends and family describe you in one word?
Francis: Determined, passionate and creative.
Where did you grow up?
Francis: I grew up in post World War II London, UK. There was still food rationing and boarded up bomb sites everywhere. Both the milkman and the Rag and Bone man came by in horse drawn vehicles. There was no central heating, just coal and gas fires or kerosene heaters to heat homes, which caused such dense fog on occasion that you could not see more than a foot in front of you. As you walked home on the sidewalk you had to run your hand across the building, fence or bush you passed by to make sure you were walking in the right direction. Economic recovery was very slow after the war and Britain did not rebuild until the end of the 1950’s early 1960’s. There was an acute labor shortage. At the time, we were aided immensely by immigrants from the Caribbean who came to Britain and helped run our buses, trains, and sanitation trucks and work in construction.
What is your favorite unimportant thing about you?
Francis: My insatiable curiosity gives me a habit for going down rabbit holes.
If the next five years is a chapter in your life, what is this chapter about?
Francis: Moving the Friends of Marshlands into a good place to attract more board members and members at large who can volunteer by contributing their time, energy and expertise to the organization moving forward, so we can achieve all our goals.
What would you do if you were not afraid?
Francis: I would do what I am doing anyway. But I am very aware of the enormous challenges of our time that we have not faced up to as a nation or worldwide. The United Nations reports that globally we have achieved only 15% of the climate goals set to achieve before the target date of 2030.
Where do you live in Rye and how many years have you lived in the City?
Francis: I live on the other side of the county near the Hudson River. I have lived there for 30 years.
Thanks Clare!
Learn more:
For volunteer opportunities please call the curator Michael Gambino: (914) 835-4455 or email: [email protected].
