The Olive Lippoldt Tidal Wetland Garden
Cypress Park ~ Pocomoke City, Maryland
April 5, 2012
If you venture into Cypress Park, just beyond the flag you will see what looks like to some nothing but weeds and overgrown brush. Oh, how far from the reality of what this truly is.
The tidal garden was the idea of Dr. Ritchie Shoemaker some years ago.
This selected area may look like an unkept or forgotten about area in the park but the grasses and dead looking twigs are quite essecential to the birds, insects and water life that share our space.
The photo below was taken from a Delmarva Discovery Center newsletter http://delmarvadiscoverycenter.org/documents/August09-Email.pdf. in 2009. Students and workers at the DDC helped clean in and around the garden.
More recently Dr. Ritchie Shoemaker and Don Malloy have been working to control/remove the invasive wetland grass known as phragmites from the area and replace it with other natural growth, such as the Marshmallow (althaea officinalis) which blooms in mid summer.
Which almost brings us up to speed....
This is the latest project for the tidal gardens.
Encircling the tidal garden is a graveled path with reading stations along the way providing all the information you need to understand what occurs in tidal areas like this, what lives there and how important they are.
The foot bridge (not completed in these photos) will provide the visitor a better look at the area. The Delmarva Discovery Center uses this are quite often in their nature walks. And as you can see in some of the photos the DDC is just a short walk to Cypress Park.
More photos of the foot bridge nearer completion will be posted soon. Before going I think it's very important to mention the lovely person for which this garden was named.
The Olive Lippoldt Tidal Wetland Garden is in honor of the wife of Curt Lippoldt, Mayor of Pocomoke City for many years.
She was an elementary school teacher in Pocomoke City and well loved, not just by her students but by anyone that knew her. In July of 1995 Mrs. Lippoldt died and it only seems fitting that this tidal garden be nurtured and continued.
There is still plenty to do not just here in the tidal garden but on the nature trail at the back of Cypress Park also.
And here's a parting thought.... If Mrs. Olive Lippoldt was your teacher or the teacher for your children wouldn't you like to volunteer your time, in memory of her, to keep her memory alive and so that others may enjoy the great outdoors?
