Wildflowers native to the North Coast are often subtle and easily overlooked unless ones makes an effort to look for them. When I returned here after a world away, I was amazed at the beauty and number of native species.
Alas, my effort to establish a wildflower walk along the historic Erie Canal towpath failed, due in large part, to a lack of interest. All I asked for was a two mile path to be unmowed and kept free of herbicides which are applied routinely on both sides of the towpath.
The Canal Corporation, the authority entrusted with management and maintenance of the 524 mile Erie Canal had myriad excuses for why this was impossible and unlikely to happen. The most amusing of these was the oxymoronic assertion that allowing plants to grow sufficiently to blossom would erode the canal bank. The opposite of course is the truth, that's why knowledgeable managers plant willow and grasses on water embankments--to prevent erosion.
Another excuse was that 'people don't like their nature natural, they like it tidy,' A corollary of this absurd axiom is that wildflowers at the edge of a two mile natural history walk would interfere with cyclists and joggers.
So, instead of a cost-free wildflower nature walk we now have a paved lane with crushed stone covering what once was a native species habitat for wildflowers, ducks, herons, turtles, fox, woodchucks, etc.
It ain't nature, but it's tidy.
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