Lovewell Pond - Intermediate Fen EarthCache

Southwest Trails Conservation Area encompasses a total of 245 acres and includes Lovewell Pond and Yudicky Farm in Southwest Nashua. There are a combination of paved, unpaved and single track trails. No bushwhacking is required; please stay on the obvious trails.

This Earthcache is completely Wheelchair Accessible with a paved path, providing everyone with an opportunity to visit. The area and pond are teeming with life, beavers are a very common site. While not required there is single track foot trail leading to a marked (Reference Point) for a full view of the Lovewell Pond and a bunch of beaver chewed trees! The Pond was named for John Lovewell, a British explorer and soldier, who lived nearby during the Indian Wars. He died in battle near Fryeburg, Maine in 1725.

This is a Earthcache... Nothing physical has been placed. Read the cache page to learn about the location and logging requirements. You must answer questions to claim the find. Send your answers by email or the Geocaching Message Center directly to the cache owner.

Required information:

1. What is the typical pH range of the pond water? (The two listed numbers on the sign).
2. When was this particular "kettle pond" formed? (Listed numbers on the sign).
3. Name two of the listed shrubs floating in sphagnum mat near the edge of the pond.
4. Using the image about fens what type does this fit under based on what you see in this area?
5. If you look directly across the water or in the distance to the Right. You'll see a lot of large dead trees. Using the information you have learned about this Intermediate Fen, describe for me why you believe these large trees have died around the perimeter of Lovewell Pond?
6. OPTIONAL: Photographs of yourself or surrounding area! (No Sign Spoilers)

Once you send your answers, you may log your find online before hearing back from the cache owner.

Earthcache Information:

The Laurentide Ice Sheet began to retreat about 20,000 years ago, creating kettles in New England at the end of the last glacial period. Specifically, kettles are formed when chunks of ice fall, known as calving, from the front of receding glaciers and are partially or completely buried by the sediment carried by meltwater. This process of sediment deposited by streams of glacial meltwater is called glacial outwash. The outwash forms plains called sandurs. Eventually, the buried ice melted and formed a large depression in the soil, Kettles are what becomes of these broken pieces of glaciers as they melt and pool in hollow and later filling with water to form the pond.

Lovewell Pond is a rare type of bog known as an intermediate fen. Intermediate fens are dominated by a larger range of shrub sizes, robust herbs, and even small trees in the partially floating sphagnum mat that contains a higher nutrient level than a typical bog. They occur in central and southern parts of the NH, usually where there is enriched groundwater seepage influence. The prominence of shrubs, deeper organic soil, and greater abundance of peat moss separates this minerotrophic fen community from herbaceous seepage marshes; the abundance of herbs (25-90% cover) distinguishes it from other fen communities; and the absence or low cover of trees in the overstory (<25%) differentiates it structurally from seepage swamps.

Typically Kettle hole bog systems, pHs are usually 4.0 or lower throughout the bog. This Intermediate fen system has a much higher range usually pH 5.0 or higher.