The Office of Volunteer Services extends our great thanks and sincere appreciation to the Volunteer groups that lead the restoration of the Trumbule Trail in Magruder Park!

Thanks to the following Volunteer groups for their assistance in the restoration of
the Trumbule Trail in Magruder Park!

• Dr. Marc Imlay & the Anacostia Watershed Society 
• Naval District Washington
• Shelton Redding Lodge #139
• The Washington Ireland Program
• The Washington South Africa Ireland Program
• The Potomac Job Corps
• City Year 2009

About the Trumbule Trail Restoration Project

The Trumbule Trail was an existing 600' U shaped boardwalk in a natural swamp. 

Restoration began with Volunteers carrying over 100 utility poles into the swamp.  Those utility poles served as the base for the addition of 400' of boards for a new continuous loop.  Volunteers also upgraded the trail making the boardwalk more accessible, added a new gravel path and a fiberglass foot bridge and two observation decks. 

 

Over 900 hours of Volunteer service were recorded for this project.

 

The Trumbule Trail is part of the Anacostia Watershed and located in the Critical Care Area of the Chesapeake Bay. 

This area and the surrounding Magruder Woods have been host sites of large scale Volunteer efforts to remove non-native invasive plants.  Hundreds of Volunteer hours have been recorded in the removal of English ivy, garlic mustard, bush honeysuckle and multi-flora rose.  Those efforts have lead to the emergence of a large population of the native skunk cabbage, cinnamon fern, sweet cicely, and swamp rose. 

 

Most exciting is the reemergence of the turtlehead plant.  Turtlehead is the feeder plant for the state insect of Maryland, the Baltimore Checkerspot Butterfly.  Experts at the Anacostia Watershed Society believe that by rescuing the turtlehead plants we are creating the host environment for this threatened insect.