Showing posts with label ronald bog. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ronald bog. Show all posts

This can't end well: Eagles and ducklings

Saturday, April 25, 2020

Ronald Bog
Photo by Martin DeGrazia

By Diane Hettrick

There's a lot going on in this Ronald Bog photo by Martin DeGrazia. The two eagles are the ones in the previously published photo, landing in Ronald Bog. (see previous article).

In this photo they are sitting on one of the sandbag barriers put in place to prevent sediment from entering the lake during the park remodeling project.

The large black plastic bags outside and inside the barrier wall are also part of the project.

If you look closely, there are two mother ducks with large broods of ducklings swimming inside the barrier. One has a brood of 13 and the other has 7-9. The eagles are clearly interested.

I asked Martin what happened to the ducklings but he didn't stay to see. 

I did check in with Sound Transit for an update on the park.

Rebecca McAndrew, Sound Transit Senior Environmental Planner reported: 

Most of the work is finished at Ronald Bog. The contractor should be hydroseeding the lawn outside of the mitigation area this week. The ideal time to hydroseed is after March when there is no chance of frost. 
The three interpretive signs to be installed are almost done. I believe the parking lot will need to be restriped and there could be a few other minor things that need to be done before the park is reopened. 
The sandbag wall (also called a cofferdam) isolates the work area from the rest of the pond so sediment-laden water (stirred up while the contractor disturbs soil) doesn’t enter the main pond and flow downstream on the North Branch of Thornton Creek. 
The “fish window” — when in-water work may occur — for Ronald Bog is July 1 to September 30.  
Since work continued after September 30, the wall had to be left over the winter and spring. The sandbags will be removed once the fish window opens again.



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Sound Transit begins mitigation work at Ronald Bog by moving sculpture

Tuesday, March 26, 2019

Courtesy City of Shoreline


Photos by Martin De Grazia

Sound Transit is offsetting impacts to wetlands as a result of light rail construction in Shoreline by creating new wetlands at Ronald Bog Park on N 175th and I-5. (see previous article)



The first step in constructing the Ronald Bog Wetland Mitigation Site was to move Michael Sweeney’s The Kiss to a new location.



Workers constructed a new earthen mound approximately 200 feet east from the sculpture's current location and then carefully transferred the sculpture to the new mound.



The entrance to the park was reconfigured with access to The Kiss. The sculpture is still visible from the Bog.




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The future of Ronald Bog - meeting Thursday

Tuesday, April 11, 2017

Ronald Bog meadow
Photo by Martin deGrazia


Thursday Meeting About Future of Ronald Bog Park, N 175th and Meridian

This Thursday, April 13, 7pm-8:30pm, in Shoreline City Council Chambers at City Hall, the Shoreline Parks Recreation and Cultural Services and Sound Transit will present plans for transforming a portion of Ronald Bog Park into protected wetlands.

The public is encouraged to attend and give comment.

Potential plans could include

  • closing most of the grass meadow to foot traffic
  • relocating the “Kiss” sculpture
  • removing, rebuilding, and relocating the shelter by the lake
  • possibly building footpaths running parallel to I-5 running north/south.


The proposed change to Ronald Bog Park is due to Sound Transit locating wetland mitigation there to replace wetlands being disturbed / removed near the fire station on 155th related to the elevated guideway.

Shoreline City Hall is located at 17500 Midvale Ave. N. For more information see the Sound Transit webpage or email Juniper Nammi at jnammi@shorelinewa.gov.



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Critters at the Bog

Thursday, February 23, 2017

Bird diversity at Ronald Bog
Photo by Christine Southworth


By Diane Hettrick

There are critters at the Bog. Not really Creatures from the Black Lagoon variety - Ronald Bog is far too open. Two very busy streets border the Bog - N 175th and Meridian Avenue N. The freeway is right next door.

The Bog is so close to the street that a couple of years ago it flooded the intersection.

And it's not very big, as bodies of water go.

Guess who's been keeping their teeth filed down?
Beavers live at Ronald Bog
Photo by Christine Southwick


Yet Ronald Bog seems to have more diversity of wild life than any other body of water in the area - and all our lakes are teeming with life.

Beavers, otters, raccoons, possums, frogs, turtles, enough birds to create a birdwatchers' guide, and (oops) invasive crayfish.

More evidence of beaver teeth
Photo by Christine Southwich


Our Bird Lady Christine Southwick went there for a visit Tuesday and was delighted to encounter:

  • a pair of Hooded Merganser (male and female);
  • 30 American Wigeons feeding on the grass  (these ducks are frequently seen on Green Lake lawns);
  • 8 Canada Geese;
  • one White-fronted Goose with them;
  • 1 Northern Flicker (in tree and on the ground), 
  • a Steller's Jay, and 
  • heard, but didn't see, a Kingfisher.
  • and while searching for beavers, I saw an otter checking me out!

Here's one of the otters that was looking at Chris
Photo by Martin DeGrazia


Volunteer extraordinaire Dick Decker led many weeding and planting parties at the Bog in 2011-2012, removing blackberries and planting hundreds of trees and shrubs. At one point, they had to put fences around the young trees because the resident beavers kept chewing them down.

Martin DeGrazia spends many hours on the Bog taking photos and has set up a Facebook page Ronald Bog Photo Blog with his beautiful photos.


Updated 2-23-2017 names of birds
Updated 2-24-2017 Turns out we have real, dam-building beavers at Ronald Bog! I'd been told that all our locals were mountain beavers, which are more of a burrowing rodent-type creature. I have no photos of either in our towns - if you do - send them in!

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Schedule for Saturday's SummerSet Arts Festival: Celebrating Ronald Bog

Friday, September 14, 2012

Follow the tree socks to SummerSet Arts Festival Saturday
Photo by Susan Armstrong

Colorful knitted tree socks herald the arrival of SummerSet Arts Festival this coming Saturday afternoon from 1pm-5pm at Ronald Bog Park on N 175th at Meridian and I-5 in Shoreline. 35 Knitters spent 2 1/2 months making 54 socks. Susan Armstrong organized the order of the socks and directed the installation last Saturday with much encouragement from passing drivers.

Now it's time to follow the socks to the park for the festival!

The festival schedule includes:
  • 4 tents of Live Acoustic Music including: country, jazz, bluegrass, old-time, cajun, folk, and Renaissance music
  • Outdoor Sculpture Exhibition
  • All Ages art-making
  • Jellyfish Storytelling
  • Live Landscape Painting
  • Park and Arboretum Tours

Highlights include:

  • 1 - 3pm - Hula Hooping performance and demonstration
  • 2 - 2:20pm - Duwamish Tribe "Singing Feet" Drumming and Dance Troupe Share Culture
  • 2:30 - 4pm - Bluegrass Jam led by Jack Boyer
  • 2:30 - 3:30pm - Brittain Barber Jazz Duo
  • 3pm - Historical Talk about Ronald Bog - Vicki Stiles, Director, Shoreline Historical Museum
  • 3pm - Family dance led by caller Amy Carroll and accompanied by Whistlepig
  • 4:15pm - 5pm - Paul Anastasio and Elena Delisle-Perry play Music from Terra Caliente, Mexico

Come down, meet your neighbors and enjoy a late summer afternoon together. Mike's Hot Dogz and Yvette's Ice Cream will be on hand, and picnicking is also very welcome. Bring a lawn chair or blanket and spend the afternoon enjoying the recently restored Ronald Bog Park! 

Parking is available at Meridian Park Elementary School located on Meridian Ave N just south of N 175th St. For more information, call 206-218-3302.

SummerSet Arts Festival: Celebrating Ronald Bog is sponsored by Meridian Park Neighborhood Association through a City of Shoreline mini-grant. Shoreline Parks Department endorses the event and Shoreline - LFP Arts Council is a co-sponsor.


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Art projects and community knitting at Ronald Bog Sunday, Aug 12

Saturday, August 11, 2012

Hypertufa Container-Making Art Party for all ages at Ronald Bog on Sunday August 12th, 1pm-4pm


Do you like to play with stuff outside? Come down to Ronald Bog Park and explore art-making with artists Mary Coss and Cynthia Knox. Mary will demonstrate how to make containers using hypertufa made with peat moss. Bring a small bowl or small dairy tub if you want to make something yourself. Wear comfortable outdoor clothes and bring work gloves if you have them. Also handy, a chair or blanket to sit on. Minors must be accompanied by adult. For more info contact Cynthia.


Community Knitalong at Ronald Bog Park on Sunday August 12th, 1pm-4pm

Yarn - Bombers Unite! Make tree socks not war! Would you like to contribute your knitting skills to a worthy and artistic cause? Come to community knitalong at Ronald Bog Park. Bring a chair or blanket to sit on. The yarn and needles/loom are provided along with instruction. For more info contact Cynthia.

Ronald Bog Park is located in Shoreline on N 175th between Meridian Ave N and I-5.


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Art Party at Ronald Bog on Sunday August 5th, 1pm-4pm

Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Art Party at Ronald Bog on Sunday August 5th, 1pm-4pm


Do you like to play with stuff outside? Come down to Ronald bog Park and explore art-making with artists Jeff Tangen and Cynthia Knox. Using natural materials found in the park, we will create a piece to be displayed at SummerSet Arts Festival: Celebrating Ronald Bog in September. Wear comfortable clothes and bring work gloves if you have them. Also handy, a chair or blanket to sit on. For more info contact Cynthia.


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Local sculptor featured in SummerSet Arts Festival this fall

Thursday, June 28, 2012

"Red Glow" by Jeff Tangen
Shoreline metal sculptor Jeff Tangen has shown his work regionally since 1994 in venues such as the Peace Arch in Blaine, Washington, Edmonds Arts Festival, and Bumbershoot Festival at Seattle Center. This year he will be exhibiting his works in Shoreline at the year-long Outdoor Sculpture Stroll and in September at SummerSet Arts Festival: Celebrating Ronald Bog.

On a quiet street in the Ridgecrest neighborhood, Tangen has a spacious studio with a multitude of gathered metal blades, fasteners, wires, and colorful toy parts, in a vast variety of shapes. Tangen strives to make the environment better with his art and he does this by primarily using recycled materials. His orderly studio is outfitted with all the tools required to turn this assortment of parts into entertaining and sometimes kinetic sculptures. In addition to his artistic practice, Jeff Tangen and his wife Marla run a cat boarding business named Purrfect Cat Boarding. The cats have deluxe accomodations and an enviable play area.

For Tangen the sculptor, the creation process starts with a key element and he builds the artwork around it. For his sculpture “Red Glow” scheduled for the Ronald Bog SummerSet Arts Festival, the key elements are the colored glass lenses. When sunlight shines on them they glow, reminiscent of stained glass windows. The lenses are placed above eye level requiring the viewer to look up, thus increasing their impact – similar to looking up at church windows. The lens holders, or pods, are made from discarded tools and pieces of scrap metal. At first glance the individual elements of the pods aren't noticeable, but the identification of the these parts draw the viewer in and prompt more visual investigation. “Red Glow” has an organic shape but it also has the sense of being a machine. Tangen enjoys this conflict and loves hearing people try to decide if the piece is a mutant plant or a crazy stoplight!

SummerSet Arts Festival: Celebrating Ronald Bog connects people, place, and nature through art. Art-making for the event takes place over the summer at the Farmer's Market, Top Foods Cafe, and Ronald Bog Park. Installation begins the second week in September and the event culminates in a celebration day of music, art-making, and dance on September 15th from 1-5pm. The park is located in Shoreline at 175th and Meridian near Interstate-5. The event is free and open to the public. Parking for the event is at Meridian Park Elementary School. For information about how you can participate in the event, contact project coordinator Cynthia Knox.



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Art in the Park - SummerSet Arts Festival at Ronald Bog

Sunday, June 10, 2012


The Ronald Bog Arboretum

Meridian Park Neighborhood resident and artist Cynthia Knox looked out her kitchen window onto Ronald Bog one day this spring and thought "the park keeps getting more and more beautiful with the restoration work that Dick Decker, Marty DeGrazia and volunteer crew keep doing. 

Wouldn't it be great to have a sculpture exhibition and neighborhood gathering in the park one day!". The next thing she knew she was chatting the idea up with Gretchen Atkinson, Meridian Park Neighborhood Association Board President.

Cynthia found out that Gretchen has long been an arts advocate for all things Shoreline and loved the idea of having the park dressed up for residents to enjoy. Having traveled to Europe and immensely enjoyed the art of Trafalgar Square in Britain, Gretchen had longed to have more art around her home city. 

Cynthia and Gretchen joined forces and began creating the event with the support of Ros Bird of the Shoreline Parks Department and Nora Smith of the Shoreline Office of Neighborhoods. The idea was presented and approved by the Shoreline Parks Board at the end of April. In May, Shoreline Arts Council came on board as co-sponsors of the event.

The project is called SummerSet Arts Festival: Celebrating Ronald Bog 
It has four components. 

  1. There will be a professional artists sculpture exhibition that will be up in the park for two weeks. 
  2. There will also be several sculptures made from gathered materials in the park that will remain over time to naturally disintegrate. 
  3. Thirdly, there will be a traveling community art-making table that will be showing up at the Farmer's Market, Top Foods Market Cafe, Ronald Bog Park, and other local places within Meridian Park Neighborhood. 
  4. To cap off the summer of art-making, a day of celebration is planned for September 15th from 1-5pm in Ronald Bog Park. Everyone is invited to come and enjoy a variety of live acoustic music including: jazz, rock, old-time music, and more, while participating in art-making with your neighbors and other fun activities.

SummerSet Arts Festival needs you! 
Meridian Park residents are needed to join the event steering committee, help make art for the exhibition, play music, be a park tour guide, work the welcome table, etc. Be a part of the fun and contribute your gifts to the neighborhood! All ages welcome. Contact Cynthia Knox or call 206-218-3302.



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Ronald Bog work party Saturday, February 25

Thursday, February 16, 2012

Blackberry vine. Photo by Fastily.
Wikimedia Commons
Ronald Bog Park, 2301 N. 175th St, Shoreline 98133, Saturday, February 25 and April 28, 9am-noon

Volunteers continue to remove the blackberries and other invasive plants around the bog. This is part of an ongoing effort to restore the park and create great views of the water. 

Bring your friends and enjoy the pleasure of improving our park. Please bring gloves if you have them. Meet at the pony statues on N 175th. Treats provided.**

For information call Dick Decker 206-542-1552.

** Participants under 14 must be accompanied by an adult. Participants 14-18 must have a permission form signed by a parent or guardian. 



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Captured on camera - a Ronald Bog otter

Thursday, November 3, 2011

Ronald Bog Otter.  Photo by Martin DeGrazia.

These normally elusive critters have lived in Shoreline and Lake Forest Park long before we two-legged types showed up, but they generally stay out of sight, living in our lakes, bogs, and streams.  These are fresh-water river otters, cousins to the salt-water types commonly seen in zoos, and TV programs.

There are otters in Ronald Bog, Echo Lake, McAleer Creek, and certainly other bodies of water.  Otters will travel across land and there have been several reports of otters in Kruckeberg Gardens.

Wonder what else is in the streams and woodlands?


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Ronald Bog volunteers continue to weed and plant

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Volunteers at Ronald Bog
By Dick Decker

We had 13 volunteers gather Saturday, May 21, 2011 at Ronald Bog to remove blackberry roots and some other invasive plants and plant native plants.

This comes to a total of about 500 native plants planted on this portion of the bog since October 2010. The number of volunteer hours since that date are approximately 280.

The volunteers Saturday ranged from novices to old pros and ages from middle school (Mukilteo) up through me as the oldest guy on the block. We had a couple from Columbia who brought their 2 year old and 7 year old daughters to play and enjoy the park. Volunteers came from Edmonds, Seattle and Shoreline.

We also were joined by some members of The Aurora Church of The Nazarene A friend, Rajinder Manhas, joined Terry Roche and me to plant four native shrubs the three of us donated to the park to commemorate a friend, Jerry Crawford, who died recently. We worked with Jerry for a number of years.

We will continue throughout the summer to remove blackberrry roots and ivy as it resprouts.

Thanks to all the volunteers and Gretchen Atkinson, Meridian Park Neighborhood Association, for her ongoing support, promotion and supplier of treats and to the City of Shoreline for the grant to purchase plants, tools and gloves. Thanks to Nora Smith, who gets announcements of our work parties out to so many sites and bring such a diverse group of volunteers. A big thanks to Kirk Peterson for all the support from Shoreline Parks.

Come visit the park to see our work and look for fish, frogs, turtles, the resident beaver(s). otters. eagles, osprey, Great Blue Heron, cormorant, Kildeer, King fisher, many other water fowl and small birds.

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Work party at Ronald Bog Saturday, May 21, 9am to noon

Sunday, May 15, 2011

Ronald Bog volunteers at a previous work party

From the Meridian Park Neighborhood Association


On Saturday, May 21, at Ronald Bog Park, 9am - Noon (near the Ponies), Dick Decker will be leading a work party to remove blackberries and ivy and will be planting native plants. 



Treats and water will be provided. Bring your tools and gloves if you have them and wear boots and wear appropriate clothing. There will be some tools furnished. 



While you are there look for the resident beavers, otter, KingFisher, and eagle. For more information contact Dick Decker at 206-542-1552.

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Ronald Bog work party Saturday, April 9, 9 am to noon

Sunday, April 3, 2011

Neighbors at a previous Ronald Bog work party
On Saturday, April 9, from 9 am to noon, the Meridian Park Neighborhood Association will hold a work party at Ronald Bog, N 175th and Meridian Ave N.

The group will be working near the ponies to remove blackberries and ivy and replant the area with native plants. 

Volunteers are welcome. For additional information contact Dick Decker 206-542-1559.

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Ronald Bog Park Work Party Sunday, 10/10/10

Saturday, October 9, 2010


Volunteers tackle blackberry vines.  Photo courtesy Meridian Park Neighborhood.
Help remove invasive species and plant native species at Ronald Bog Park in Shoreline on Sunday, October 10.

The work party will take place on Sunday, October 10, from 10:00 am to 12:00 pm. Co-sponsored by the City of Shoreline, Meridian Park Neighborhood Association and Landau Associates, the event is part of 350.org’s 10/10/10 Global Work Party celebration.

The City of Shoreline will provide hand tools and some gloves, but bring your own gloves and tools if you have them. 

Volunteers celebrate after a work party.  Photo courtesy MPNA
Enjoy free food, drink and live music from The Brambles, a local Shoreline band. Landau Associates will also be giving away free canvas bags to all volunteers. 

Organizers ask that if possible, volunteers RSVP.  But if not possible, everyone is still welcome to come over and join in.


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