Connor Bushoven, a North Haledon resident and a senior at Paramus Catholic High School, has completed his Eagle Scout project at Laurelwood Arboretum. He designed, created and installed eight bird signs along the arboretum’s pathways. For four of the signs, he built accompanying bird houses that he hopes will attract birds that are not often seen in the park. In addition, Connor created a tree-ring timeline cut from a large red oak that had fallen during Hurricane Sandy. The two projects together took him nine months and more than 190 hours of work.
Connor is a member of Boy Scout Troop 170 in North Haledon and worked under the direction of Scoutmaster Clifford Konnerth. To qualify as an Eagle Scout project, Connor had to plan and supervise all aspects from conception to construction. For the final installation, which took four days, he directed the work of 35 scouts and leaders.
“I came up with the idea for this trail because I’ve always loved drawing, and from that the idea of creating signs highlighting region-specific birds came to me,” Connor said. The aluminum signs he designed are 1/4-inch aluminum mounted onto pressure-treated lumber posts, set in concrete and secured with tamper-proof bolts.
Connor wrote the text for the signs and did the bird drawings himself. There are signs for the screech owl, black-capped chickadee, robin, cardinal, tufted titmouse, blue jay, goldfinch and red-bellied woodpecker. The birdhouses are for chickadees, woodpeckers, titmice, and screech owls. Connor has also left a checklist at the Knippenberg Center for Education with a list of native birds to be checked off to help catalogue the number and types of birds seen by visitors.
For the timeline tree project, Connor counted the rings on the tree and estimated it to be 106 years old. A 6-inch-thick section was sliced, sanded, treated with marine varnish, and then mounted into a box that he designed. The timeline events are marked with tacks, and the accompanying sign list these important moments that occurred during the life of the tree.
Most of the materials for Connor’s projects were donated by various businesses. These include the Home Supply and Lumber Center, Inc. in Hawthorne and van Grouw Welding and Fabrication in Wyckoff.
Connor has been in scouting since he was in kindergarten. He has been drawing and painting for many years and hopes to major in animation at college.
Friends of Laurelwood Arboretum welcomes Boy and Girl Scout volunteers and encourages them to develop projects that enhance the arboretum. To learn more about such projects or about other opportunities to volunteer, go to https://www.laurelwoodarboretum.org/volunteer/on-site-opportunities/, send an email to info@laurelwoodarboretum.org or call 973-831-5675.