We have been informed by NYSDEC that funding will be stable for fiscal year 2003-2004.

Actions:
1. Reintroducve nursery-propogated 2-year-old plants into site from which seeds were originally colleted. This will help us evaluate our ability to transplant successfully but not risk dilluting the gene pool.

2. Collect seeds by propogation from sites in danger of extirpation is anticipation of reintroduction in the future to strengthen these populations.

The Catskill Mountain Program of the Nature Conservancy applied to AmeriCorps for an Invasive Species Management Assistant and has invited ONHS to partner with their project.

Action:
ONHS will investigate necessary 'in-kind' contributions but in general was positive about working with the TNC and the project.

NYSDEC will continue to fund a summer intern to monitor HWA in the Catskills.

Action:
Jamie McGinnis, a student at SUNY Ulster has begun work for ONHS this summer.

ONHS has contracted with NYS Biodiversity Research Institute to conduct the first year [of a projected 5-year project] to produce an updated "List of the Insects of NYS".

Action:
1. Complete a digital version of the macrolepidoptera documented in Leonard, M.D., 1928, A List of the Insects of New York.

2. ONHS members will visit the collections of NYS Museum, Cornell University, and the American Museum of Natural History to verify the determination and enter pertinent data into a relational database of each species of Lepidoptera families Noctuidae and Geometridae collected in NYS.

3. Sampling will be conducted for the aforementioned familieas at 20 sampling stations. A total of 60 sampling forays for insects will be made, and all specimens examined and processed according to protocol.

4. Vascular plants within 25m radius will be recorded, and voucher specimens entered into database of the Catskill Flora Project.

5. All vouchered specimens will be assigned a unique number and all metadata will be entered into a relational database.

6. Species of macrolepidoptera that represent the herbivore and dentritivore trophic levels of typical food chains will be selected for long-term monitoring.

7. ONHS will generate a new data layer for each species selected for long-term monitoring from the database of vouchered specimens in collection at NYS Museum.

ONHS will participate in the annual July 4th Butterfly Count sponsored by the North American Butterfly Association.

Action:
We will meet on July 5 at 10am at the West Shokan lab and proceed to the Catskill Interpretive Center site.

Dr. Michael Kudish, Paul Smith's College, reviewed his 2003 fieldwork with emphasis on peat sampling of bogs with the puropse of reconstructing Catskill forest history.

Hudson River Environmental Society is putting on a conference on June 12th at the Institute of Ecosystem Studies dealing with the state of our knowledge on the health of Hudson River Tributaries.

A naturalized population of horsradish was noted on Sheldon Hill Road.