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A Dedicated Couple of Conservation Educators
A Dedicated Couple of Conservation Educators
By John E. Ross
What are you making, chocolate milk?” Phil Daley asked three boys stirring muddy water in the wheel barrow. “Add another shovelful of dirt,” he suggested, gesturing to a pit in the ground, “and it’s a milkshake.”
“Across the way at a picnic table, his wife, Ellie, asked another youngster how many antennae a butterfly has. Holding a bright plastic model of a tiger swallowtail, the boy answered, “two.”
“That’s right,” Ellie said. “Do you know what they do?” She went on to tell him that butterflies smell with their antennae and with their feet, too. Wide-eyed, his face beamed with amazement.
As they’ve done for decades, Ellie and Phil were volunteering at a Saturday Pop-in-Playtime at Sweet Run State Park, formerly the Blue Ridge Center for Environmental Stewardship in northwestern Loudoun County.
They’ve been environmental leaders in the county for nearly 45 years. “Their persistent devotion to conservation and environmental education is exceptionally extraordinary to say the least,” said Pat McIlvaine, senior conservation specialist with the Loudoun County Soil and Water Conservation District.
In 1980, Ellie, a pre-school teacher, and Phil, an Air Force lieutenant colonel just reassigned to Washington, D.C, were looking for a house in the country in 1980 to raise their three young children. They settled on a half timber, half stone house dating from the 1750s on an acre in Lincoln.
The location proved ideal. Not only could the kids walk to school, but the backyard ended in a small wetland. Over the years, they planted scores of native species, including persimmons and bottlebrush for butterflies. They added a broad deck overlooking the back yard. It’s their favorite place to sit, chat with guests, and keep track of bluebirds nesting in the box by the garden.
While a part-time pre-school teacher at the Philomont Community Center, Ellie transformed her classroom with a teepee, an igloo, and a terrarium in a canoe complete with turtles, tadpoles, and crayfish. She and Pat introduced children to nature’s treasures hidden in riparian buffers. On field trips to nearby Beaverdam Creek, students waded, netted, and identified aquatic insects.
Volunteering at Banshee Reeks and Claude Moore parks, Phil and Ellie shared their interest in birds and all things outdoors. They lead nature walks and Piedmont Environmental Center-sponsored day and overnight camps for youngsters.
Phil laughs recounting the perpetual problem with his nature walks. “We’d advertise them as covering two miles in about two hours. But I’d get so carried away answering questions we sometimes didn’t go even a half-mile.” Winter nature walks were his favorite. “Nobody expected there was so much to see in the woods in winter.”
Loudoun County purchased Banshee Reeks in 1991 with the intention of creating an event venue. But kids who had taken part in wildlife walks and camps and their parents objected strenuously. Hearing their pleas, Phil and Ellie were among leaders who convinced the Board of Supervisors to create Banshee Reeks Nature Preserve in 1999.
Phil worked with Joe Coleman and others to strengthen the Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy, Loudoun Environmental Education Alliance, the Goose Creek Scenic River Advisory Committee and the Blue Ridge Center for Environmental Stewardship.
Given that Phil and Ellie have been leading summer camps, bird walks and annual bird counts, and nature hikes for nearly four decades, there’s no tallying the number of kids and adults whose eyes and minds they’ve opened to the wonders of Loudoun County’s ecology.
FOR THE BIRDS
Meet one of Phil’s former students, Spring Ligi. While in high school, she accompanied Phil on nature walks sponsored by Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy. To complete her bachelors’ degree at James Madison University, she had to pick between a course in statistics or one in ornithology.
She chose to study birds despite the fact that the course met at 7 a.m. “For a college kid,” she giggles, “that’s really early.”
Bitten by the birding bug, she went on to study Baltimore and Orchard Oriole behavior and earned her masters’ degree from the University of Maryland-Baltimore County.
Shortly thereafter, Loudoun Wildlife offered her a job developing Loudoun County’s Bird Atlas. In it she tabulated and analyzed observations by 85 volunteers who devoted nearly 6,000 hours over five years to identifying 262 species in the county. In 2019, the atlas was published as “Birds of Loudoun.”
A few years after compiling the atlas, she was offered a job as volunteer coordinator at the 884-acre Blue Ridge Center for Environmental Stewardship, where Phil and Ellie Daley were active volunteers. In May, Virginia’s Department of Conservation and Recreation Formal finalized management of the center now open as Sweet Run State Park. Spring continues as the volunteer coordinator for the park.
Located at 11661 Harpers Ferry Road about eight miles from Hillsboro, the park will be formally dedicated later this year.
