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"Gardens Pennsylvania."
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A Guide to the Great Gardens of the Philadelphia Region
Finally, for every resident and visitor to the region, a comprehensive guide to the gardens of eastern Pennsylvania, southern New Jersey, and northern Delaware. Magnificently illustrated with nearly 200 full color photographs, A GUIDE TO THE GREAT GARDENS OF THE PHILADELPHIA REGION provides essential information on how to locate and enjoy.
eBook
Soil contamination in community gardens of Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Community gardens have been seen sprouting up in and around urban settings such as Philadelphia and Pittsburgh over the past several decades. Due to the long histories of industrial activities and urbanization, these soils in urban regions may be at a high risk for various contaminants such as metals and metalloids. Using inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS), we measured 7 elements (lead (Pb), zinc (Zn), copper (Cu), vanadium (V), cadmium (Cd), nickel (Ni), and arsenic (As)) in soil samples collected from a total of 21 community gardens in Philadelphia City, Philadelphia suburban areas, and Pittsburgh City during September and October 2021. We found that the city areas in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh had higher elemental concentrations in community garden soils compared to the suburbs. We found that all elements except vanadium were below the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (PADEP) guidelines. When compared to more stringent Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment (CCME) guidelines of a maximum of 140 mg/kg of lead in the soil, 36% percent of Philadelphia community gardens, 60% of Pittsburgh gardens, and 20% of the Philadelphia suburb gardens exceeded the CCME guideline. In Philadelphia city, generally, elemental concentrations exhibited a negative trend with increasing distance to historical smelter locations, although a significant correlation was observed for only zinc. We found that the soil from the raised beds had lower concentrations of lead and arsenic, but many of the samples from the raised beds had higher concentrations of zinc, copper, vanadium, and nickel. This discrepancy in raised beds is most likely attributed to these elements being actively deposited in the soil from present day sources such as vehicles on the road and active industrial sites. Understanding and recognizing such variations of these contaminants in community gardens are essential to understanding how industrial legacies and modern pollution continue to put urban communities at a disproportionate risk of health impacts.
Journal Article
Study on Class Imbalance in Land Use Classification for Soil Erosion in Dry–Hot Valley Regions
The inherent spatial heterogeneity of land types often leads to a class imbalance in remote sensing-based classification, reducing the accuracy of minority class detection. Consequently, current land use datasets are often inadequate for the specific needs of soil erosion studies. In response to the need for soil conservation in dry–hot valley regions, this study integrated multi-source remote sensing imagery and constructed three high-precision imbalanced sample datasets on the Google Earth Engine (GEE) platform to perform land use classification. The degree of class imbalance was quantified using the imbalance ratio (IR), and the impact of sample imbalance on the classification accuracy of different land use types in a typical dry–hot valley was analyzed. The results show that (1) Feature selection significantly improved both classification accuracy and computational efficiency. The period from February to April each year, between 2018 and 2023, was identified as the optimal time window for land use classification in dry–hot valleys. (2) Constructing composite images over longer time scales enhanced classification performance: using a 2020 annual composite image combined with a Gradient Tree Boosting classifier yielded the highest accuracy, indicating that longer temporal synthesis improves classification results. (3) The effect of class imbalance on classification accuracy varied by land type: woodland (the majority class) was least affected by imbalance, whereas minority classes such as cultivated land, garden plantations, and grassland were highly sensitive to imbalance. In imbalanced scenarios, minority classes are prone to omission errors, leading to notable accuracy declines; producer’s accuracy (PA) decreased by 46%, 42%, and 25% for cultivated land, garden plantations, and grassland, respectively, as IR increased (with PA dropping faster than user’s accuracy, UA). Cultivated land was especially sensitive and frequently overlooked under high imbalance conditions compared to gardens and grasslands. Despite overall accuracy improving with higher IR, the accuracy of these minority classes dropped significantly, underscoring the importance of addressing the class imbalance in land use classification for erosion-prone areas.
Journal Article
Tree-induced alterations to soil properties and rhizoplane-associated bacteria following 23 years in a common garden
Aims
Key functional root traits, including mycorrhizal association and root diameter, can help project ecosystem processes like root turnover and soil carbon sequestration. It is less clear, however, how such traits relate to variations in soil biology and chemistry. Here, we examined the impact of tree species with varied root traits on soil properties and rhizoplane bacterial composition, focusing specifically on mycorrhizal association type and root diameter.
Methods
Within a long-term common garden in central Pennsylvania, USA, we selected three arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) and three ectomycorrhizal (EM) tree species and assessed changes in (1) soil and leaf chemistry and (2) bacterial composition along fine absorptive roots, through 16S rRNA gene sequencing.
Results
AM trees increased soil pH and soil available nitrogen relative to EM trees, and mycorrhizal association type was significantly associated with rhizoplane-associated bacterial composition. Absorptive root diameter did not clearly explain soil variability but was associated with changes in the composition of rhizoplane-associated bacteria.
Conclusions
Tree-mediated shifts to soil properties were linked to mycorrhizal association type, whereas rhizoplane recruitment of bacteria was linked to both mycorrhizal type and root diameter. This has implications for predicting changes in biogeochemical processes following shifts in tree species composition.
Journal Article
Architecture and Landscape of the Pennsylvania Germans, 1720-1920
The phrase \"Pennsylvania German architecture\" likely conjures images of either the \"continental\" three-room house with its huge hearth and five-plate stoves, or the huge Pennsylvania bank barn with its projecting overshoot. These and other trademarks of Pennsylvania German architecture have prompted great interest among a wide audience, from tourists and genealogists to architectural historians, antiquarians, and folklorists. Since the nineteenth century, scholars have engaged in field measurement and drawing, photographic documentation, and careful observation, resulting in a scholarly conversation about Pennsylvania German building traditions. What cultural patterns were being expressed in these buildings? How did shifting social, technological, and economic forces shape architectural changes? Since those early forays, our understanding has moved well beyond the three-room house and the forebay barn. InArchitecture and Landscape of the Pennsylvania Germans, 1720-1920, eight essays by leading scholars and preservation professionals not only describe important architectural sites but also offer original interpretive insights that will help advance understanding of Pennsylvania German culture and history. Pennsylvania Germans' lives are traced through their houses, barns, outbuildings, commercial buildings, churches, and landscapes. The essays bring to bear years of field observation as well as engagement with current scholarly perspectives on issues such as the nature of \"ethnicity,\" the social construction of landscape, and recent historiography about the Pennsylvania Germans. Dozens of original measured drawings, appearing here for the first time in print, document important works of Pennsylvania German architecture, including the iconic Bertolet barns in Berks County, the Martin Brandt farm complex in Cumberland County, a nineteenth-century Pennsylvania German housemill, and urban houses in Lancaster.
eBook
Stunts and Sensationalism: The Pennsylvania Progressive Era Campaign for Women’s Suffrage
Drawing on biographies of Pennsylvania women active in the National American Woman Suffrage Association, this article explores strategies used by suffragists during the Progressive Era. During Pennsylvania’s 1915 campaign for a state suffrage amendment, supporters participated in several stunts, including suffrage gardens and tour of a replica Liberty Bell. Despite the failure of the amendment to win the vote for women, the experiences of campaigning in 1915 and up to 1919 functioned as a training ground for the first generation of women to fully participate in the political life of Pennsylvania.
Journal Article