Butterflies in bloom

If you love butterflies, now’s a banner time to see them, and the sunny meadows along side the dirt on Hamburg Mountain just off Route 515 is the perfect place. A rough, rutted dirt road alternately climbs and plunges along the mountain at the border of Mountain Creek land. The sunny roadside now is covered with banks of lavender wild bergamot, and rabbles of moths and butterflies sip the fragrant nectar. In the space of a few minutes, humming bird moths, monarchs, Eastern tiger swallowtails, spicebush swallowtails, and several kinds of fritillaries appeared to pose for the camera. The leaves of the fragrant plant are used to create oil of thyme, and their aroma pervaded the air. Abundant goldenrod and purple or yellow coneflowers also draw their share of bees and butterflies, and in a few places, butterfly bushes escaped from cultivation lure the hungry Lepidoptera, the scientific name of the order that includes butterflies in moths. Hamburg Mountain also is a rich habitat for other wildlife. If you are fortunate, you also might see a red-shouldered hawk or a Northern goshawk circling above, or see a flock of wild turkeys cross the road. Or you might meet see black bear lumbering through the woods, or hear a sleep barred owl awaken and call. Hamburg Mountain has been in state ownership since 1940, when New Jersey bought the land atop Hamburg Mountain for a Wildlife Management Area with funds from the license fees of hunters and fishermen. A succession of owners, including developer Eugene Mulvihill had contracts with the state to use the area for ski and hiking trails. In 1986, the state sold over 600 deed-restricted acres of the Hamburg land Vernon Valley Ski Association, which in 1992 asked for permission to build a golf course and a 1,000-site campground on top of Hamburg Mountain. But in summer 2003, the N.J. Conservation Foundation and Highlands Coalition member groups including the Association of New Jersey Environmental Commissions, Environmental Defense, N.J. Audubon Society, and the N.J. Chapter of the Sierra Club, won their 2001 lawsuit against the state department of environmental protection, Intrawest and the Vernon township to halt the proposed construction and preserve the mountain as open space. In January 2003, the Department of Environmental Protection and Intrawest Corporation, parent company of Mountain Creek Resort, completed an agreement to preserve more than 1,800 acres atop Hamburg Mountain, with Intrawest consenting to cancel plans to build condominiums and a golf course on the mountain and instead developing a tourist village at the mountain’s base.