Volunteer Tom Goettel Spraying Poison Ivy - Photo Credit: USFWS Photo by Beth Goettel

Pond Island, located in the mouth of the Kennebec River, hosts a healthy tern colony and is one of seven seabird restoration projects run by the Maine Coastal Islands National Wildlife Refuge Complex. For a number of years, poison ivy has been encroaching on some of the nesting areas and making inventory and monitoring efforts difficult for the island researchers stationed there during the summer. This year, the refuge hired a certified pesticide applicator to oversee the staff and volunteers in spraying the plants in certain areas to try to restore the habitat.