Sasco Creek Pond
Route 1, Norwalk, Fairfield County, Connecticut

Acquired:  1968
Acreage:  5.57 acres
Uses: hiking, fishing, wildlife conservation, wetland protection  
Access:  Arbor Drive; Hulls Highway just north of Arbor Drive

Directions:

US 95 north to exit 19; turn left onto Center Street heading north under US 95; turn left onto Route 1 ( Post Road East); in about 0.2 of  a mile, just before the sign for the Town of Westport, turn right into the small parking area just before the bridge over Sasco Creek.  (The Old Sasco Mill is on the other side of the pond.)

Trails:

11/09/2005.  On a cool morning, Ceferino Santana, dog Sonar and I parked in the small parking area by Sasco Creek Pond.  At the parking lot is the dam and an accompanying water fall.   There are no trails.  There is only a small area by the pond nearly adjacent to the parking area.  It looks like they have put a lot of vegetation waste in the way to prevent people walking farther along the pond.  I stepped over the stuff and took a somewhat difficult walk (because of the somewhat steep hill heading down to the pond edge).  I did not get very far.  Soon the hill side ended and the pond edge came to a sheer cliff.  This is a pretty area, but they sure don't give you much area from which to admire it.  Dr. Patrick L. Cooney.

PLANT LIST:
Dr. Patrick L. Cooney
* = plant blooming on date of field trip, 11/09/2005

Trees:
Acer platanoides (Norway maple)
Acer rubrum (red maple)
Acer saccharum (sugar maple)
Ailanthus altissima (tree of heaven)
Carya sp. (hickory)
Fagus grandifolia (American beech)
Fraxinus americana (white ash)
Juniperus virginiana (red cedar)
Morus alba (white mulberry)
Picea abies (Norway spruce)
Pinus strobus (white pine)
Platanus occidentalis (American sycamore)
Prunus serotina (black cherry)
Quercus palustris (pin oak)
Salix alba var. (weeping willow)
Thuja occidentalis (arbor-vitae)     planted
 

Shrubs and sub-shrubs:
Berberis thunbergii (Japanese barberry)  --  lots
Cephalanthus occidentalis (buttonbush)
Cornus amomum (swamp dogwood)
Euonymus alatus (winged euonymus)
Forsythia sp. (golden bells)
Lonicera morrowii (Morrow's honeysuckle)
Rosa multiflora (multiflora rose)
Rubus occidentalis (black raspberry)
Viburnum dentatum (arrowwood viburnum)

Vines:
Celastrus orbiculatus (Asiatic bittersweet)
Clematis terniflora (sweet autumn clematis)
Euonymus fortunii (Fortune's euonymus)
Mikania scandens (climbing hempweed)
Smilax rotundifolia (round-leaved greenbrier)
Toxicodendron radicans (poison ivy)

Herbs:
Alliaria petiolata (garlic mustard)
Allium vineale (field garlic)
Artemisia vulgaris (common mugwort)
Aster spp. (aster)
Epifagus virginiana (beech drops)
Iris sp. (blue or yellow flag)
Lemna sp. (duckweed)
Lythrum salicaria (purple loosestrife)
Peltandra virginica (arrow arum)
Plantago lanceolata (English plantain)
Sedum sp. (stonecrop)
Verbascum thapsus (common mullein)
Yucca filamentosa (Adam's needle)

Grasses:
Panicum clandestinum (deer-tongue grass)