The decrepit mansion once served as home to the president of the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore, but two decades of brush has grown and, along with vandals, has made it uninhabitable.
Cue the goats.
In what's the first step to a $10 million project to transform this piece of Druid Hill Park into an environmental and recreational center for the city, the four-legged weed whackers have cleared a half-acre ring of ivy and other invasive species. The herd of 40 will be brought back to clear the rest of the 9-acre parcel that few have used, legally anyway, for years.
"It's been an eyesore and has all sorts of unsavory activity going on," said Jean DuBose, director of development and promotions for the Parks & People Foundation, a Baltimore nonprofit group that has undertaken the project. "Most people don't even know it's part of the park. But soon it will be a great resource in the city. "
Under an agreement with the city, the group will use the renovated mansion as its headquarters and also will develop a community center and a lab for school kids. They will build trails and connect the property just past the main park at the corner of Auchentoroly Terrace and Liberty Heights Avenue. Construction is expected to begin in the spring and take about 14 months.
The group has been fundraising for the past few years and has secured much of the money from private sources, the city and state, historic tax credits and some federal transportation funds for creating a recreational corridor near the Mondawmin subway and bus station.
To get started, and even get near the mansion, the foundation needed to clear the overgrowth. Human labor might have been too expensive. The fastest and cheapest way to clear brush would have been herbicide, said Brian Knox, the supervising forester for Eco-Goats, the Davidsonville-based firm that supplies the herd.
But that is also the most un-environmental, and the foundation is seeking the highest Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, or LEED, status from the nonprofit U.S. Building Council. That's become the stamp of approval for eco-conscious developments. It means lots of recycled materials, a green roof and other sustainable measures.
Such buildings frequently cost more to construct but typically make up for it in energy savings. The eco-friendly goats cost about $300 for the first half-acre.
"They'll eat just about anything, except the stuff that's poisonous," Knox said.
By late Friday morning, the Boar and Spanish species of goats in their second day on the job had been eating much of the vegetation and left a lot of twigs and bare trees. They can reach up to 6 feet off the ground.
Goats have been used around the region before to clear parks, residential properties and the shoulders of highways.
DuBose said the foundation had to gain permission from animal control and health department officials to bring in the goats, which are considered exotic animals in Baltimore. Parks & People, and maybe even some neighbors in the city, would like to have a resident goat to help maintain the property. But that's still against the law in Baltimore - unless you're the zoo.
However, the pygmy goats that frequent the children's zoo area are not laborers, said spokeswoman Jane Ballentine. "They don't work. They get adored."
