Discoveries

Red Rocks Park in South Burlington, Vermont, takes its name from the iron-tinged Monkton Quartzite, formed some 500 million years ago. But above the old red sandstone are bands of younger…

Invasive plants impact the ecological integrity and timber production potential of forests. One particularly problematic species is glossy buckthorn (Frangula alnus). A shade-tolerant,…

Land protection has increased in recent decades parallel with development pressures. Town leaders struggling to balance budgets and to provide services often resist conservation because of…

The northeastern population of moose, subspecies Alces alces americana, declined during the nineteenth century as a result of hunting and forest clearing for agriculture. Hunting regulation…

What we in the Northeast sometimes call a “Town Forest” is known elsewhere as a “Community Forest.” Although common and cherished by local residents, these publicly…

Moisture is a major factor encouraging the growth of northern hardwood trees, but timing is just as important as volume. New research from University of Vermont and the U.S. Forest Service has…

Northeastern bats are on the decline for multiple reasons, especially fungal pathogens that cause white-nose syndrome. To support bat conservation efforts, researchers at University of New…

The boreal forest encircles the northern hemisphere from Alaska to Russia to Scandinavia to Labrador, making up almost one-quarter of global forest area and containing more than a third of…

For decades, acid rain was one of the biggest problems affecting northern forests, the focus of extensive research and advocacy in the latter decades of the twentieth century. The fact that…

First identified in 1998, the chytrid fungus Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis has infected more than 1,300 amphibian species in the last decade and led to the population decline of more than 200…

Alpine plants grow where they do because mountain summits are cold, icy, windy, snowy – but also sunlit, dry, and hot. Alpine plants are directly vulnerable to warming temperatures, and…

For as long as the blacklegged tick has been expanding its range in the Northeast, many have thought that cold winters limit its geographic range. This belief in part derived from laboratory…

The American marten (Martes americana) and fisher (Pekania pennanti) are closely related inhabitants of the Northern Forest region. Both species have been impacted by historical trapping and…

Two and a half years ago, much of the world shut down in response to the emergence of the Covid-19 virus. Some people worked, many stayed home, everyone worried. The outdoors was both the…

Up until a few decades ago, cold temperatures limited the range of the southern pine beetle to areas south of New Jersey, where winter temperatures rarely dip below minus 15 degrees…

Forest fragments in tropical regions are often skirted by trees dying along the edges as the ecosystem declines. But new research in northeastern forests suggests that a different dynamic is…

The modern world is filled with plastic in part because plastic is, well, plastic: flexible and moldable, polymers can be formed into a seemingly infinite variety of shapes. Aluminum, too, has…

Wolastoqiyik (Maliseet) and Mi’kmaq peoples maintain relationships with hundreds of species of plants and fungi in their forested homelands of the Canadian Maritimes, the Gaspe…

When northeastern farmers left for the city or for greener pastures to the west in the early 20th century, their abandoned fields grew into sunlit forests marked by mossy stone walls, wolf…

The largest butterfly in North America has expanded its range from the South and Midwest during the last decade and is now appearing in much of New England with regularity. The eastern giant…