One night just before Christmas last year, my youngest daughter and I opted to walk the short distance home from dinner at my parents’ house, rather than drive with the rest of the family. Our…

This Week in the Woods, we’ve been seeking out bright colors wherever we can find them, including on the edge of marshes, where winterberry often grows. The red fruits of this wild holly (more…

Yet again, we received many gallery submissions, so we’re sharing selections in two batches. In this first gallery, Steve Eustis admired the final logs from a harvest, Matt DeLuca…

We found this holey orb-like structure on a dried stalk near the edge of the woods. What happened here?

Fourteen-year-old Coen Mullins has loved spending time outside for as long as he can remember. His parents had him on skis when he was a toddler, sliding around their yard in Morrisville, Vermont. A…

As winter approaches and snow coats the ground, the tufted titmouse (Baeolophus bicolor) will again become a ubiquitous backyard visitor. Familiar to even the most casual observers of nature, titmice…

This Week in the Woods, we stumbled upon a patch of creeping snowberry. This ground plant’s tiny leaves (each about the size of raindrop) have white hairs widely spaced along the edges. Creeping…

By late fall of 2017, I was suffering from slingshot finger. It was caused by routinely firing off an 8-foot version of the weapon traditionally wielded by fiendish little kids. I’d spent much…

A magnificent 92-mile-long ribbon of interconnected lakes, ponds, rivers, and streams flowing through the heart of Maine’s vast northern forest, the Allagash Wilderness Waterway (AWW) features…

AFTER THE STORM After the storm they venture out, she and the big black dog who breaks trail with broad chest cresting through virgin white. He pauses with lolling tongue and steaming breath to plunge…

Frozen Time: “A drop of water hanging from this twig was twisted by the winds blowing through the forest in Manchester Center, Vermont, as the temperature rapidly dropped, forming an unusually…

Take a walk through the wooded mountains of North Central Pennsylvania and you may catch a glimpse of a magnificent animal, previously extirpated in the state. Throughout a 3,500-square-mile area,…

Back in 1997, the state forester reviewing a habitat improvement grant application for a property on the northwestern edge of Worcester, Massachusetts, remarked that the proposal was “a little…

Fans of Northern Woodland’s monthly Reader Photo Gallery may recognize the name Charlie Schwarz, a regular contributor to the gallery. A retired forester and lifelong naturalist, Charlie lives…

Harper, a great blue heron (Ardea herodias), could win a prize for endurance. This fall, after leaving her post-breeding area in Pointe-à-la-Croix, Quebec, Harper flew 68 hours nonstop (61…

Community engagement in nature and art takes many forms. A two-decade effort to restore a healthy meadow to an urban forest in Worcester, Massachusetts, also brought a college campus and a…

“I am a passionate painter focused on representing both seen and unseen elements of the environment.” — Bunny Harvey Bunny Harvey knows her environment intimately; she knows the…

The sky islands of Appalachia – that phrase from a place miles away captured my imagination as I read Sonia DeYoung’s story on page 52. Her research with the University of Vermont aspires…

After this issue of the magazine goes to print, I’m looking forward to some quiet time outdoors. I suspect many people feel as I do right now – weary of news of any kind, and eager to step…

A hundred years ago the black cherry tree in the gully behind our house on Cliff Street sprouted in a hillside pasture. It hasn’t moved, but the village has crept up the hill and the…