Our dying orchard was demolished during a frigid February storm that exposed the earth’s bones. My daughter, who had studied environmental science in college, suggested we not worry. Nature, she…

I’ll never forget my first encounter with lady’s slippers. While hiking the Long Trail in southern Vermont one June, we camped near a remote pond. Our tent site beneath an evergreen canopy…

Wuk-wuk-wuk-wuk! With a rattling call, a large bird took off from a tree and flew in an undulating fashion across our field towards the woods. It was black and the size of a crow, but flashes of white…

It’s the beginning of another mowing season, and green is only one of many colors found on most rural lawns. While yellow dandelions are seemingly everywhere, these small white and purple flowers…

It was a gray May day, and at the town forest in Fairlee, Vermont, a patchcut hummed with industrious students and volunteers. At the base of the hill teenagers plucked trees off a car-trailer, the 5-…

May is turkey season in the Northeast, a time when the sight and sound of a strutting tom is sure to stir a bird hunter’s heart. In this series of photos, a hot tom dances with himself. He…

To call the hurricane that pummeled the Northeast on September 21, 1938, “New England’s Katrina” might be to understate its power. Without warning, the storm plowed into Long Island…

Gabriel Tempesta’s home and studio are perched high on the edge of a Vermont meadow, overlooking rolling forests and fields. This sublime location is reflected in his artist’s statement:…

On summer evenings, Sam Jaffe has a tendency to loiter in gas station parking lots. This behavior has resulted in a continued acquaintance with the local police. Fortunately, he has the perfect…

One morning in mid-March, I opened the door to discover a dark-eyed junco frenetically battling another bird. Or at least it thought it was another bird. His nemesis was, in fact, his own reflection…

I’ll never forget the day I learned that certain bees nest on the ground. At nine years old, I was the self appointed neighborhood nature guide. One summer, as we entered the woods, a bunch of…

A frog that sounds like a duck. A fairy shrimp that swims upside down. A fat salamander with bright yellow spots. These are some of the inhabitants of vernal pools whose lives are explored in science…

Abandoned industrial sites litter the world, and many are contaminated with pollutants that make it difficult to redevelop the land. Yet some species of trees can tolerate polluted soil and thrive.…

Rusty blackbird populations have declined by about 95 percent in the last 50 years, making their decline the fastest of any songbird in all of North America. They breed in stunted conifers deep in the…

Beavers have long been admired for their dam-building skills, which enable them to create ponds and slow the movement of water. Recently, a team of University of Rhode Island scientists has discovered…

When Garland Mill began operations in 1856 – five years before the start of the Civil War – there were more than 600 water-powered sawmills in New Hampshire. One hundred-sixty years later,…

Troubled Waters: Preserving a World-Class Trout Fishery in Maine, Weed Wars: A Battle Against Poison Parsnip, Bat Rehab, Thirty-Eight: Salvaging Lumber After the Storm, and much more

Did you ever use your hands to scoop the air toward your nose when someone takes a pie out of the oven? Snakes are doing the same thing when they flick their forked tongues. “They are…

Found in a vernal pool in late April. What is it?

With respect to Donald Trump (and without making a partisan political statement), I think it’s fair to say that in a lot of ways America is greater than it’s ever been. A perfect example…