The hiking trails throughout the Northeast provide affordable recreational and educational opportunities for everyone, but it’s easy to forget how much effort goes into constructing and…

The early light of dawn was filtering into the bedroom, when I heard that faint but distinctive pounding, as though someone were pounding with a tiny ball peen hammer. Ratta tatta tat-tat-tat. I knew…

Vermont’s Current Use Program is one of those rare pieces of legislation that garners high praise from both the left and right side of the political spectrum. Established in 1980 as a way of…

When the alarm sounded on a hot and dry weekday afternoon in April, fire crews from Londonderry, N.H., rushed in tanker trucks and pickups not to a burning house but to a fire at the University of New…

So the other day a mass mailing went out to landowners in Corinth, Vermont from a timber harvest/tree removal company in New Hampshire. The company was peddling their services, which include tree…

When it comes to fires, forest management practices across the U.S. have evolved considerably in recent decades, from complete fire suppression in all forests to the realization that fire plays an…

Who knows whether or not an apple a day does what it’s supposed to, or whether Dr. D.C. Jarvis was right about the healthful properties of apple cider vinegar. I do know that I feel better when…

One of the pleasures of the brief northern spring is moseying-about in back forties to learn what birds are arriving, what insects are emerging and what flowers are blooming.  And among the most…

My friend E’s a barrel-chested logger who lives down in southwestern Vermont. He’s a tough hombre, as is anyone who makes their living cutting trees. I’ve seen him bull his skidder…

Biology, History, and the Fate of an Endangered Species Every once in a while, a book comes along that defies categorization. Such is the wonderful, slithering conundrum that author Jon Furman poses…

It’s a strange, beautiful scene. I see cliffs and chasms and valleys unlike anything I’ve viewed on earth. It’s as though I’m glimpsing a rugged landscape on a planet somewhere…

Even if we shun the leggy creatures that make them, we marvel at the geometric precision and dew-frosted beauty of spider webs. There is nothing so elegant, so versatile, and so perfectly suited to…

My brother and his fiancé just built a log cabin home on a broomstick lot in southern Vermont. It was a bit of a nightmare to build—ledge issues, drainage issues, septic issues, budget…

When Andy Warhol said everyone would have 15 minutes of fame, he wasn’t talking about invertebrates. But in March of 1987 the dwarf wedge mussel garnered national attention when Plainfield,…

The good news is that Canada Lynx are thriving in Maine. Hundreds of the leggy, snow-loving cats are breeding in the state’s vast north woods, perhaps a historic high. The bad news is that the…

“I want to cut some firewood but don’t want to jeopardize my valuable timber trees. How do I choose which trees to cut?” You can make firewood from most any hardwood, but you can…

The Bicknell’s thrush looked like a greedy patron at a salad bar. Stuffed into her bill were a crane fly, a moth, a pupa of some kind, and what looked like a caterpillar. But that apparently…

Healthy butternut trees are now so rare that, before the image of this tree in its full glory fades, let’s bring the butternut tree of 40 years ago to mind. Back then it was a robust member of…

Bill Mackowski’s stick-built house and rustic outbuildings in Milford, Maine, taken as a whole, suggest a frontier settlement more than a modern, private residence. Antique tools, fishing…

Most loggers are well aware of the perils of blue stain. If freshly cut logs are left for any length of time in the summer months, one of the many species of fungus that leave bluish streaks in the…