Extreme weather was a big theme in the 2018 news cycle. People died from heat waves in Montreal and Tokyo, of all places. Parts of the Carolinas endured their third “historic”…
Magazine Series
Wash of the West Branch
Each year that we run the West Branch of the Penobscot into the big lake, I think, this will be the last time. Our canoes packed for the four-day trip, we slide into the river at Old Roll Dam…
From the Center
Upstairs in the Northern Woodlands office hangs a copy of Charles Joseph Minard’s map depicting France’s 1812 invasion of Russia. It’s a remarkable work, both for the story…
Outdoor Palette: Neil Riley
En plein air is the French term for painting outdoors; it translates as “in the open air.” This method of painting became popular in the late nineteenth century with the Dutch…
Tricks of the Trade: Myths and Mistakes of Chainsaw Sharpening
Maintaining a sharp chainsaw chain not only makes for faster cutting, it also reduces wear and tear on the saw and the sawyer. Given those obvious benefits, it still surprises me to see people…
Shadows on Craft and Culture: The Loss of Ash
THE LOSS OF ASH IS FELT BEYOND THE FOREST With snow on the ground in mid-March, trees in Connecticut’s Naugatuck State Forest presented a dense network of bare branches against a sky the…
Backcountry Zones: Where Skis Meet Trees
Once upon a time, skiers had to hike uphill for the exhilarating reward of gliding down through the trees. The earliest ski trails in New England were cut through forests in the 1930s –…
Allure of the Moon
My New Year’s resolution is to not allow political despair to affect the allure of the moon. Yesterday at about 4:30 in the afternoon, just before dark here in late December Vermont, the…
Horse Logging: It Took its Toll
George Bellerose, a photojournalist from Weybridge, Vermont, has spent the last five years documenting the experiences of people who work in the forests of Addison County, Vermont. The Vermont…
Esau Cant and the Gorbie
The sound of the gray jay evokes an image of the deep North Woods: dark green spruce trees, spire-like balsam fir, and bare-branched tamaracks silhouetted against a raw, slate-colored sky; the…