His assignment was to train gauchos to be loggers. That’s what the Peace Corps hoped Brett Chedzoy would accomplish in Argentina in the 1990s. “I wasn’t too…
Features
Blood Sisters
Walking in the New Hampshire woods, I mark my trail with eau de DEET. Chickadees twitter judgmentally in the hemlocks: “She’s wearing the CDC-recommended, permethrin-impregnated…
A Hayfield Home for Northern Pike and Wild Trout
On the western side of Vermont, the Otter Creek wanders leisurely through hayfields before easing into Lake Champlain. Wildlife abounds, with shore-nesting bald eagles and ospreys,…
Floodplain Forests: Resurgence of a Long Lost Ecosystem
The canoe scraped noisily onto the gravel bar on the point of one of the great bends in the northern Connecticut River. I’ve stopped to see a remnant of the floodplain forest that once…
Saving the Wood Turtle
Growing up, I spent many summer afternoons along the banks of a local canal snatching painted turtles as they basked on fallen logs. For many of us, turtles are the gateway animals that start…
The Herbs Around Us
As a longtime resident of Sugar Hill, New Hampshire, Holly Hayward has an intimate knowledge of the landscape here. And she comes from a long line of foragers. She remembers gathering…
Making Paper at the Old Groveton Mill
Author and Northern Woodlands contributor Jamie Sayen recently released a new book entitled You Had a Job For Life, published by University Press of New England. It’s the story of the…
Harvesting the Fruits of Time
A Primer on Apple Tree Release and Grafting Techniques In the early nineteenth century, John “Johnny Appleseed” Chapman sallied forth from Leominster, Massachusetts, to sell and…
Woodworking Schools - and Their Students - Look to the Future
On a Tuesday morning near the end of the school year, a half-dozen students move purposefully through the woodshop at St. Johnsbury Academy. Machines whirr, and the sweet scent of sawdust…
Miracles of Beauty
“Under the microscope, I found that snowflakes were miracles of beauty; and it seemed a shame that this beauty should not be seen and appreciated by others.” -WILSON BENTLEY,…