At age 12, Paul Reed plunked down $275 for a new Jonsered, his first chainsaw. The boy’s father ran a small sideline firewood business, and while dad had spare chainsaws, of course,…

If Richard Jagels had a casebook like Sherlock Holmes, the titles might be: “The Case of the Twig in the Mirror”, “The Case of the Killer Ship Mast”, “The Case…

Like house designers everywhere, James “B’fer” Roth starts with the building site. Though unlike most, it’s not the soil or topography that he studies first. He looks…

“Dead wood coming down.” “All clear, Bear.” “Thanks!” THUD. A dead oak branch crashes to the ground after a brief but thorough exchange between two…

Mark Baker’s friends call him Birdman, and it’s easy to see why. There’s the alertness in his dark eyes, his baseball cap with a bald eagle embroidered on its crown, and the…

Imagine a life that smells like Christmas – that rich, deep-woods aroma of balsam that fills living rooms every December. For Jack and Wendy Newmeyer, it’s the cozy smell of…

When Charles “Duke” Besozzi looks at a big tree, he sees bowsprits, masts, and decking in its contours. This is a change from what he used to see when he was a commercial logger…

From the trees he harvests, Mark Fenwick sculpts his dreams. At the end of his dirt drive in Guilford, Vermont, a dancing bear, larger than life, poses on one paw, beguiling passersby. Beyond…

It’s a still, misty afternoon in Westminster, Vermont, and low-angled sun rays are piercing the water droplets, making everything seem preternaturally bright. Tom Wessels pulls on his boots…

There is only one place Christina Hazelton, founder of the Upper Valley Reptile Group, likes to see a red-eared slider paddling by an Eastern painted turtle: on the shelf at her…