By Chelsea Clarke Sawyer, Communications Coordinator Inspiration struck Brooke Piana and Katrina Jimerson on a hot July day last summer. Here at NBNC for our week-long Vermont Biodiversity Educators Institute, the two art teachers were immediately drawn to Susan Bull Riley’s paintings of local plants and wildlife on display in our gallery. The Woodstock Union…
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The Nature Of Wild Houseguests By Sean Beckett, NBNC Program Director (This is an expanded version of the article published in NBNC’s semiannual “Field Marks” newsletter.) As sure a sign of spring as blooming trilliums are phone calls to NBNC by those wondering what to do about the wildlife wandering around outside –and sometimes inside–…
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Vermont Pubic Radio’s Lexi Krup recently reported on New England’s spring amphibian migrations, featuring North Branch Nature Center’s work alongside many project partners and friends including the Vermont Agency of Transportation, the Hartford Conservation Commission, and the Harris Center for Conservation Education. To listen to the 6-minute segment, click here.
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[Photo: Eleanor Ray] By: Richard Littauer (NBNC Board Member) Published in The Bridge, March 8 2022 On the last day of 2021, I drove to Maine to see a bird I’d never seen before. You may have heard about this one — a Steller’s sea eagle, normally a native of northern Japan and Russia’s far…
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The month of October is the time to band Vermont’s smallest owl! As the Northern Saw-whet Owl is migrating south for the winter, Central Vermont and the North Branch corridor see a flush of these birds move through the area. Facing dark and cold nights, NBNC staff and volunteers actively netted, banded, and released 123…
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By Sean Beckett NBNC Director of Natural History Programs I was in the garden lamenting what a single conservationist could really do amid a planet in crisis, when a Colletes latitarsis bee landed in my tomatillo flower. A local bee biologist gave me two beautiful tomatillo starters this spring, on the condition that I photograph any and…
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The Vermont Alliance for Half-Earth is a group of Vermont residents and conservationists, including NBNC staff, who have come together to advance biodiversity preservation in the state. The Alliance gets its inspiration from the legendary biologist E. O. Wilson, his Half-Earth Project, and its vision to conserve half the Earth’s oceans and land for nature.…
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By Amy Butler The COVID-19 pandemic has presented numerous challenges for teachers, students, schools, and families. One response has been increased interest in outdoor learning as a safer alternative to traditional classrooms. Over the past year Inside-Outside: Nature-Based Educators has produced three position statements aimed at helping schools embrace outdoor learning year round. These statements…
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Rain patters as the streetlights kick on in the fading grey of daylight. Within the hour, amphibians will be on the move. Volunteer Amphibian Crossing Guards will be on the move too. Throughout the spring, dedicated community scientists visit sites where frogs and salamanders make dangerous road crossings as they move from their winter…
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By Laura Nikolaides (reposted from https://lauraniko.medium.com) “Maria Libby had always wanted to make outdoor education a fundamental part of the school district she runs near Camden, Maine. Libby, a former Outward Bound instructor, had a bounty of outdoor resources in her district, a river, a lake, an ocean, and mountains. Taking advantage of the natural…
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