Recent News

CT Town Working to Conserve 224 Acres

January 16, 2021 — cfergus

By Joe Wojtas, The Day (New London, CT)

Stonington — The town of Stonington is partnering with the Trust for Public Land to purchase and preserve 224 acres of forest and farmland. The trust and the town have 12 months to raise the $1.1 million needed to acquire the three parcels, off Al Harvey Road, from trustee Katherine Anne Brewster-Duffy of Los Altos, Calif.

New Wildlife Refuge Unit in Maine

January 16, 2021 — cfergus

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service acquired the first parcel of land in Maine for the Great Thicket National Wildlife Refuge with the purchase of a 48-acre property in South Berwick and Berwick.

Virus May Threaten Cottontails in Northeast

September 22, 2020 — cfergus

(The following is excerpted from ecoRI by Todd McLeish)

It hasn’t yet reached Rhode Island, but local scientists are on the lookout for a disease that rapidly kills wild and domestic rabbits before it wipes out the rarest rabbit in the Northeast, the New England cottontail.

Will Tropical Storm Isaias Help Wildlife?

September 08, 2020 — cfergus

Robert Miller in the New Haven Register

The morning of Tropical Storm Isaias, the sky turned witchy gray-green, “the way it looked in ‘The Wizard of Oz,’” said Jim Arigoni, conservation biologist at Deer Pond Farm, the nature sanctuary in Sherman owned by the Connecticut Audubon Society.

Grants to Benefit Fish and Wildlife in New England

August 27, 2020 — cfergus

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) has announced $1.8 million in grants to restore and sustain healthy forests and rivers that provide habitat for diverse bird populations, as well as freshwater and diadromous fish populations, in Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Vermont, and portions of the Lake Champlain and Upper Hudson River watersheds in New York.

How Beavers Change Forests: New Understandings

August 20, 2020 — cfergus

From New York Almanack

Aside from humans, perhaps no other species can modify its surroundings for its own purposes as much as beaver.

Throughout much of North America, these busy critters take down trees and dam streams to create waterways safe from predators and to lay up enough woody food stores to last the winter.

Deadly Rabbit Virus Spreads in U.S.

July 17, 2020 — cfergus

By Genevieve Rajewski in Tufts Now

An emerging virus threatens both wild and pet rabbits in the United States. The fatal virus—which causes an Ebola-like disease called rabbit hemorrhagic disease—already has been reported in the western and southwestern United States.

New England Cottontails in NH Studied With Genetic Monitoring

April 23, 2020 — cfergus

As conservationists create hundreds of acres of young forest each year to provide food and cover for New England cottontails, it’s becoming increasingly clear that humans will need to help these native rabbits find and occupy new areas. One way to do that – and to boost numbers and health of small populations that already exist in the species’ six-state range – is to release captive-bred rabbits into habitat sites.

Burning Wood Can Be a Clean Source of Power

April 03, 2020 — cfergus

New study shows high demand for biomass power could lead to better forest management.

By Jess Shankleman for Bloomberg Green

Burning large amounts of wood from forests can cut greenhouse gas pollution—but only alongside policies that encourage new trees to quickly absorb carbon dioxide.

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