Harwinton Land Trust | Preserving Open Space For a Better Harwinton

Thursday September 28 at 6:30 pm in the Town Hall Assembly Room on Bentley Drive in Harwinton.

Presented by the Harwinton Public Library and Harwinton Land Conservation Trust.

Join us to screen this new documentary film that tells the story of passionate citizen scientists and researchers working to restore this ecologically and economically important species. At the turn of the 20th century a deadly blight accidentally imported into the US devastated the American Chestnut. Within a span of only two generations, the tree was nearly extinct.

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Forever Forest

Two of our amibitious and hard-working members completed the third and final bridge to the small island on the blue trail at our Forever Forest property. Thanks Steve and Eric!

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Thanks to volunteers from the Wilderness School we were able to get a mulch cover for the pollinator garden at Indian Meadow. The volunteers then went to Forever Forest and hauled in wood and set the bridge pilings for the third and final bridge on the blue trail.

Thanks to the crew for a good day’s work!

The Land Trust has been working with the American Chestnut Foundation on a project to reintroduce this iconic tree species to our forests. The pollinator meadow at our Indian Meadow property was selected as a suitable demonstration site for the project. The first step, completed on 11/5, was to plant five wild American chestnut trees. Although these are susceptible to the blight that has decimated the original population of American chestnuts, we hope that these young trees will survive until after we complete the second step of the project. That will be the planting of another batch of trees, these having been bred with a gene that helps the trees resist the blight. If both plantings survive and cross-pollinate, we’ll be one step close to a genetically diverse population of chestnut trees that are resistant to the blight.

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With the remainder of the money from the Thomaston Savings Bank grant, member Rob Lesniewski and his daughter Makaela constructed a water collection station for the new pollinator garden at Indian Meadow. Thanks also goes out to Scott Butcher for assembling the water barrel.

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Forever Forest Bridge #2 is complete!

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Thanks to a grant from a very supportive Thomaston Savings Bank, we were able to purchase plants for the Pollinator Garden at Indian Meadow. We chose the hottest day in recent memory to have the workparty! We greatly appreciate the help we have received from the Harwinton Garden Club. They designed the garden, recommended plants and then showed up to help plant them.

A couple of very productive members have been working on completing a second bridge at Forever Forest. Thanks Steve and Eric!