Research & Conservation

The landscape of the Tidmarsh Wildlife Sanctuary tells a powerful story of rebirth, healing, and hope. It is a place where a once-pristine natural setting was altered significantly by human activity. More than a century later, with the reality of global climate change now fully established, new human actions were conceived and implemented to restore and protect nature, and to make it accessible to people—to study it and learn from it, to be inspired by it, and to be helped by it in the important years ahead.

A Research Collaboration

Living Observatory is a nonprofit, art, science, and technology learning initiative founded by Glorianna Davenport and Alex Hackman. Prior to the active restoration, Living Observatory researchers provided data that informed the restoration design.

Today, Mass Audubon and Living Observatory work together to expand this place-based, long-term outdoor laboratory in ways that engage scientists, naturalists, citizen scientists, artists, and visitors.

Climate Change Response

Tidmarsh Wildlife Sanctuary is a landscape of hope, where promising land conservation approaches revive degraded ecosystems into beautiful, diverse, regenerative landscapes. The restoration and conservation of this property has powerful potential to boost nature's resilience to the impacts of climate change.

Natural landscapes help us adapt to a climate changing world in many ways—by storing carbon, absorbing greenhouse gases, storing floodwaters from increasing extreme precipitation events, and blunting the impact of storm surges. As a freshwater wetland, Tidmarsh provides a resilient landscape that may help plants and animals adapt to changes in climate.