Mass Audubon Blogs

Over the course of the 2020 Photo Contest, we will be highlighting 5 photos from the previous month’s entries on Facebook and asking fans to select their favorite. This is just a fun way of sharing some of the amazing entries and doesn’t have to do with the official judging process. You can pick your favorite by “liking” it on Facebook. Not […]

Summer just isn’t summer without camp. Sunshine, fresh air, friends, and fun in the outdoors are the optimal nourishment for body, mind, and soul. So when COVID-19 shut down Massachusetts this spring, our camp and education staff immediately got to work, developing plans to open some of our day camps if the opportunity presented itself. […]

The Great American Outdoors Act has been signed into law! The law includes long-awaited permanent funding for the federal Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) to protect our public lands. LWCF helps protect invaluable wild spaces across Massachusetts and the United States. Although LWCF was permanently reauthorized last year, its annual funding still wasn’t guaranteed […]

Climate change is not only shifting the breeding season for northern forest birds, but it is also shortening it for some, according to a 43-year study co-authored by a UMass Amherst ecologist. The study examined 73 species of boreal birds in Finland, but the results reflect patterns in bird observations from other parts of the […]

About 4 years ago, I received a call from a landowner in Hampden about a possible donation of some land next to Laughing Brook Wildlife Sanctuary.  We talked about the process and the costs involved. It was helpful information for the landowner to have, though not the right time for him to act. In the […]

Summer is a great time to explore new places. Two beautiful nearby locations are Little Farm Pond, in Sherborn, part of Broadmoor, and Waseeka Wildlife Sanctuary in Hopkinton. Little Farm Pond is a 23 acre kettle hole pond formed as glacial ice melted millennia ago. Fragrant sweet pepperbush is in bloom along the pond edges. […]

Good thing we didn’t give up on the flower patch when we learned that selling ornamental flowers wouldn’t be permitted at Union Square during the pandemic. Volunteer Sheila continued seeding them in the greenhouse, the farm team kept up with the transplanting, and community volunteers and camp kids went after the weeds in the patch. […]

We held two sessions of Wednesday Morning Birding this week, co-led by Dave Weaver at 7:30 AM and Dave Williams at 9:30 AM. The path of the tropical system that we knew would bring amazing rarities inland this week did not promise the same for the coast. So, we kept to an original plan to […]

Wood Lily (Lilium philadelphicum) On a recent walk I was surprised to see these Wood lilies. About twenty were in bloom over a ten square foot area. A power line runs through the woods here so a swath about 20 feet wide is kept clear of woody plants. Wood lilies need sunlight so a clearing […]

Julia is a teacher-naturalist at Moose Hill who has been with Mass Audubon for over four and a half years and at Moose Hill specifically for the last year and a half. Julia is passionate about conservation and protecting the environment so future generations have the same resources that we have today and she loves […]

Before the pandemic, a highlight of the Wellfleet Bay field season was the diamondback terrapin nesting cycle. Terrapins are a Threatened species in Massachusetts and Wellfleet is the northern edge of their range. In a normal year, small crews of volunteers regularly patrol nesting hot spots in Wellfleet, Eastham and Orleans to find and protect […]

Join us in summer 2020 for a physically distanced family getaway at Wildwood! Wildwood is turning our camp into a campground for camp families from July 10–October 15. We will provide families with a space to sleep and relax while being physically distanced from others. You can choose from any of the following lodging options: […]