NEBC 120th Anniversary Research Conference
Celebrating Botanical Research!
June 5-7, 2015
Smith College
Northampton, Massachusetts
Field Trips
The actual field duration (time botanizing) for each trip described below will be approximately 3 hours, although participants are welcome to continue exploring on their own thereafter. Please be prepared for all weather conditions and expect slippery terrain (appropriate footwear and clothing, bug repellent, sunblock, etc.). Bring your own water. Bag lunch will be provided before departure for those that registered for lunch. Carpooling is encouraged.
Mass Audubon's Arcadia Wildlife Sanctuary - Easy Terrain
This trip will include hiking through the Mill River floodplain forest, which supports bladdernut (Staphylea trifolia) and tulip poplar (Liriodendron tulipifera), and possibly a small rich mesic area. The hike will also cross through an old orchard with some "interesting non-natives."
Schedule: Meet at Smith College Parking Garage: 54 West St, Northampton, MA (Map to Parking Garage) at 10AM. Lunches will be distributed and a carpool caravan to the site will depart at 10:15AM (~10 minute drive). Site parking is specified below. If you would rather meet at the site, note that the foray will depart from the designated site parking area at 11AM.
Site Parking: Combs Rd., Hadley, MA Google Map - Arcadia Wildlife Sanctuary
Site Map: Mass Audubon's Arcadia Wildlife Sanctuary (pdf)
Trip Leader: Karro Frost ([email protected]; 413.531.5745)
TTOR's William Cullen Bryant Homestead - Moderate Terrain
This walk will focus on helping generate an inventory of species within the old growth forest located on the 195-acre historic homestead property. The inventory will be proximal to the Pine Loop trail, which features 150-foot pines– one of the tallest stands in the northeast.
Schedule: Meet at Smith College Parking Garage: 54 West St, Northampton, MA (Map to Parking Garage) at 10AM. Lunches will be distributed and a carpool caravan to the site will depart at 10:15AM (~40 minute drive). Site parking is specified below. If you would rather meet at the site, note that the foray will depart from the designated site parking area at 11:15AM.
Site Parking: 207 Bryant Road, Cummington, MA 01026 Google Map - Bryant Homested
Site Map: TTOR's William Cullen Bryant Homestead (pdf)
Trip Leader: Julie Richburg ([email protected]; 413.250.1983 )
Mt. Toby (east side, near Roaring Brook) - Easy Terrain
The site is well-known for its fern richness (and spring ephemerals). Attendees should be able to see: Three-leaved toothwort (Cardamine maxima), Plantain-leaf Sedge (Carex plantaginea), Bishop's Cap (Mitella diphylla), and Sweet Cicely (Osmorhiza claytonia). Roughly 20 species of ferns have also been recorded from this area including, Walking Fern (Asplenium rhizophyllum) Maidenhair Spleenwort (A. trichomanes), Bulblet-fern (Cystopteris bulbifera), Glade-fern (Diplasium pycnocarpon), Goldie's Fern (Dryopteris goldiana), as well as some grape ferns. The trip will pass through several other vegetation types including a utility corridor and a mixed oak forest. If time permits, and if people are interested we could visit a second site off Bull Hill Road in Sunderland.
Schedule: Meet at Smith College Parking Garage: 54 West St, Northampton, MA (Map to Parking Garage) at 10AM. Lunches will be distributed and a carpool caravan to the site will depart at 10:15AM (~30 minute drive). Site parking is specified below. If you would rather meet at the site, note that the foray will depart from the designated site parking area at 11:15AM. Site parking is limited; carpooling is strongly encouraged.
Please call Karen at 413.230.4622 if you plan to meet at the site rather than at the Smith College garage. The entrance to the parking area for the trailhead can be difficult to spot from the road. Therefore, we ask those who are meeting the field trip leader at the site to please proceed to the intersection of Route 63 (Long Plain Road) and Montague Road. There is a large pull-out, and we will proceed to the trailhead parking area by carpool from there. We strongly recommend carpooling from Smith College or elsewhere, as there is limited parking at the trailhead.
Site Parking: Intersection of Long Plain Rd (Rt. 63) and Montague Rd., Leverett, MA Google Map - Mt. Toby
Site Map: Mt. Toby (pdf)
Trip Leader: Karen Searcy ([email protected]; 413.230.4622 )
Mt. Sugarloaf - Difficult terrain
This trip will explore the unique Sugarloaf Arkose landform. During the foray, keep your eyes open for the striking, unusual flowering shrub described below. Flowers of Mountain Laurel (Kalmia latifolia) are typically white to pink, with showy cup-shaped, sympetalous corollas. However, a rare, though naturally-selected variant was collected by Miss Mary Bryant of South Deerfield, MA in 1885 and the live, grafted specimen still resides at the Arnold Arboretum. This mutant, first described by Harvard Professor of Botany Asa Gray in 1870 as Kalmia latifolia var. monstrosa, later referred to as K. latifolia f. polypetala, and now generally known as the cultivar 'Polypetala', has unfused (individual) petals. If time allows and there is interest, the group may continue their foray on nearby Mt. Toby.
Schedule: Meet at Smith College Parking Garage: 54 West St, Northampton, MA (Map to Parking Garage) at 10AM. Lunches will be distributed and a carpool caravan to the site will depart at 10:15AM (~25 minute drive). Site parking is specified below. If you would rather meet at the site, note that the foray will depart from the designated site parking area at 11:00AM.
Site Parking: Sugarloaf Mountain Rd, South Deerfield, MA 01373 Google Map - Mt. Sugarloaf
Site Map: Mt. Sugarloaf (pdf)
Trip Leader: Bryan Connolly ([email protected]; 860.428.8712)
Mt. Tom (southern portion) - Difficult Terrain
We will explore the area surrounding the second highest peak (1,202 ft) of the basaltic Metacomet Ridge landform. The foray may range through rich woods along an intermittent stream at the base of a talus slope, up wooded talus slopes, along rocky ridge top, and through hickory hop-hornbeam forest depending on interests of the participants.
Schedule: Meet at Smith College Parking Garage: 54 West St, Northampton, MA (Map to Parking Garage) at 10AM. Lunches will be distributed and a carpool caravan to the site will depart at 10:15AM (~15 minute drive). Site parking is specified below. If you would rather meet at the site, note that the foray will depart from the designated site parking area at 11:00AM.
Site Parking: The Log Cabin/ Mountain Joe parking lot on Rt. 141, Holyoke, MA Google Map - Mt. Tom
Site Map: Mt. Tom (pdf)
Trip Leader: Brett Trowbridge ([email protected]; 518.573.2487)
Ada & Archibald MacLeish Field Station - Moderate terrain
Nestled along the Whately/Conway town line in the foothills of the Berkshires, Smith College's MacLeish Field Station is a 240-acre patchwork of forest and farmland that provides opportunities for environmental research, outdoor education, and low-impact recreation. This exploration of the MacLeish Field Station lands will traverse mixed hemlock - hardwood forest, visit several ecological experiments, and potentially explore sites for unusual bryophytes and botryichiums, depending on the interests of the attendants.
Schedule: Meet 11:15AM at MacLeish Field Station (Directions to MacLeish Field Station) (PDF). Site parking is specified below. Lunches will be distributed at and the foray will depart at 11:30AM.
Site Parking: Poplar Hill Rd, Whately, MA Google Map - MacLeish Field Station
Site Maps: Ada & Archibald McLeish Field Station (pdf)
Trip Leader: Jesse Bellemare ([email protected]; office:413.585.3812, cell:413.522.1730)