Eagle Reserve Conservation Area
Royalston, MA
Eagle Reserve Conservation Area is a 139-acre mix of woods and wetlands, including a floating Spruce-Tamarack Bog and a Level Bog, which is a complex community that floats upon a large beaver-influenced pond. Thanks to a Massachusetts Recreational Trails Program Grant, our new David H. Small Community Trail provides people with limited mobility access to the beauty of this amazing wildlife refuge—a patchwork of ponds and wetlands providing habitat and refuge for wildlife in a sheltered wetland where no signs of human habitation are visible. A breeding pair of bald eagles has nested near the waterside in past years. Rare pied-billed grebes are also found on the reserve, as well as blue heron, Canada geese, bald eagles, ravens, mallards, hooded mergansers, black ducks, and a rare juvenile golden eagle.
(photograph courtesy of Jeff Blanchard)
Read Two Poems for Eagle Reserve by Candace Curran
Sunset View Farm
Winchendon, MA
Sunset View Farm is a 70-acre organic farm that sells fresh-picked, seasonal local produce including tomatoes, strawberries, broccoli, and even maple syrup made in the farm’s sugar shack! In addition to five acres of agricultural fields, the land is rich with forests, wetlands and a hiking trail that is only accessible from the North Central Pathway.
(photograph courtesy of Norm Eggert)