Partners

Sustainable Farming

Over 40 acres of trust property is farmed by local farmers. By supporting our local farmers today, we are helping to ensure that there will be farms in our community tomorrow. In alignment with the trust's conservation mission, we are committed to working with the farmers to ensure that their agricultural operations are sustainably managed to preserve and restore critical habitats, help protect watersheds, and improve soil health and water quality.

The Trustees of Reservations

The Trustees of Reservations hold a Conservation Restriction (CR) on over 200 acres of trust property. The conservation restriction is designed to permanently protect the conservation values of the trust's property by defining allowed uses. Conservation restrictions offer one method of helping us to maintain our property as protected open space forever. The Trustees of Reservations' CR Stewardship Program staff conduct and coordinate annual monitoring of CR-protected properties, create and update baseline documentation reports, enforce the terms and conditions of the CR, and respond to landowner requests for project approvals. The Trustees of Reservations hold 393 Conservation Restrictions comprising more than 20,000 acres, connecting and protecting 54 Trustees reservations across Massachusetts.

UMass Dartmouth - Gegear Lab - Planting for At-Risk Pollinators

In collaboration with the Gegear Lab at UMass Dartmouth, we are replacing invasive plants around the property with structures and native plantings to support and increase the abundance and diversity of at-risk pollinators. Pollinators maintain the function and diversity of natural ecosystems through their unique relationship with flowering plants. For example, animal pollination of native plants provides food, shelter, and nesting habitat for wildlife. However, plant-pollinator systems have degraded at an alarming rate worldwide over the past two decades. In Massachusetts alone, current and historical data comparisons show that native bumblebee pollinators and bumblebee-pollinated native plants have declined in abundance, species richness, and geographic distribution.  

MA Forest Stewardship Program for Birds

Recognizing the public benefits of good stewardship on private forest land, the Massachusetts Forest Stewardship Program (MFSP) supports private forest landowners' efforts to manage their land using a long-term approach. We have committed to managing our forest by working with foresters certified through the Forester for the Birds program to create a 10-year forest management plan to maintain habitats essential to sustaining and increasing at-risk bird populations. Mass Audubon has partnered with the Department of Conservation and Recreation and the Massachusetts Woodlands Institute to bring the Foresters for the Birds program to Massachusetts. 

MassWildlife's Natural Heritage & Endangered Species Program

More than 400 plants and animals are rare in Massachusetts. These rare species play an important role in keeping the Commonwealth's natural communities thriving. MassWildlife's Natural Heritage & Endangered Species Program focuses on conserving rare species and their habitats throughout Massachusetts. We work with MassWildlife to certify vernal pools and conduct extensive data collection surveys on the areas of the property that could be home to endangered species. 

Massachusetts Division of Ecological Restoration (DER)- Stream Restoration

Many Massachusetts rivers lack enough water at certain times of year to support aquatic ecosystems, fishing, recreation, and adequate drinking supplies. The DER works with partners to collect streamflow data, inform and support policies and actions that restore and maintain healthy streamflows, and manage restoration projects aimed at restoring natural flow. We are partnering with the DER to restore natural streamflow (the amount of water that flows through streams on the property). The stream restoration project will also include a detailed plan to restore habitat around the stream with native plantings and forest management for songbirds and at-risk native pollinators. 

National Wildlife Federation - Certified Wildlife Habitat® 

The trust property is a Certified Wildlife Habitat® with the National Wildlife Federation. Rapid and large-scale changes to our lands and waters mean wildlife are losing the habitats they once knew. Every habitat garden is a step toward replenishing resources for wildlife such as bees, butterflies, birds, and amphibians—locally and along migratory corridors. The National Wildlife Federation certifies properties that provide food, water, cover, places to raise young and sustainable practices. By adding pollinator-friendly and monarch-friendly plants, our property also counts toward the Million Pollinator Garden Challenge.