July 28, 2023
By MCHT Nature Bum Steward Kirk Gentalen Alright, we’re going to cut right to the chase here with this post. I had an encounter with a “whisker of shrews” (I just learned that collective noun). It was on a Midcoast Maine beach, of which I am not at liberty to say (let’s just say I […]
April 21, 2023
Nature Bummin’ with MCHT Steward Kirk Gentalen A nice thing about writing a monthly nature blog is that in any month there are a gagillion topics to write about. At times it can be hard to pick just one thing to focus on. And so, often I find myself with two, three, or even four […]
March 28, 2023
By MCHT Land Steward Kirk Gentalen Land conservation is about so much more than views and human access trails—though we do love those! When Maine Coast Heritage Trust protects land, we protect wildlife habitat for all kinds of plants and animals. And of all the habitat I have visited on MCHT protected lands, vernal pools are […]
March 16, 2023
Nature Bummin’ with MCHT Steward Kirk Gentalen All dates mentioned in this post are based on personal observation and may change by days or even up to weeks depending on the year. It’s nature, not everything is etched in stone. Blood itself is a track. But we’ll get to that in a bit. Let’s start […]
March 13, 2023
These days at Maine Coast Heritage Trust, climate change factors into most decisions we make about how we conserve land. To ensure our work has the greatest impact, we’ve launched special initiatives to protect and restore some of our coast’s most vital and resilient habitat types, coastal rivers and tidal marshes. We’ve been involved in […]
February 21, 2023
Nature Bummin’ with MCHT Steward Kirk Gentalen So, January ’23 has come and gone, and February announced its presence with authority by providing a fierce chill that sent me and my son off the ice and to the movies (“Knock at the cabin”—wonderfully uplifting movie). Now, with the first half of winter being just about […]
October 31, 2022
Nature Bummin’ with MCHT Steward Kirk Gentalen So-called “Spring” Peepers The old timers say, “happens every ’tember,” and the old timers are right! After a summer of silence, some Spring Peepers start peeping again each September (or “each ‘tember” if you’re an old timer). You know Spring Peepers, the little tree frogs with the X […]
October 25, 2022
Saving Maine Marshes Protecting land is one of the most valuable tools we have to respond to climate change, and on the Maine coast, protection and restoration of tidal marshes has a profound impact. Tidal marshes are incredibly effective at removing gases like carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and storing them in roots and soils below—as much as […]
October 10, 2022
On a drizzly morning in June, a group of Maine Coast Heritage Trust stewards, marsh scientists, and restoration specialists met at the Old Pond Preserve trailhead in Hancock, where they spent the day in knee-high boots exploring the salt marsh and learning all they could about how it’s functioning—or, rather, not functioning as well as […]
