Spring 2012
Teaching and demonstrating the benefits of innovative, sustainable management of forest and farmland.
Welcome page 1
Note From the Director’s Desk
Features page 2
Merck’s New Sugarbush New Staff Members page 3
Education Evolving page 4
View From the Farm Cabin Now in the Visitor Center page 5
Thank You to Our Contributors page 6
Intern Interview Recipe from the Lodge page 7
About Us and Membership
Calendar page 8
Workshops & Events Merck Forest & Farmland Center 3270 Route 315 PO Box 86 Rupert, Vermont 05768 p. 802.394.7836
www.merckforest.org
Note From the Director’s Desk By Tom Ward, Executive Director It may be the “dead of winter,” but I just heard one of the resident barred owls begin the courtship season, hooting to announce his desire. Local owls mate in late winter so that their young can be well fed on the bounteous harvest of young rodents, whose parents are also breeding now. Coincidentally, monarch butterflies, which over-winter at 3300 meters elevation in the Transvolcanic Mountains of Mexico, are beginning to emerge from their seasonal hibernation in anticipation of returning to the northeastern United States and Canada. It takes as many as four generations of these insects to make the trip. Critical information seems to pass from parent to offspring genetically, enabling this years’ progeny to return to the same geographic regions their forebears frequented in years past. Animals and plants have evolved myriad systems and behaviors that allow them to survive in various conditions. For example, hibernating chipmunks avoid the energy deficits typically encountered during winter in the northeast by entering torpor by lowering their internal temperature to near zero degrees Celsius. Golden-crowned kinglets adapt their feeding behavior to provide enough calories to survive minus thirty degree Celsius nighttime
photo courtesy of Laura Rissolo
In This Issue
Barred Owls usually appear at dusk. Often at the top of Old Town Road, visitors can hear them hooting.
temperatures by keeping their internal temperature at 41.67 degrees Celsius. Other animals produce chemicals enabling them the “super-cool”; their internal temperature drops below freezing without incurring cell damage. Natural selection leads to adaptations which enable successes to be encoded in the DNA of future generations. There is much to be learned from the plants and creatures around us though it seems the more I learn, the greater my amazement. Peace, Tom
Back by Popular Demand After a hiatus of several years Merck Forest and Farmland Center has decided to recommit to keeping in touch with you via our newsletter, the Ridge Line. We hope to use this as a springboard to increase communication with the many people who care so deeply about
our mission to demonstrate sustainable management models for farm and forest land. Merck invites your feedback and wants to ask as many of you as possible to choose to receive the Ridge Line electronically so we can reduce our expenses—and our carbon footprint. Please email us at “info@merckforest.org” to subscribe for the digital copy.