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May 1, 2009

Forest Landowners to Sell Carbon Credits: a pilot study

Managing forests to sequester carbon is often mentioned as a strategy to address concerns about increasing levels of carbon dioxide and climate change. In Massachusetts and many other eastern states, most forest is owned by private families and individuals. Consequently, it is important to understand the factors that influence the likelihood of landowners choosing to sell sequestered carbon and participate

May 1, 2009

Partners in conservation

In the April issue of Mass Audubon's magazine Connections, Chris Leahy describes the partnership between MassAudubon and the Harvard Forest's Ants of Massachusetts project. Begun in 2007 by Senior Ecologist Aaron Ellison, Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology ant systematists Stefan Cover and Gary Alpert, and University of Vermont Biologist Nick Gotelli, the Ants of Massachusetts project is working to develop

May 1, 2009

Fisher Museum opens for Summer Hours

Image from Fisher Museum

The Fisher Museum will be open on the weekends from 12pm-4pm from May - October, in addition to the weekday hours of 9am - 4pm. The Fisher Museum's main exhibit displays twenty-three internationally acclaimed models (dioramas) portraying the history, conservation and management of central New England forests. Other exhibits at the museum represent the range of Harvard Forest's

May 1, 2009

Harvard Forest Hosts Workshop with an Eye to the Future

Workshop attendees 1

A diverse group of social and ecological scientists recently gathered at the Harvard Forest to ponder potential ecological futures around Long Term Ecological Research (LTER) sites. They were participants in the "Scenarios of Future Landscape Change Workshop," which was designed to encourage prescient thinking in coupled human-natural systems where true prediction is not possible. The workshop was funded

May 1, 2009

Harvard Forest Summer Institute for Teachers

Summer Institute for Teachers August 10, 2009- The Harvard Forest offers a Forest Ecology training institute for teachers of grades 2-12. Learn how to implement field studies related to local ecosystems with your students right in your schoolyard. 

April 1, 2009

New Harvard Forest Publication: Predicting Ecological Regime Shifts

Former Harvard Forest student Raphael Contamin and Harvard Forest Senior Ecologist Aaron Ellison analyzed the classic lake model of Steve Carpenter and William Brock to determine how much advance warning indicators of regime shifts provide to managers interested in preventing dramatic ecosystem changes. Their analysis suggests that an indicator based on the high-frequency signal in the spectral density of the

April 1, 2009

New Harvard Forest LTER Brochure

LTER Brochure

Since 1988, Harvard Forest has been a National Science Foundation Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) site. This group of more than 25 sites studies and compares ecological processes, which typically take many years to understand, in ecosystems ranging from the arctic to the Everglades and from coral reefs to deserts. We have just produced a new brochure that

April 1, 2009

Harvard Forest Seeks Rememdy for Illegal Cutting and Environmental Destruction

Illegal Logging

In January 2008, in conjunction with tree harvesting on abutting Petersham Country Club property, Harvard Forest experienced illegal cutting of nearly 100 trees on its property and significant environmental damage to the surrounding forest, including a fragile vernal pool. This Fact Sheet and the accompanying map/photographs describe and illustrate the damage, outline Harvard Forest's goals, and provide substantial

April 1, 2009

New Species Added to Research with Grant

Sydne Record, a Ph.D. student in the Plant Biology program at the University of Massachusetts whose dissertation research is being supervised by Harvard Forest Senior Ecologist Aaron Ellison, has received a Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant (DDIG) from the National Science Foundation. The DDIG will enable Sydne to expand her research on forecasting demography and population viability of the regionally rare

April 1, 2009

Forest Ecology and Management training for Landowners

Keystone Trainees 2009

On April 23rd-26th, Harvard Forest will be hosting the annual Keystone Project training. Keystone, an effort of UMass Amherst, is an intensive three day seminar on forest ecology and management, wildlife management, land protection, and community outreach. It is designed to train landowners and community leaders in forest conservation. The goal of Keystone is to put into place in each

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