It’s been a joy to spend the first month of spring inspecting the trail at the East Branch Nature Preserve at the Catskills Water Discovery Center, a local Catskills conversation non-profit where I have been a board member and secretary since last fall. Last October, a fellow board member and I walked with Laura Silverman of the Outside Institute, and we identified many plant and tree species on our trail. We developed a list of everything that we found on the trail and spent spring watching all of it slowly wake from its slumber.

This week, we walked with the Catskills Forest Association to identify our tree species and prepare for a Tree Identification event that will be open to the public this year.