Treleven in June

We’ve been working hard lately to get the several miles of footpaths through the woods on the farm all gussied up, since beginning on August 3^rd we’ll be offering weekly walking tours of the “bat zones” every Saturday morning at 10 a.m. These tours will take place every Saturday morning right through the fall foliage season, up until November 2. Anyone who shows up at Don and Cheryl’s house at 10 a.m. will get a guided tour of the areas where the forest has been reshaped in order to help bats find an attractive shagbark hickory to snooze in through the daylight hours, and also to provide some foraging zones where the mid-story trees have been removed so that bats can hunt insects at night with greater success. (We call these The All-Night Diners.) Don will tell you all about bat project, and show you a copy of his new book FLYING BLIND which tells the story of how we became bat-lovers.

Please come dressed for the weather, and ready to spend about 90 minutes walking on paths of easy to moderate difficulty. Bring a camera, too, because if the weather’s nice we’ll go up what we call “the back cliff” and enjoy a spectacular view of Treleven Farm and the surrounding Champlain Valley.

One part of the “bat project” here has involved a two-year effort to eradicate invasive plant species from the areas where bat habitat was specifically being enhanced. And we thought we’d pretty well succeeded—but sad to say, once again this year we are battling garlic mustard in the old sugarbush close to our house. It’s a very persistent exotic—so if you find it growing on your own premises, watch out! Here’s a picture of this biennial plant in its second-year stage, just before setting the seeds that will bring forth a next generation. Hope we can get them all picked before then!

For a map to Treleven Farm, click here. There should be plenty of parking available right behind Don and Cheryl’s house, which is the last of three houses on Mitchell Drive. Children and pets are welcome, although dogs—because we raise sheep on the farm—will have to be kept on a leash.