BTW Berkshires 
I haven’t caught the time exactly right in years — but on Friday the whole hillside was in bloom. The azaleas are open in Pittsfield State Forest, where the Taconic Crest Trail crosses the ridge above berry pond. You can walk through, but I drove up in the afternoon. You pass wind up the hill, and…
May is an exciting month, writes Berkshire naturalist Thom Smith. Black and white warblers return to nearby woodlots, and spring azure butterflies, become common in open deciduous woodlands and old fields that have grown up to shrubs and small trees. Also look for their blue wings along roads and the edges of woods. * Jack-in-the-pulpit…
As the annual wildflower festival and native plant sale heads into its final weekend, Berkshire naturalist Thom Smith recalls a walk through Bartholomew’s Cobble, a Trustees of reservations Property in Sheffield along the Housatonic River. American author Hal Borland (1900 – 1978), best known for his nature musings, wrote, while living on his 100 acre farm on…
Are these shad blow? Because they’re all over up here. I ask my mother, because she taught me shad bush, serviceberry, years ago, walking the plank walk in the marshy hollow of the woods at the end of our street. But today I ask her by phone, because I’m standing halfway up Pine Cobble. I…
In New England (and old), May Day is traditionally a day for wildflowers. People would go Maying, giving bouquets, decorating the town center with flowers. They would play music and dance. The celebration has roots in Roman and Celtic holidays, and it’s easy to see the same kind of excitement now in the wildflower festival at Bartholomew’s Cobble all this week and the wildflower search at Lime Kiln Sanctuary on Saturday. So here, in celebration, Berkshire naturalist Thom Smith gathers wildflowers in Berkshire woods and fields, and his daughter, Laura Gross, offers a May tribute to each one.
Have you ever seen a bluebird? If you have, it is easy to understand how this beauiful bird got its name. How the larger American robin got its name is more interesting though. Homesick settlers (maybe even the Pilgrims) named our robin after their favorite bird, the robin red-breast, Britain’s National Bird. Both birds have similar…
As crocuses open on these early warm days, Berkshire Naturalist Thom Smith finds signs of the changing season. From early April through mid May, woodland wildflowers appear in greatest numbers and variety. While we thrill at the golden blossoms of the cultivated forsythia, we often overlook the abundance of eye-catching wildflowers. Before foliage covers the…