Boston Flora

Tag: New England Forestry Foundation

  • Sunday, June 15 – Application Deadline: 2025 New England Leopold Conservation Award

    The Leopold Conservation Award Program recognizes and celebrates achievement in voluntary conservation by agricultural landowners. Sand County Foundation, our national sponsor American Farmland Trust, and conservation partners across the U.S. present the prestigious honor, which consists of $10,000 and a crystal award, in settings that showcase the landowners’ achievements among their peers.

    The Leopold Conservation Award program widely shares the stories of these conservation-minded farmers, ranchers, and forestland owners to inspire countless other landowners to embrace opportunities to improve soil health, water resources and wildlife habitat on their working land. Finally, the program builds bridges between agriculture, government, environmental organizations, industry and academia to advance the cause of environmental improvement on private land. The New England award is presented in partnership with American Farmland Trust and the New England Forestry Foundation. The nomination deadline is June 15, 2025. Apply at https://sandcountyfoundation.org/our-work/leopold-conservation-award/application-info

  • Tuesday, June 10, 12:30 pm – 3:00 pm – New England Forestry Foundation Annual Meeting

    Join New England Forestry Foundation (NEFF) for our free 81st Annual Meeting Celebration! Head to NEFF headquarters in Littleton, MA, on June 10 as we celebrate another successful year.

    Guests will enjoy a beautiful, outdoors catered lunch surrounded by wildflowers and hear plans for the year ahead. Attendees can also help us honor our most steadfast supporters and woodland advocates, and catch up with old friends and make new ones.

    Kindly RSVP as soon as possible (deadline was May 9 but do contact them). Speaker Ethan Breitling is Vice President for Strategic Communications at the National Alliance of Forest Owners (NAFO). A native New Englander, Ethan began his career running a sawmill and teaching forestry and ecology at a 100-year-old Boy Scout summer camp in the Adirondack Park. The camp owned and operated its own working forest, which not only provided him with hands-on experience in forest management but also taught him the foundations of strategic communications—convincing 11-year-old boys that the Forestry Merit Badge is exciting.

    In Washington, DC, Ethan has built his career by specializing in communicating complex scientific and policy concepts to diverse audiences. Before joining NAFO, Ethan worked at Bay Armoury Consulting, where he managed several fundraising communications campaigns for federal, state, and local races, all aimed at promoting moderation in politics. He earned his degree in Political Science from Western Connecticut State University and studied Foreign Policy at American University.

  • Wednesday, January 26, 12:00 noon – 1:00 pm – Engaging Landowners in Sustainable Stewardship, Online

    The decisions that private owners of woodlands and other natural areas make in the coming decade will play a large role in determining the sustainability of not only our New England landscape but across the country as well.

    How can we reach and motivate this audience to take specific actions that will benefit not only their own lands, but the larger landscape and community? This Ecological Landscape Alliance online presentation on January 26 at noon will share experiences and lessons from a multi-year landowner outreach project in the MassConn Woods, a rural, largely forested region on the border of central Massachusetts and northeastern Connecticut, as well as region-wide efforts to unite rural and urban communities in implementing natural solutions to climate change. We’ll discuss tools and resources for promoting climate change resilience and developing communications to motivate stakeholders across the country to take action in order to care for the places they love.

    Presenter Lisa Hayden  is the Outreach Manager for New England Forestry Foundation, where she works with steward volunteers and leads an outreach program in the MassConn Woods of south central Massachusetts and northeastern Connecticut. Collaborating with numerous partners, her recent grant-funded work focuses on creating and implementing communications tools about climate-informed forestry for land trusts and conservation partnerships. With a Journalism degree from the University of Connecticut and an MA in Urban & Environmental Policy & Planning from Tufts University, Lisa brings experience from The Nature Conservancy developing strategic messaging and blogging about how climate change affects people’s lives. A former journalist covering politics and environment in Connecticut and California, and a woodland owner herself, she is excited to be supporting land owners in her home area.

    Free to ELA members, $10 for nonmembers. Register at www.ecolandscaping.org.