Mark your calendars! On Saturday, June 2 you are invited to celebrate Champlain Area Trails (CATS) between 4:00 PM and 6:00 PM at Blockhouse Farm in Essex, New York. Discover what the CATS crew has been up to over the last year and join us on the adventure ahead. Brian Mann, inspiring commentator for Adirondack Life, Adirondack Explorer and North Country Public Radio, will address matters local, environmental and outdoorsy. Don't miss out!

[Originaly published in the Adirondack Almanack on February 6, 2012.]

An independent field biology study turned out to be especially fruitful for both teacher and student. Every week since January 2011, Westport ninth-grader Peter Hartwell and mentor David Thomas Train have been exploring the Champlain Area Trails along shoreline, streams, wetlands, and woods near Westport. Those explorations eventually prompted them to enter the Champlain Area Trails Society Travel Writing Contest.

We have some fabulous winners in the first Champlain Area Trails Travel Writers Contest! 

Here are two great outdoor opportunities to learn more about the animals who live in the forests, fields, and wetlands around us.  One is an all-day hike to see how animals prepare for winter and the other invites you to join the next Keeping Track training program.  Here are the details and attached are flyers describing both programs:
 
How Wildlife Prepare for Winter - Saturday, December 10th, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Two youngsters hike up the Cheney Mountain Trail in Moriah (photo by Elizabeth Lee)

Please join us on Saturday morning, November 5 at 8:30 when we return to Cheney Mountain in Moriah to hike up through the forest, enjoy the views and clear the final 200 feet of trail to the best overlook.  Click on this link   http://www.thevalleynews.org/news/2011/oct/26/cheney-mountain-trail-work-continues/   -  to see an article from the Valley News describing the trail party.  It feature

We had a great turnout for the October 8 trail project at Cheney Mountain in Moriah, with volunteers coming from Port Henry, Mineville, Moriah, Crown Point, Westport, Wadhams, Essex, and even southeast Kentucky.   After some tasty muffins, welcoming words, and introductions we cut branches and saplings, removed fallen logs, weed-whacked through tall goldenrod, and put up trail markers as we worked uphill to the summit.
 
Cheney Mountain is shaped like a loaf of bread so the top of the mountain has a long, fairly level surface with rock outcrops near the edges and numero

Champlain Area Trails was recently featured on North Country Public Radio in a radio interview with Brian Mann.  In case you did not hear the program, click on the link below to hear about our work to create trails that link communities, connect people with nature, promote economic vitality, and protect natural areas, farms, and scenic vistas.

http://www.northcountrypublicradio.org/news/story/18571/20111011/new-adirondack-grou