Please join the faculty/staff adventure group for a walk through the Mill Brook preserve at the north end of North Mannheim Blvd., New Paltz. Meet there in the parking lot at 5:00 p.m. or join us for a walk and roll from College Hall parking to the trail head at 4:45 p.m. All significant others including dogs on leashes welcome. The trail itself is not wheelchair accessible. If you require accommodations, please email (facultycenter@newpaltz.edu) and we will design alternate options, including a meet-up later on.

Info about the Mill Brook Preserve

What did you learn today? Naturalist Alex Bartholomew (Geology) led us through the Mill Brook Preserve, a parcel of land bought by the village and town of New Paltz to save it from developers. We saw trout lilies, skunk cabbage, brittle beech leaves shimmering like beach sand, red-tipped scarlet maples, invasive bittersweet and honeysuckle. The confluence of three creeks is now home to otters who skittered across route 32 and past Stewart’s from the Wallkill to cleaner water. We heard redwing blackbirds and a barred owl near a fox den at the end of a game trail. Fishers living in a tall dead tree are caught on infra-red camera while we are home in bed. The beavers chewed so many trees that their multiplying dams have reshaped the central pond rimmed round by songbird houses monitored by our own New Paltz students in Kara Belinsky’s Biology classes.