Hilltown Legacy Tree Project

11/26/2025

10/26/2023

Volunteers needed this Sunday - 10/29 10-2 - to plant 50 trees at Buckland-Shelburne Elementary School! Bring a shovel if you can and help us dig some holes!

07/29/2023

Please complete this form to urge Governor Healey to include the Municipal Reforestation Program in the upcoming Environmental Bond Bill. The full text of the letter you are signing on to is shown below this form. Learn more about the Act Establishing the Municipal Reforestation Program in this fact...

02/15/2023

07/14/2022

🌳🌳🌳🎤 🌟 MTWP Public Listening Sessions 🌟🎤🌳🌳🌳

04/27/2022

Arbor Day is Friday. What will you do to commemorate?

03/27/2022

Happy spring!

2-8-16 BUD SCALES
Much of this coming summer’s woody plant growth is contained in embryonic form inside a tree’s buds. Buds contain an undeveloped shoot, leaf, and/or flower. Formed last summer, these buds must survive the freezing and fluctuating temperatures, relatively dry air and the potential insect, bird and fungal damage that may occur during the fall, winter and early spring.

Bud scales, which are small, modified leaves, cover and protect many of these buds. The number of scales, their arrangement, color, presence or absence of hairs or sticky substances are often distinctive. Willows have one visible bud scale (actually two fused into one), whereas pine and fir buds may have anywhere from 100 to 350. The scales on a bud can either be arranged in pairs facing each other edgewise (American Basswood, pictured) or overlapping like shingles (Sugar Maple, pictured). Colors range from the wine-colored bud scales of Striped Maple to the mustard yellow Bitternut Hickory scales. The texture of bud scales has great variation, including the satiny-smooth hairy bud scales of Box Elder (pictured). Many bud scales, such as poplars, are covered by a gummy substance which serves as added protection.

A few trees and shrubs have buds that lack scales. These are referred to as “naked” buds, and often the embryonic leaves are quite hairy. Witch Hazel, Hobblebush and Staghorn Sumac (pictured) are species of woody plants lacking bud scales.

Most buds have multiple scales which, upon falling off when the bud opens, leave a series of horizontally-elongated scars on the surface of the growing stem. By means of these scars one can determine the age of a young branch, since each year's growth ends in the formation of a terminal bud which produces an additional group of bud scale scars. Continued growth of the branch causes these scars to be indistinguishable after a few years so that the age of older branches cannot be determined by this means.

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03/22/2022

Dutch elm disease came to Connecticut in 1933, and it struck very deeply into the hearts of New Englanders who feared the extinction of their beloved elms.

03/19/2022

03/17/2022

Congrats, Greenfield!

01/15/2022

Studying conifer cones is a worthy investment of time. Many conifers can be positively identified by their mature seed cones alone. Pictured here are seed cones produced by 15 conifers that grow in Eastern North America, alphabetized by scientific name. In a few months, I will be releasing an extensive online tree identification course that goes into much more detail. If you are interested in staying up to date with its release, please subscribe to the Learn Your Land email newsletter (https://learnyourland.com). For now, enjoy these 15 conifers!

10/26/2021

Are you interested about the science and logistics of growing trees in paved sites? Think grow pits, sidewalks, root establishment irrigation...

The webinar will be focused on the effects of impermeable, permeable, and porous pavements on tree growth and physiology. It will unravel the changes induced by the different pavement types on soil traits, and how this impacts tree health. The presentation will first focus on newly planted, establis...