Hilltop Farm

06/01/2026

Four plants in the same family. All have umbrella-shaped white flower clusters. All have divided feathery leaves. Three of them will hurt you in completely different ways.

🌿 The 3-second field check:

Is it taller than you with massive leaves? Giant hogweed. The sap causes severe blistering burns when skin is exposed to sunlight afterward. Do not touch. Do not cut. Report to your county extension office.

Are the flowers yellow? Wild parsnip. Same phototoxic sap as giant hogweed. Same burn risk. The yellow color is the diagnostic — if the umbrella flowers are yellow, don't touch any part of it.

Is the stem smooth with purple blotches? Poison hemlock. Crush a leaf — it smells musty, not like carrot. Toxic in every part of the plant. Grows in ditches and roadsides across the US.

Is the stem hairy with no blotches? Queen Anne's lace. Crush a leaf or root — it smells like carrot. Flat cluster that curls into a bird's nest shape as it dries. Not toxic.

🐾 The sequence: size first, then flower color, then stem, then smell. Four checks. Four answers.

When unsure, leave it. The safe one has a hairy stem and smells like carrot. Everything else gets distance 🌿

05/30/2026

BLUE MOON THIS WEEKEND! 🌕🩵 It peaks Sunday morning and is the 2nd Full Moon of the month. It’ll be the first monthly Blue Moon in nearly 3 years! Although it won't actually turn blue, it will be what's called a "micromoon", which is more distant from Earth and visually smaller as a result. Get your cameras ready!

05/28/2026

Our Bridal Open House is THIS Sunday! ✨
If you haven’t RSVP’d yet, there’s still time — we can’t wait to see you!

RSVP to [email protected]

05/28/2026

You can tell what a bird eats by looking at its face for one second. The bill is the tool. The shape is the job description.

The cardinal's thick conical bill is a seed crusher — built to crack sunflower shells with force. The chickadee's thin pointed bill is a pair of precision tweezers — picking caterpillars and spiders off leaves one at a time. Same feeder. Completely different equipment.

🌿 The nighthawk is the one that stops people. Her mouth opens wider than her head — a scoop that catches moths in mid-flight. She's not pecking. She's flying with her mouth open and filtering the air.

The heron's bill is a dagger. She stands still for twenty minutes, then strikes faster than you can track — spearing fish, frogs, and mice from the shallows. The woodpecker's bill is a chisel, hammering into bark to extract larvae hidden inside.

The crow's bill does everything adequately and nothing perfectly — seeds, fruit, insects, garbage. The generalist tool for the generalist bird.

Eight bill shapes. Eight diets. The bird at the feeder already told you what she eats — you just have to look at the tool she brought 🐾

05/24/2026

☆ Ladies and Gentlemen, Boys & Girls! ☆
Come One, Come All, to the Marvelous 1886 Vintage Base Ball Festival at Stroh Field, Hilltop Farm, Suffield Connecticut.
• Saturday and Sunday June 20 & 21 • Our home team the Westfield Wheelmen will be Slugging-It-Out with Teams from all
around the Greater Northeast Region! Bring Your lawn chairs & coolers, enjoy the Ole Timey Rivalry and Sportsmanship as it was outfitted and played between the 1864 - 1886 era.
❖ A Splendid Time is Guaranteed For All !! ❖ See less

05/22/2026

‼️ADDED LEWIS’S & IVORY BILLED TO LINE UP‼️ADDED YELLOW BELLIED SAP SUCKER too 🥰🤗‼️ADDED AMERICAN THREE TOED‼️

Most people hear a pileated woodpecker long before they ever see one 🌲

The pounding sounds like someone swinging a bat against a dead tree deep in the woods.

Then suddenly she lands nearby — and everything changes.

She’s massive compared to the little downies and hairies most people know. Nearly crow-sized, with a bright red crest and powerful beak that can tear through dead wood like bark paper.

Those big rectangular holes in trees? That’s her signature. No other woodpecker makes them quite the same.

And when she’s done nesting, her abandoned cavities become prime real estate for owls, ducks, squirrels, and other wildlife that can’t carve homes of their own 🪵

That “dead” tree in your yard may actually be one of the most important parts of the forest ecosystem 🌿

05/21/2026

Coming soon to a Hilltop Farm near you…
Enhance your understanding, and your relationship with your faithful "best" friend!
The Escential Canine is currently offering their refined and notable dog training sessions to again be presented at the Farm!
Please visit their website for more information at: https://www.essentialcanine.net
> > or register directly here:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdXf6-jOST8dvgvsAHCl0U6pxCk7iJe9-nzFPNfcfEjIFrCuw/viewform

This will be an outdoor group class. Working on practical life skills to improve behaviors outside the home. Attention building with distractions & some intro to agility Be prepared to be outside on the farm. *Portion of proceeds go back to support the farm Location: Hilltop Farm 1616 Mapleton Ave S...

05/20/2026

Happy World Bee Day 🌼🐝
To make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee,
One clover, and a bee . . . -Emily Dickinson
One mature tree can have millions of flowers - don't cut it down.
One native seed planted can rematriate a meadow.
One backyard garden can link to millions of bee-yards for bees of every stripe around the world!
Do it for yourself, your grandchildren...and the bees🐝Bzzzzzzzzz! What are your favorite pollinator plants?

05/20/2026

🐝✨ Happy World Bee Day! ✨🐝

Today we celebrate the tiny pollinators that help flowers bloom, gardens grow, and ecosystems thrive. Bees may be small, but their impact is huge. 🌼🌈

Take a moment to appreciate the magic of bees today — and remember, every flower planted helps. 💛