The Sheepscot Valley Conservation Association (SVCA) invites volunteers to join our “Green Workout Team” to help with general trail clean-up, painting kiosks, marking trails and bridge building at its 7 public preserves.

The Trout Brook Preserve in Alna is getting a new interpretive trail and the interpretive trails at Marsh River and Palermo will be getting a face-lift this year. Interested trail workers can visit the SVCA website for dates and times and send an email to be added to the workout list.

In addition to trail work, several SVCA properties will be benefiting from active wildlife habitat improvement projects. The Stester Preserve in Jefferson has a number of old brush piles designed for wildlife habitat that need rebuilding. A small pine stand will be thinned as part of timber stand improvement on the property and some areas will be trimmed back to provide habitat for those wildlife species that benefit from forested openings.

The SVCA’s Whitefield Salmon Preserve has an area along the trail that was historically a field. With volunteers we will remove small pines and shrubs to maintain the opening and alders for American woodcock habitat. The property was protected specifically for wildlife habitat along the West Branch and main stem of the Sheepscot River.

Stewardship volunteers do a variety of jobs, including trail and boundary work, collecting data for baselines, creating interpretive materials, monitoring nest boxes, water quality monitoring, and annual monitoring of properties. SVCA stewardship volunteers provide extra eyes and ears to help protect the lands managed by the organization.

Volunteers may commit to an hour or two a year, or to many days during each month! SVCA volunteers have an abundant opportunity to explore lands that are less traveled, provide a valuable service to the organization and learn new skills and natural history along the way!

If you are interested in volunteering for any stewardship task, or just want to know more, please call the office at 207-586-5616 or email Lynne Flaccus at lynne@sheepscot.org. There are opportunities and interesting tasks for everyone!