This spring weekend, there are a variety of events in and around the Berkshires, including Spring Celebrations, music, cleanups, and more.
Editor's Pick
Downtown Celebrates Spring Week
Downtown Pittsfield
Saturday & Sunday
There will be various events to celebrate spring, including a beach and tea party, and a free Kids' Paint & Sip event.
The featured event is "Where's Winston?" a spring scavenger hunt for images of the Pittsfield Police Department's comfort dog, Officer Winston, at a dozen downtown locations. More information here.
Friday
Tattoo Body Art Show
Bennington (Vt.) Museum
Time: 6 to 9 p.m.
During the show, models will share their tattoo stories, and tattoo artists show off their work. There is a $10 cover charge. There will be prizes awarded to models with the audience's favorite body art.
DJ Pup Daddy will be performing some of his favorite albums and encourages the community to bring their own. More information here.
Rock and Roll Performance
Zinky's Pub, Dalton
Time: 8 to 11 p.m.
Western Mass rock 'n' roll band The 413s will perform. Food and drinks are available for purchase, and there is no cover charge. Information is here.
Free Swimming
Berkshire Family YMCA
Time: noon and 3 p.m.
The pool is open to families looking to dive into some fun and quality time together. This event is open to swimmers of all ages and abilities.
Free Family Movie
North Adams Public Library
Time: 2 p.m.
Families can enjoy a screening of the movie "Wish" with free popcorn and drinks in the third-floor community room. Youth under the age of 10 must have an adult present at all times.
School Break Kidspace Workshops
Mass MoCA, North Adams
Time: 11 a.m.
The final workshop of the Spring Break workshop series will introduce participants to the creative process behind Sol LeWitt's wall drawings
Kids will explore conceptual art, color theory, lines, geometric shapes, and follow instructions to re-create LeWitt's wall drawings.
This will be the last indoor market of the season and features local dairy, meats, produce and foods as well as artisan vendors and music. The market returns for the summer season on May 18 on Spring Street.
420 Hoopla
Himalayan High, Becket
Time: 8:30 a.m. to 8 p.m.
This free event is an opportunity for 21-plus cannabis enthusiasts to connect with Massachusetts craft cultivators and enjoy ice cream and pop-ups. More information here.
Annual 420 Festival
Little City Cider Co., Bennington, Vt.
Time: doors open at 4; music starts at 7
People 21 and up are invited to the 2nd annual 420 festival, which features live music, food, beverages, and an opportunity to connect with Vermont's cannabis growers. No cannabis sales onsite.
Celebrate Earth Day and the Great Global Cleanup by helping Hoosic River Revival clean up various sites along our Hoosic River within North Adams city limits. More information here.
Pittsfield Dog Park Spring Cleanup
Pittsfield Dog Park
Time: 10 to noon
The Pittsfield Parks Department and current volunteers will be cleaning up the park. The event features free food for humans and dogs. More information here.
Open Farm Day
Second Chance Stables & Draft Rescue
Time: 2 to 4.
The farm at 262 Loop Road in Savoy will be open to meet the rescue animals and learn about its operations. Complimentary tea, coffee and cookies will be available and a belated Easter egg hunt will be held.
There is no charge to visit but if you choose to make a donation you will be entered for a door prize. A waiver is required to enter the property and will be available at the door. This is a working farm so dress appropriately.
AC/DC tribute band Back In Black will perform some of the rock band's old and new music. Tickets cost $25. More information here.
Sunday
Gentle Yoga Class
Berkshire Community College, Pittsfield
Time: 11:45 a.m.
Hang with My Soul will lead a beginner-level, gentle yoga class in the Patterson Field House. Tickets cost $7 or free for students and faculty. More information here.
The Exchange
The Stationery Factory, Dalton
Time: 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
There will be a farmer's and flea market where people can buy, sell, or trade art, collectibles, antiques, vintage clothing, jewelry, and more.
The event also features baked pastries, Charlie's Bistro Box food truck, and live music. More information here.
Multiple Days
Baby Animals at Hancock Shaker Village
Through Sunday, May 5
The museum is concluding its baby animals festival this weekend. Visitors can meet the farm's newest editions, including lambs, kids, piglets, calves, and chicks.
Festival goers can participate in daily events and activities, including talks about the farm and the Shakers, craft demonstrations, and more. More information here.
General admission is $20 for adults, $8 for youths ages 13-17, and children 12 and under are free. More information here.
Disney's 'Frozen JR.'
The Colonial Theatre, Pittsfield
Friday through Sunday
The students from Berkshire County and beyond will take center stage to perform this condensed version of the popular "Frozen."
The production is based on the 2018 Broadway musical, which features beloved songs from the film, such as "Let It Go" and "Do You Want to Build a Snowman," in addition to five new songs created for the Broadway production.
It expands upon the journey from the original film and "explores the depth of the sisters' relationship when faced with danger, revealing their hidden potential and the unbreakable bond of sisterhood."
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Amphibious Toads Procreate in Perplexing Amplexus
By Tor HanseniBerkshires columnist
Toads lay their eggs in the spring along the edges of waterways. Photos by Tor Hansen.
My first impressions of toads came about when my father Len Hansen rented a seaside house high on a sand dune in North Truro, Cape Cod back in 1954.
With Cape Cod Bay stretching out to the west, and Twinefield so abundant in wildflowers to the east, North Truro became a naturalist's dream, where I could search for sea shells at the seashore, or chase beetles and butterflies with my trusty green butterfly net.
Twinefield was a treasure trove for wildlife — a vast glacial rolling sandplain shaped by successive glaciers, its sandy soil rich in silicon, thus able to stimulate growth for a diverse biota. A place where in successive years I would expand my insect collection to fill cigar boxes with every order of insects abounding in beach plum, ox-eye daisy and milkweed. During our brief summer vacation there, we boys would exclaim in our excitement, "Oh here is another hoppy toad," one of many Fowler's toads (Bufo woodhousei fowleri ) that inhabited the moist surroundings, at home in the Ammophyla beach grass, thickets of beach plum, bayberry, and black cherry bushes.
They sparkled in rich colors of green amber on beige and reddish tinted warts. Most anurans have those glistening eyes, gold on black irises so beguiling around the dark pupils. Today I reflect on a favorite analogy, the riveting eye suggests a solar eclipse in pictorial aura.
In the distinct toad majority in the Outer Cape, Fowler's toads turned up in the most unusual of places. When we Hansens first moved in to rent Riding Lights, we would wash the sand and salt from our feet in the outdoor shower where toads would be drinking and basking in the moisture near my feet. As dusk fades into darkness, the happy surprise would gather under the night lights where moths were fluttering about the front door and the toads would snatch bugs with outstretched tongue.
In later years, mother Eleanor added much needed color and variety to Grace's original garden. Our smallest and perhaps most acrobatic butterflies are the skippers, flitting and somersaulting to alight and drink heartily the nectar abounding at yellow sickle-leaved coreopsis and succulent pink live forever sedums of autumn. These hearty late bloomers signaled oases for many fall migrants including painted ladies, red admirals and of course monarchs on there odyssey to over-winter in Mexico.
Our newly found next-door neighbors, the Bergmarks, added a lot to share our zeal for this undiscovered country, and while still in our teens, Billy Atwood, who today is a nuclear physicist in California, suggested we should include the Baltimore checkerspot in our survey, as he too had a keen interest in insects. Still unfamiliar to me then, in later years I would come across a thriving colony in Twinefield, that yielded a rare phenotype checkerspot (Euphydryas phaeton p. superba) that I wrote about featured in The Cape Naturalist ( Museum of Natural History, Brewster Cape Cod 1991).
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The fate of the facility attached to Brayton School has been in limbo since the closure of the pool last year because of structural issues and the departure of the Berkshire Family YMCA in March.
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The School Committee will be presented next week with a $20 million spending plan for fiscal 2025 that includes closing Greylock School and a reduction of 26 full-time positions.
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The initiative was sparked by the Police Department's acquisition of bike helmets as part of a Municipal Road Safety Grant, according to Police Chief Mark Bailey.
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President Jamie Birge told the board of trustees on Thursday that the college has been in discussions for the last couple years with a donor who wishes at this point to remain anonymous.
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