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Annual Fall Festival Slated at Hopkins Forest - September 18, 2007
WILLIAMSTOWN - The Hopkins Forest Fall Festival will be held Sunday, Sept. 23, from 1 to 4 p.m. Hopkins Forest is managed by the Williams College Center for Environmental Studies and is situated at the intersection of Northwest Hill Road and Bulkley Street. The annual event is free and open to the public.
Festival-goers will be able to explore the life of the forest at a number of science stations, forest-related trades and crafts stations, and a cider-pressing station. It will include children's events and performances by local musicians. Refreshments will be provided.
The forest has long been a center of scientific research and exploration. The widow of Col. Amos Lawrence Hopkins, the son of college President Mark Hopkins and an 1863 alumnus, offered the forest to the college in 1934. From 1934 to 1971, the U.S. Forest Service used it as a research site. In 1971, the original 1,600-acre plot expanded to 2,500 acres and the forest has become an invaluable research facility for Williams College.
The forest service's research projects focused on forestry, meteorology, hydrology and tree genetics. Today, professors and students are building on that collection of work. Professor of geology and mineralogy David Dethier carries out meteorological, hydrological, and biogeochemical monitoring in the forest. Landscape historian and professor of biology Henry Art studies the developments of plant communities with the help of forest monitoring records that date back to the 1930s. Tom Baribault from the University of Vermont studies sugar maples that the forest service planted in the 1960s. The trees are peculiar for their high sap sweetness potential and Baribault is working to identify the genes for sweetness in the tree's DNA.
New projects are always emerging. Professor of biology Joan Edwards is analyzing the population dynamics of the invasive garlic mustard plant in the forest. Assistant professor of biology Manuel Morales is studying ant/treehopper mutualism. Senior lecturer in biology David Smith has studied black-capped chickadees, among dozens of other research projects in the forest.
The Center for Environmental Studies encourages disciplinary and interdisciplinary teaching, academic activity, and research in the forest. Andrew Jones is the manager of the forest. |
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