Adam Moore
With a gust of wind, November blows the last of the oak leaves from the branches and the clear November light pours down from the emptied gulf of sky above. Now begins the other autumn, the autumn of spare and austere beauty, the half of the season that follows the glorious autumn of September and October.
With most leaves fallen, the cold sun of November floods the woodlands with light. It shines through the bare branches, reaching clear to the forest floor where, for the past six months, the sun had struck in dappled rays alone.
Wilfred J. Caron was a quizzical man. He owned a Christmas tree farm in Old Mystic, Conn., right on U.S. Route 1. His ramshackle house was painted pink, with green signs out front, an old cemetery nearby, and new housing development crowding the land on all sides. When I met Mr. Caron, his Christmas trees had grown beyond the reach of his shear and were fast becoming a forest.
Curious, it is, that while some trees evoke only a shrug, others inspire speculation, and exploration, and great trans-Atlantic expeditions, and stir the very highest of hopes. Consider the sassafras.
This fall, Sheriff’s Meadow Foundation will officially allow a restricted amount of bow hunting of deer on certain selected properties. While hunting has occurred on many of our lands over our 50 years, it has not occurred with our sanction. This policy has changed, and the change in policy warrants an explanation.