Anna Laird Barto

First Lady Jill Biden hailed this year’s White House Christmas tree as a symbol of resilience. The 20-foot Fraser fir withstood the floods and landslides of Hurricane Helene in September, which killed over 5,000 other trees on the Cartner family’s christmas tree farm in Avery County, North Carolina . Meanwhile, the stately Norway spruce which illuminates Rockefeller Center this season was shipped from western Massachusetts, where growers have lost up to 25% of young trees to severe drought condi...

Twice a growing season, a big yellow truck with the license plate “P4FARMS” pulls into Jesse Kayan’s farm in Brattleboro, Vermont, loaded with a thousand gallons of pasteurized human urine sloshing around in IBC totes.For more than 10 years, Kayan has been applying human urine to his hayfields through a partnership with the Brattleboro-based Rich Earth Institute, a non-profit engaging in research, education and technological innovation to advance the use of human waste as a resource. In August,...

Last summer, I chronicled my 68-mile paddle of the Connecticut River through Massachusetts. Along the way, I became very well acquainted with the river, its bends and currents, dams and bridges, trees and wildlife — even its sewage overflows! Here are a few of my favorite sections, which highlight the richly varied landscape and character of our valley.

These four-to-seven-mile segments can be paddled in a day or an afternoon, depending on your speed. It takes some coordination to shuttle boats