Category: Outdoors

From Sheep Week to Cow Week, Joppa Hill has all the farm fun

By Zachary Lewis
[email protected]

On a 35-acre parcel of land, The Educational Farm at Joppa Hill provides a path to learning about life on a farm for the whole family with their friendly menagerie of livestock and volunteers to guide you along the way. The farm is open and free to the public from sun-up to sundown every day of the year. Visitors can feed the animals, explore extensive trails, or take part in one of the many events, like fairs, concerts and even a Christmas tree bonfire after the holiday season.

The Farm and barnyard family will be growing this year.

“We are excited to announce that we are acquiring new animals,” Kim Wall, a member of their board of directors, said, and they will be “rebuilding our bunny enclosure, just to give you a hint of some of the animals that might be coming, and … we are redoing all the fencing around the farm and around the animal enclosures.” These additions and renovations will enhance an already pleasant environment.

Because it is an educational farm, Joppa Hill has a bountiful harvest of programs to educate the public throughout the year. One particular program that gets a lot of attention is the summer camp.

“There are kids who will sign up for multiple weeks,” of camp, Wall said. She pointed out a perk to visiting the Farm or attending summer camp: “You can play with these animals and not have them at home.”

Katie Schelzel, Farm Manager and Camp Director, gets a lot of joy from running the summer camp.

“It is so fun to watch [campers] gain ownership in the success of the farm and caring for the animals and taking care of the property and going inside of the barn,” Schelzel said. “My favorite part of camp is when parents come and pick the kids up … and they pull their exhausted parents around the entire farm and show them every animal in detail and stories of all the things they learned throughout the day, and I am an exhausted parent so I know what that’s like, but it’s a real treat to watch them feel so proud of what they do.”

Each camp is centered on activities tailored to a specific barnyard animal.

“For cow week we make butter. For horse week, we’re grooming the horses and bathing the horses. Chicken week we do a lot of experimentation with eggs.’ she said. “There’ll be farm- and animal-themed books. Daily lessons and activities about the animals are what really change.”

Some things are the same every week.

“We have eight weeks, we’re considering adding a ninth, and each week has a different animal theme but every day of every week has the same general routing.” Schelzel said. “Every day kids will do barn chores such as collecting eggs, measuring feed for the animals, or mucking the horse stalls. They’ll go on daily nature hikes.”

Sixty spots per week are available for kids ages 5 to 12 with two cohorts, the first for ages 5 to 8 and the other for 9 to 12, so that the experience is tailored to their age range. The day on the farm goes from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday, and registration starts in late March. Farm members get priority registration.

“It’s really structured so that kids could come for every week and still have something new every week,” Schelzel said. “Even if a week fills up, there’s a waitlist, which isn’t ust like the pie-in-the-sky waitlist …. As parents, you know, you sign your kids up in the spring and then you get an opportunity for summer plans and you have to change your week — so I would definitely encourage parents to use the waitlist … it’s rolling, so there isn’t a deadline.”

The first week of camp starts June 17, and it’s Sheep Week.

Schelzel signed her own daughter up a few years ago and she’s never looked back.

“My daughter actually went five, six years ago to camp, which is how I originally was introduced to the farm,” she said. “And then I started volunteering … working for the farm, and now I’m the Farm Manager and Camp Director and have an amazing team that helps keep it updated … and having an exciting curriculum to learn and be really hands-on with the animals.”

Fresh air with blue skies or rain clouds can’t be beat.

“There’s something naturally therapeutic about being out in nature and with animals all day. One of the most special things about the farm is that everybody leaves happy. Parents can feel good when they pick their kids up at the end of the day that they’re learning about nature and about animals,” Schelzel said. “They’re learning about teamwork and organization and responsibility and they’re having fun while doing it.”

Summer camp with farm animals

The Educational Farm at Joppa Hill
174 Joppa Hill Road, Bedford
theeducationalfarm.org, 472-4724

Camp is 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., $350 per week.
Ages 5 – 8, limited to 30 campers per week.
Ages 9 – 12, limited to 30 campers per week.

Extended day option (limited to 15 campers) offers early drop-off (8 a.m.) and late pick-up (by 5 p.m.) for $75 per week.

Snack boost: $20 per week.
Sheep Week | Week 1: June 17 – June 21
Alpaca Week | Week 2: June 24 – June 28
Duck Week | Week 3: July 8 – July 12
Goat Week | Week 4: July 15 – July 19
Bunny Week | Week 5: July 22 – July 26
Horse Week | Week 6: July 29 – Aug. 2
Chicken Week | Week 7: Aug. 5 – Aug. 9
Cow Week | Week 8: Aug. 12 – Aug. 16

Featured Photo: Courtesy photo.

Animal rehabilitators at Discover Wild NH Day

By Zachary Lewis
[email protected]

The Millstone Wildlife Center in Windham provides an unparalleled service in the Granite State with its devotion to mammal rehabilitation. Executive Director and Licensed Wildlife Rehabilitator Frannie Greenberg and her husband, Michael, who holds a master’s degree in animal science, have dedicated their lives to creatures large and small. They will be at Discover Wild New Hampshire Day in Concord on Saturday, April 20, to educate the public on the hard work they do with the help of animal ambassadors.

Discover Wild New Hampshire Day is a day of educational exhibits and wildlife-related activities for kids and families, including archery, casting and more, hosted by New Hampshire Fish and Game.

“We operate from our home,” Greenberg said. “We are not funded by state or federal government. Everything we receive is from donations from kind individuals that either have brought us an animal or corporations who believe in our mission.” That mission is to rehabilitate as many critters as possible.

“We’re serving almost 1,400 animals a year,” Greenberg said. More and more of our space becomes animal space…. This is quiet time for us. At 42 animals, this is a piece of cake. In the summer we have up to 150 animals here. When some of those eat every two hours, we’re hopping.”

These animals range “from the tiniest little voles all the way up through coyotes,” she said. “We don’t do bear. We don’t do deer and moose. Beyond that, if we are available we take them. Sometimes we are full to the gills with raccoons and I have to find somebody else to take them. Things like a raccoon might be here for six months. They’re a tough one in that they eat a lot, they need to be dewormed, they need to be vaccinated, they need vet care. So there comes a point where we’re out of cage space for them…. We don’t do birds by choice. We don’t have the space.”

MWC has helped bobcats, bats, porcupines, coyotes, foxes and more. Different animals require different care.

“Things like little eastern cottontails stay with mom three weeks,” said Greenberg, “so we’re talking a month, maximum, if we get a newborn. It’s a whole lot easier to go through many, many, many rabbits in a year and … they take up less room, they take less resources, and last year we served 722 Eastern cottontail rabbits that came through our door, so many, many, many.”

Their rehabilitation efforts are not a guise for pest removal, Greenberg said. “I am not here just to take all the things you do not want. People call and say, ‘I have a woodchuck and it just ate all my lettuce.’ That’s not a service we provide.”

Growing up, Greenberg always cared for animals.

“I was a little kid who brought home every animal from wherever,” she said. “From the schoolyard, from the backyard, from a field trip. If there was an animal I brought it home. Luckily I had parents who indulged this. I had a dad who would build a cage or help me figure out how to get it help…. My background is animal science education. I got licensed in 2015 and we’ve grown since then. The plan initially was to start small, have a few animals because I was still doing science education consulting.”

Greenberg is licensed by New Hampshire Fish and Game as a rehabilitator and their home is classified as a permitted facility by the USDA.

“We also raised three little human animals. When my daughters were out of the house, all at college or beyond, was when I said, ‘OK.’” Their full-time rehabilitation mission soon began. “It became apparent very quickly that there’s a huge need in this state, there still is, there are not enough people, understandably because you must give your home, you must give your money, you must give your time. It’s 365 days a year, there’s no vacation, no sick days. It doesn’t matter if it’s Christmas … any day of the year, any time of the day….”

A large part of the work involves education.

“The more we educate people the more people realize we’re here … when they might have otherwise either tried to do it on their own, which is, one, illegal, two, dangerous for the animal…,” she said.

Discover Wild New Hampshiire will have a stage where MWC can do some show and tell with animals.

“We take animals that are registered. We are … licensed by the USDA to keep ambassadors, those animals that are deemed not to be releasable and that can educate the public. Right now we’re planning to bring — and I say we’re planning because with animals you just never know — we are planning to bring our Virginia opossum; she will be in the big area for our 1:30 general presentation,” Greenberg said. “When we bring her out we always try to teach by example and wear gloves so people see that you should always wear gloves, or if you don’t have gloves you use a barrier.”

That isn’t all. “We will also bring along a snake and a turtle,” Greenberg said. “If they’re nervous, we put them back; if they’re comfortable a snake can just sit on us.”

Discover Wild New Hampshire Day
When: Saturday, April 20, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Where: Fish and Game Headquarters, 11 Hazen Drive, Concord
Admission: Free. Trained service dogs only.
More: wildlife.nh.gov

Millstone Wildlife Center
millstonewildlife.com
320-0941

Featured Photo: Woodchucks. Courtesy of MWC.

Enjoy pipe bands and much more

By Zachary Lewis
[email protected]

Scotland lies about 3,050 miles to the slight northeast of New Hampshire, as the crow flies if crows fly across the Atlantic. A shorter trip is to the 21st Annual New Hampshire Indoor Scottish Festival on Saturday, April 20, at Salem High School, where you will feel as if you had made that trans-Atlantic journey.

The New England Scottish Arts Centre, the organization behind the event, was founded in 1984 and this is their festival where they showcase the cultural history of Scotland. Traditional Scottish dance, pipe and drum music, and representatives from various clans will fill the area with the sights and sounds of the Scottish Highlands, minus the sheep and caber-tossing, for this massive competition.

Scottish Arts also holds classes year-round on Highland dance, piping and fiddle, and even hosts a kilt-making workshop in the winter months as well as other events and festivals.

“It’s the largest indoor contest in North America,” said Lezlie Webster, founder and director of Scottish Arts. Webster is the head piping instructor as well as a Highland dance instructor.

“A lot of people from all over New England, including New Jersey and Pennsylvania, are coming up, and New York. It’s a huge competition … 14 pipe bands from New York all the way through to Maine. Highland dancers, same thing,” Webster said. More than 100 soloists for piping and drumming are competing as well.

The festival starts with dance.

“The dancing is in the morning only and that’s … on the main stage in the big theater…,” Webster said. “Solo piping and drumming are down the hall, around the corner, and they are starting at 8 a.m. … because there are so many of them and they go through till about 1.”

“In the middle of that,” Webster said, “the pipe bands start arriving around 10, 10:30, and they go upstairs to classrooms and they start warming up there and in hallways, and every nook and cranny, so the building is alive by noon hour just with so much stuff going on … and it’s free. Very free.” Brave participants will even get a chance to try the Highland Fling themselves.

As the dancing dwindles, the music heads to the forefront. “The pipe band competitions will take over the stage [at] about 1:30 and they’ll go till 4. The end is a little recital by a couple of our piping judges that are world famous, some of the top in the world.” These include Bruce Gandy, Derek Midgley and Andrew Douglas.

Claire MacPherson, president and coordinator of clans and societies for Scottish Arts, who is originally from Grantown-on-Spey in the Highlands of Scotland, expands on the activities of the day and advises participants to “start with the clans because … everything in the games will make sense if you go to the clans and particularly if you are looking to trace your Scottish heritage, your clan might not be there, but these people are so incredibly knowledgeable, they’ve been doing it for decades.”

Food trucks will be outside as Celtic clothing, artwork, jewelry and face painting will be available on top of learning about Scottish heritage from the various clans, clan associations and societies.

One such society is the Scots’ Charitable Society — “they were formed in 1657 by former Scots prisoners of war,” MacPherson said. Those prisoners are highlighted in John D. Demos’ workshop called “The Seventeenth Century Scottish Prisoners of War in New Hampshire and Maine.” Demos, former archivist for Old Berwick Historical Society in Maine, will go over in precise historical detail their odyssey of capture in 1650 by Oliver Cromwell during the English civil war.

Demos said, “Cromwell and the English decided they were going to try to get rid of the rest and send them away where they couldn’t cause anymore trouble and they ended up packing off 150 to New England who came into Boston…. Many of those ended up at the Saugus Iron Works.”

These historical roots established a Scottish heritage in the Granite State. “I discovered my culture,” MacPherson said, “I think, from the descendants of Highlanders who are here in New England, and that’s really amazing, I think, personally. It’s very touching, it’s very humbling.”

Rain or shine, The Scottish Highlands will be alive in Salem on Saturday, April 20.

“The weather can do what it likes,” MacPherson said, “but people can be comfortable in a nice seat in this building that was purpose-built for the sound and just enjoy a big pipe band. It’s a really lovely treat.

21st Annual Indoor Scottish Festival
When: Saturday, April 20, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Where: Salem High School (44 Geremonty Drive in Salem)
Admission: free
More: nhssa.org

Featured Photo: Courtesy photo.