Black Fly Work Day

A good crew turned out on a mostly pleasant but occasionally threatening skies, braving the black flies to get some work done on the hill.

Thanks to Anne and the crew from Mass Highways, we walked the gravel road and explored ideas for improving drainage. Anne made several good suggestions that we'll try to implement over the next few months. Thanks to Kevin Collins for leading this effort.

Jonathan Klinkowski and Tom Walker spent the rest of the afternoon cleaning out our existing culverts best they could given the tools at hand. They report our culverts were pretty well filled in with debris from over the years, and they were able to improve flow considerably though more work is needed.

Barry Hervieux and Tom wrangled mowers around the pavilion, Club House, Gaertner, and upper picnic area.a The grass has really exploded in just a few weeks, and mowing is a necessary job, though thankless hard work with our ancient mowers.

Ray Burk, Peter Scherff and I cleared a beech and birch tree from the clearing.

Dan Carnevale had to postpone the planned Notchview observing due to clouds. Our next event will be the Hilltown Festival at the Cummington Fairgrounds on Saturday, May 14. Should be a fun event. I'm already on the lookout for planets for our "Scale Model Solar System Walk".

-Ed