Working with the trees
Valley News Correspondent HANOVER — About 70 feet up an 80-foot white pine on a private parcel overlooking the Connecticut River, Nate Moore skillfully handles a small chainsaw and carefully cuts a notch near the top of the tree.Moore had already removed all the limbs as he worked his way from the bottom up and was now tackling the main trunk of the tree, removing sections from the top down.Watching from a distance, Travis Vickerson,...
Building for future generations
Valley News Correspondent WOODSTOCK — There are thousands of miles of public trails for hiking and other outdoor pursuits throughout the United States on federal, state and municipally-owned land. From the flat, short and easy stroll through a meadow or marshland to the more challenging steep trails to mountain summits, there are trails for people of every ability level. But, as the National Park Service’s website declares, “trails...
Going from food scraps to more food: How Willow Tree Community Compost and Sunrise Farm partnered together to keep waste out of landfills
By ISAAC LORTON Enterprise Correspondent They’ve been sugaring this spring at Sunrise Farm in White River Junction. They have about 700 tapped trees. They are growing “onions and onion family stuff.” They have a heated greenhouse that is growing what will make you cry chopping in the summer, among other baby plants. With the warmer weather recently, they have been getting regrowth of winter greens that they are starting to harvest...
Resale stores solidify their place: Three retailers reflect on how market for used items has grown
By ISAAC LORTON Enterprise Correspondent For Consign & Design in West Lebanon, Uplifting Thrifting in White River Junction, and Closet Treasures in Grantham, the stores are opportunities for items to have a new life and avoid landfills. During the stay-at-home orders at the beginning of the pandemic, many thrift store and consignment shop owners did not know when — or if — their businesses would reopen again. They worried that...
Feed bags get second chance: Participants in The Family Place’s Farm to Bag program create items, grow workplace skills
By ISAAC LORTON Enterprise Correspondent At the bottom of an empty polypropylene feed bag is potential. Probably not to be recycled because — up until recently — most recycling facilities have not accepted the plastic bags found throughout agrarian New England. The Farm to Bag initiative at The Family Place in Norwich takes donated feed bags and uses them as material to make tote bags, yoga mat carriers and even umbrellas, said Julia...
Exit Interview: Vassie Sinopoulos, of Woven Treasures from Vermont, discusses using recycled materials in her art
By ISAAC LORTON Enterprise Correspondent What got you into weaving and using a loom? My husband’s family from Chicago, they had a couple that lived with them. They were Swedish and he was an architect and also a craftsperson — he worked with wood and metal — and his wife was a weaver and took care of the family. Her loom that her husband had built for her in the beginning of the 1900s, they wanted it to stay in the family but they...
In Demand: Hand-crafted pottery business pulls through during pandemic
In 2016, Georgia Donnelly’s pottery business was flourishing. But with a move back to New Hampshire from Florida, Donnelly wasn’t producing as much. Donnelly was also busy: She had a job as a potter, first for Simon Pearce, then for Fireside Pottery. But she wanted to get back to her own craft and away from the physically taxing work of production pottery, where she might make 100 mugs in a single day. When she bought a house in...
Business of Agriculture: A delicate flower thrives in wintery Vermont
Delicate, fragile and subtle it is. But saffron is finding a foothold in the rocky soils of wintry Vermont. The crocus flower that produces saffron — a flavoring that is said to be the most expensive in the world — is suddenly being planted by the thousands around the state. In March, researchers at the University of Vermont held a saffron workshop attended by about 60 people in person and another 60 online from all over the country....
Exit Interview: King Arthur answers the call when baking gets the best of you
When your bread is sad and your meringue is weeping, when you want to try something new or are struggling to get a recipe just right or when you can’t find yeast, the King Arthur Flour Baker’s Hotline helpers can talk you through your baking woes, questions and experiments. The line has been active since 1993. Baking Specialist Martina Pochop is one of 15 bakers who staff the call center that operates for eight to 12 hours a day, 357...
