Come learn some easy tools to jump start our month-long Hike Barnstable celebration. As a BLT partner, Appalachian Mountain Club’s Southeastern MA chapter will be doing a brief tutorial and 4 mile hike in the Eagle Pond conservation area in Cotuit. This FREE event will be approximately 2 hours in length. The tutorial will provide an introduction on how to use a trail map and/or trail app to map out a hike or keep track of where you are from the start of the hike. If you plan to use an app, please download AllTrails on your phone prior to the hike. After the tutorial, we will take a hike around Eagle Pond and a white cedar swamp which will allow participants to use their new skills. The hike will be on flat wooded trails with lots of uneven terrain. Participants must wear sturdy shoes/sneakers or ideally hiking footwear, no sandals. Hiking poles will be useful but not required. Bring fluids for hydration. This is a registration required event limited to 20 participants. To register for this hike just click the Register Now link on the posting which will be active two weeks before the event. You will have to create a username and password if you do not have one. This program is part of Hike Barnstable which is supported in part by Cape Cod Healthcare. NOTE:  You do not need to be an AMC member to participate.

Barnstable Land Trust, Orenda Wildlife Land Trust, and Sturgis Library partner with Mark Robinson, long-time director of The Compact of Cape Cod Conservation Trusts, who will present a lively presentation on the “A History and A Future for Land Conservation on Cape Cod.” This presentation will provide an overview of themes driving efforts to preserve the Cape, from early philanthropic gifts and civic beauty efforts, to the powerful rise of land trusts and municipal programs beginning in earnest in the 1980s. There will be a focus on Barnstable projects. Projected 21st century trends of undevelopment and ecorestoration will be discussed.

Mr. Robinson has served as director of The Compact of Cape Cod Conservation Trusts since its founding in 1986. He has assisted Cape towns and land trusts in preserving more than 15,000 acres of land as open space since then, including those of the Barnstable Land Trust. The Compact represents 32 local and regional nonprofit land trusts and watershed groups operating on Cape Cod. Mark has served on the board of the Mass. Land Trust Coalition and is a regular lecturer at the national conference of land trusts.

Hike 1.5-miles through Sandy Neck’s Great Marsh and sand dunes to explore barrier beach flora and fauna with Barnstable Land Trust and Sandy Neck Park Staff. You’ll learn about ongoing efforts to protect and restore these and other sensitive natural communities. Wear sturdy hiking boots to walk over sand and uneven terrain. For more information call the Gatehouse: 508-362-8300. This hike is free. NOTE: All Sandy Neck hikes are considered strenuous in difficulty because this includes walking on loose sand.

Celebrate the Solstice on Cape Cod with a free community event that will be music to your ears as the summer officially kicks-off. In a unique collaboration between Barnstable Land Trust, Cape Symphony, Cape Cod CAN, Cotuit Library, and AmeriCorps Cape Cod, the community is invited to bring a picnic and their own flower pots (BYOFP) to BLT’s Ropes Field conservation property in Cotuit for a participatory percussion concert that is also part of warm-up events for international Make Music Day and National Pollinator Month festivities! Pollinator arts/crafts tables will be hosted by the Cotuit Library from 5:30 - 6:30 pm. Thanks to the Make Music Day Alliance, Free Vic Firth mallets available while supplies last. Bring your chair or blanket, and a small to mid-size pottery or ceramic flower pots (metal mixing bowls also work). Let us know if you are thinking of coming by registering below. This program is part of Hike Barnstable which is supported in part by Cape Cod Healthcare.

Ropes Field is located at 58 Putnam Ave, Cotuit, MA 02635. Free parking is available a short walk away at Lowell Park (10 Lowell Ave, Cotuit, MA 02635).

Discover hidden Piping Plover nests along the front beach with Barnstable Land Trust and Sandy Neck Park staff on a one-mile hike through the dunes of Sandy Neck. Explore barrier beach ecology. Learn about the Piping Plover’s life-cycle and conservation measures being taken to protect these endangered shorebirds. Wear hiking boots for sand/uneven terrain. For more information call the Gatehouse: 508-362-8300. This hike is free. NOTE: All Sandy Neck hikes are considered strenuous in difficulty because this includes walking on loose sand.

Join BLT, the Cape Cod Museum of Natural History, and the Thornton Burgess Society at the Center for Active Living in Sandwich for the 3rd in a series on Thornton Burgess Nature Books for Children, part of a year-long celebration of Burgess’ 150th birthday. This event will feature three noted conservation authorities and moderator, author Christie Palmer Lowrance. Light refreshments will be served.

Admission is Free / Reservations Recommended. Tickets available online at thorntonburgess.org.

Get the latest buzz about the blood thirsty bugs who want to take a bite out of your summer fun. Join Gabrielle Sakolsky, Superintendent of the Cape Cod Mosquito Control Project, and CCMCP entomologist, Aubrey Paolino, about the historic origins and current thinking surrounding this buggy battle that includes insights about the Cape's mosquito, greenhead fly, and deer fly populations. This program is part of Hike Barnstable which is supported in part by Cape Cod Healthcare.

Join BLT, Pollinator Pathways of Cape Cod, and the Association to Preserve Cape Cod for this Cape-wide program. Learn pollinator basics, how and why the Pollinator Pathways Cape Cod initiative came into being, and the steps that you, your business, and your organization can take to be part of the pathway creating safe pollinator habitat across cape cod. This presentation is by Kristin Andres from the Association to Preserve Cape Cod, and Stephen O'Grady of the Orleans Conservation Trust.

Join Barnstable Land Trust and Barnstable Clean Water Coalition (BCWC) staff on a tour of BCWC's historic 1800's cranberry bogs at the headwaters of the Marstons Mills River. Learn about BCWC's ongoing wetlands restoration work to remove nitrogen flowing downriver through 64 acres of bogs and how this bog system provides an opportunity to improve water quarlity in the Three Bays estuary. This one hour program is part of Hike Barnstable which is supported in part by Cape Cod Healthcare. Pre-registration is required.

We’re so pleased to have Kristen Andres, associate director for education and informational services at the Association to Preserve Cape Cod (APCC), presenting this workshop! She’ll cover not only which insects we should be trying to attract to our gardens but also which plants to include to attract those garden helpers. The insect world includes specialists and generalists that together form the foundation of our food web, and by helping them, we also help ourselves by ensuring better food production and more beauty in the garden.

This workshop takes place at Fuller Farm in Marstons Mills, a Barnstable Land Trust property that hosts the Resilient Roots demonstration garden (995 Route 149).