Northeast Wilderness Trust purchased 15 acres from Virginia Steel in 2021. Though small in size, the Steel Addition is large in impact. The land is located at the eastern entryway to the Preserve and so helps to secure access from Binney Hill Road. The land boasts an impressive amount of ecological diversity with a small “pocket wetland” and two headwater streams.
Thanks to the thoughtful caretaking of this land by Virginia and her mother, Margaret Gunn, the forest has a good start on its way to becoming old-growth. Red oak and American beech provide acorns and beechnuts to hungry wildlife in the fall. Sign of moose, deer, porcupine, and coyote have been seen there, and it is likely that bobcat and bear frequent the land.
“I’ve always been interested in conservation of any type,” said Virginia. “I’ve been very happy [that] this could be the outcome for the land.”
The Steel Addition was made possible by Virgina Steel, who generously sold her family’s land at less than its full appraised value, and through support from the New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services, the Quabbin-to-Cardigan Partnership, and generous individual donors.