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Along with our other volunteer opportunities, Wildlands Trust often works with scouts looking to complete their Eagle Scout service projects. An Eagle Scout service project provides scouts with planning, fundraising, and managing experience. Past Eagle Scout projects you may have seen include the Little Free Library at Willow Brook Farm in Pembroke, and the interpretative signage at the Indian Head River Trail in Pembroke/Hanson/Hanover. This summer we had two scouts complete their projects at our properties! 

For his Eagle project, Eagle Scout candidate Noah Sherman installed 15 new signs at Halfway Pond East Conservation Area in Plymouth. The trail system on the east side of this preserve can be confusing at times, so reworking the signage was a really helpful project for Noah to take on! The new signs are easy to read and make navigation much easier for preserve visitors, and we are very delighted that Noah was able to install them this summer. Between the new signage on the east side and the brand-new Leona’s Loop on the west, Halfway Pond has plenty of great new reasons to visit!  

In addition, Eagle Scout candidate Max Cunniff built a 20-foot-long bridge across the Drinkwater River at town-owned Melzar Hatch Preserve in Hanover. Max made sure that the bridge was high enough for vegetation flowing down the river to pass under it. He also took great care to make the ramps onto and off the bridge flush to the ground. He and his friends enjoy biking on the trails and the previous bridge was very difficult to bike over. This new bridge is already much more accessible for all and has received high praise from members of the Hanover community. Wildlands Trust is thrilled that Max made this exceptional bridge for our preserve! You can see and the new bridge at Melzar Hatch. We expect it to be there for a very long time though, so there’s no rush! 

We have some other Eagle Scout projects in the works, including Chickadee boxes at Great River Preserve in Bridgewater, and Blue Bird boxes at Sylvester Field in Hanover. If you are interested in completing your Eagle Scout Project with Wildlands Trust, contact our Stewardship Coordinator Zoë Smiarowski at zsmiarowski@wildlandstrust.org. 

Thank you again to Noah for the signage and to Max for the bridge!