Do you find it odd that you rarely went outside for high school science? For many, high school biology class memories are limited to indoors-only classrooms with formaldehyde frogs laid out on smelly wax dissecting trays.

Students at the Blue Mountain Union School are no longer condemned to studying biology strictly indoors. With the help of the VRC, the Town of Newbury recently created the 69-acre Wells River Conservation Area-right next to the school.

The project has protected over 8,000 feet of Wells River shore front, along with diverse, high-quality wetlands and forestlands and prime agricultural soils. The Town of Newbury owns the property, subject to a conservation easement held by the Vermont Housing and Conservation Board.

In the Autumn of 1999, dairy farmer Alice Allen, chair of the Newbury Conservation Commission (NCC) noticed the property for sale. She called the VRC. VRC Executive Director Jeff Meyers contacted the landowners, Delbert and Shirley Leete. The property was one of the last parcels left of what was once the Leete family dairy farm. After several meetings, the Leetes agreed to sell to the VRC at appraised fair market value.

VRC and NCC made a presentation to the Newbury Selectboard in March of 2000, emphasizing the benefits of the project to the community and suggesting that the Town agree to own the property. The Selectboard gave the project conceptual approval.
An extra attraction of the project was that it protected land along the proposed Cross Vermont Trail that runs on the abandoned Wells River-Montpelier railroad bed that adjoins the property.

All at BMU were very excited by the project. Biology teacher Jane Connolly read a letter of support to the Selectboard from the school staff explaining the value of the conservation area to the school as a "hands-on, natural science resource, right here in our backyards."

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page updated 5/14/08 by Zephyr Sites

At the packed June meeting, once the Selectboard approved the project, the room full of project supporters broke into applause.
The Vermont Housing & Conservation Board had earlier awarded the VRC a $19,000 conservation conservation grant towards purchase of the property. The Village of Wells River had donated $300. With the go ahead from the Newbury selectboard, VRC began working with NCC to raise the necessary $10,000 to meet the fundraising goal. Donations began to pour in from surrounding communities.

Students and teachers at BMU helped fundraise by a unique event called "hat day." Normally not allowed, students wore hats and teachers wore jeans-for one dollar per hat and five dollars per pair of jeans. The Fields Pond Foundation also awarded the VRC a very important $3,000 grant towards purchase of the property.

The VRC closed on the deal with the Leetes and the Town of Newbury on September 28. In early October, Jeff Meyers, Jane Connolly, and Tracy Puffer (Civics teacher at BMU) led a walk with about 24 students who had helped fundraise for the project. Amazingly, the day of the walk, frogs and toads were hopping all over the place. Students identified wood frogs, peepers, American toads, and northern leopard frogs moving overland for perhaps the last time of the year. The woods, the wetlands, and the riverbanks were alive with amphibians. Much better than a dissecting tray.

More pictures of Wells River Consvervation Area