Little Tom Mountain
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Little Tom Mountain | |
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Established | 2002 |
Operator | The Trustees of Reservations |
Website | Little Tom Mountain |
Little Tom Mountain is a 73-acre (300,000 m2)
Ancient history
Evidence of early occupants of the area can be found in the dinosaur fossil tracks in the sandstone bedrock at
Little Tom overlooks glacial Lake Hitchcock, which was formed in the present
History
In 2002, four entities joined together to acquire and protect the 396 acres on the eastern slope of Mt. Tom that had previously been home to the Mt. Tom ski area. This protection effort was led by the
Each organization/agency purchased a portion of the property as follows:
Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR) purchased 144.7 acres for $1.3 million, mostly along the northern side of the property abutting the existing
Also, the quarry operation was allowed to continue, but was contained within a nine-acre area. DCR received an option to purchase the quarry parcel, which totals 16 acres, on or after August 31, 2012 or after two million tons of stone were removed.
The four organizations have agreed to coordinate management of the 396 acres and will eventually develop a Memorandum of Understanding that outlines the management goals and responsibilities of the partnership. The Trustees and the Holyoke Boys and Girls Club run an environmental education program and manage the area together.[1]
Landscape
The Mt. Tom ridge is part of the
The bulk of the Mt. Tom ridge consists of an exposed layer of basalt. From the air, the ridge looks like a vast, flat tabletop, leaning mostly to the east and a little to the south. The slopes of the former Mount Tom Ski Area, which are mostly on United States Fish and Wildlife Service land, descend this tilted tabletop roughly from west to east. The west edge of the Mt. Tom ridge is a sharp escarpment of cliffs and talus slopes. This feature gives rise to the common name traprock, which is derived from the Swedish word for step.
The Metacomet-Monadnock Trail follows the top edge of this escarpment, and has views toward the west. Away from the edge of the escarpment, the topography near the top of the main ridge is a landscape of small outcrops and ledges alternating with hollows, which sometimes hide vernal pools.
To the east, between Mt. Tom and
The former Mount Tom Ski Area property is a long trapezoid/rectangle, which begins at the top of the ridge at the west escarpment, descends the slopes of the main ridge, climbs over Little Tom Mountain, and ends close to I-91 at its eastern boundary. Within the parcel, DCR land is a fairly narrow strip along the northern parcel boundary, adjacent to the Mt. Tom State Reservation to the north. USFWS land is in the SW quadrant of the parcel, and covers most of the former ski slopes. The Trustees’ Little Tom Reservation is the northern half of Little Tom Mountain, of which the southern half is Department of Conservation and Recreation land. The quarry, which will continue its operation for several years, is west of Little Tom Mountain, at its base, and directly north of the Boys & Girls Club land.
With the exception of the ski slopes and a couple of small fields, most of the landscape is forested. The forest on the main ridge is mostly deciduous, and on Little Tom Mountain it is mostly a mixed forest of hemlock, hardwoods, and some white pine. The ski slopes and some fields are in a non-woody old-field condition and the old field next to “the billboard” (a billboard overlooking I-91 at the northeast corner of Trustees land) is dominated by red cedar, shrubs, saplings, and swallowwort.
The deciduous forests are for the most part typical, dry, fairly acidic, oak-dominated forests. Often they are relatively open forests, with a low, patchy canopy and an ericaceous shrub layer. Scattered along the main slope and in places on the southern end of the Little Tom Mountain ridgetop there are pockets of richer, more neutral soil, often associated with seeps, where a relatively sparse shrub layer and a more diverse ground cover of sedges, herbs, and ferns, and some rare plants occur – these are pleasant places to walk.
There are a dozen and a half
Wildlife
Birds
United States Fish and Wildlife Service conducted a breeding land bird survey in 2003. A total of 75 species of birds were sighted on the property during the 2003 survey. An initial scouting survey conducted in May 2003 revealed that a great diversity of migratory songbirds use Mt. Tom for stopover habitat. Species sighted during that time include Blackburnian warbler, black-throated blue warbler, blue-winged warbler, northern parula, and yellow-rumped warbler. None of these species were counted during the landbird breeding survey. Early migratory stopover studies will be conducted by USFWS in subsequent years to further assess the use of Mt. Tom by neo-tropical migrants for stopover habitat.
Amphibians and reptiles
The Mount Tom ridge is an extremely important habitat for
A vernal pool survey was conducted on three days in April 2003. Ten amphibian species were found, including four obligate vernal pool species, and two state-listed species. The most significant vernal pool is on top of Little Tom Mountain, on the Little Tom Reservation. It is an isolated pool, far from any neighbors, and as expected, a large number of spotted salamander and wood frog egg masses were found there. This vernal pool is a very significant ecological resource.
In the course of doing botanical survey work in 2003,
Invasive species
The 2003 botanical survey included some effort to determine the status of invasive plant species in our properties. The following plant species list was compiled:
- Asiatic bittersweet
- Autumn olive
- Black locust
- Climbing nightshade
- Glossy buckthorn
- Japanese barberry
- Common barberry
- Japanese honeysuckle
- Morrow honeysuckle
- Japanese knotweed
- Multiflora rose
- Purple loosestrife
- Spotted knapweed
- Norway maple
- Northern catalpa
Recreation
The Woodland Trail to Little Tom Mountain is open to the public,[1] with access through Mount Tom State Reservation.
References
- ^ a b c "Little Tom Mountain". The Trustees of Reservations. Retrieved 2020-09-01.
- ^ Alda, Allen, producer. 2004. “Coming into America” Scientific American Frontiers. PBS July 20, 2004.
External links
- The Trustees of Reservations: Little Tom Mountain
- Trustees of Reservations trail map
- Mount Tom State Reservation Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR)
- DCR trail map