Working to keep the northern Berkshires
CLEAN & GREEN
Our Mission
Friends of the Notch Forest is watchdog group with the mission of keeping the northern Berkshires clean and green. We support permanent protection for the Notch and Mount Williams Reservoir Forests which are essential to our water supply, natural beauty, and quality of life. We support permanent protection of public forests in the Berkshires region and statewide through parks and reserves. The Berkshires are a rare blend of burgeoning arts economy, vast, forested landscapes, and small working farms. We will work alongside residents, policymakers, and environmental organizations to preserve this unique balance in our city and across the northern Berkshires.
What We Do
ADVOCATE FOR FORESTS
We use grassroots political and media action to engage with public officials to protect the Notch Forest. We attend weekly in-person and online meetings to connect with other local, state, national, and international environmental organizations who advocate for the protection of forests. We know we have to collaborate with like-minded people and work with the rest of the world to help protect what we value locally. We care about all forests, especially our local public forests that, combined, make the Berkshires such a wonderful place to live, visit and recreate.
COLLABORATE
We collaborate with other environmental and creative organizations to preserve our precious carbon-sequestering forests and share our love for them with the public.
We are happy to talk with citizens about advocating for their own municipal and state public lands and keep them safe from logging and commercial exploitation.
EDUCATE, CREATE, ENGAGE
Members of Friends of the Notch Forest are available for public discussion forums and online talks.
MAKING ART OUTDOORS
- For summer 2025, we're planning outdoor painting classes and fun outdoor art workshops for families around beautiful Mount Greylock!
Outdoor Inspiration & Action
• Artists and writers are natural activists.Time spent outdoors taking a photograph, painting or writing requires listening, feeling, looking with deep attention to the mystery of our natural surroundings. It drives curiosity and love for the plants and creatures that share this planet with us.
• The Mayor of North Adams recently announced her intention to undertake Climate-Informed Open Space and Recreation Plan. We enthusiastically support this process, and plan to participate as citizens supporting the intersection of forest recreation and developing arts economy.
• Loving something makes one want to care for it and, hopefully, consider the science behind it. Through the process of saving a beloved forest, we've learned the best tactic we have to offset the ill-effects of climate change right now is to leave our existing trees and forests standing, while planting many new trees in urban areas.
• Forests provide a deep, authentic sense-of-place for our communities. Forests increase our health and sense of well-being. The ability to recreate in forests is crucial to our happiness. Members of all communities, rural and urban, should have free and easy access to trees and forests. Access to forests and trees is a key component of environmental justice.
• Biodiversity is beautiful! Forests provide key habitat for many species and play a crucial role in cultivating biodiversity. Biodiversity is the “web of life” that maintains ecological balance on Earth and that's beautiful!
Keep scrolling to read articles about the value of our forests:
How do forests improve our lives and the health of the entire planet?
Read on...
Forests breathe so we can breathe too! Trees take in carbon dioxide and give out oxygen!
Forests improve life across the planet, even for those living in deserts! When trees sequester carbon the Earth stays cooler!
Many animals rely on forests to live, including humans! We all rely on wildlife biodiversity to live healthy lives!