2025 Highstead Open Trails Day

Come join us for Highstead’s annual Open Trails Day! Highstead is home to more than 100 acres of woodlands, wetlands, fields, and meadows. Our 1.5-mile trail system will be open all day for self-guided tours so you can explore this diverse landscape at your own pace. At 10 AM, forest ecologist Neil Pederson will present a talk on old growth forests, and at 1 PM, UConn professor Bernard Goffinet will lead a guided moss walk. We invite you to come enjoy a day filled with nature, learning, and discovery. View the trail map here.

Old Growth Forest Presentation — 10 AM
Registration Required

Neil Pederson is a consulting forest ecologist who has been studying trees and forests for over three decades. His research has taken him to China, Georgia, Mongolia, Russia, Spain, Turkey, and throughout much of the eastern United States. Neil holds a PhD from Columbia University and previously was an assistant professor at Eastern Kentucky University, a research professor at Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory, and a forest ecologist at Harvard Forest.

Guided Moss Walk — 1 PM
Registration Required

Bernard Goffinet is a professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Connecticut. He earned his PhD at the University of Alberta before spending two years at Duke University. He has published 200 articles and books on the biology of bryophytes, and has conducted fieldwork on various continents but primarily in southern South America, contributing to the initiative of “ecotourism with a hand lens” focused on the miniature forests of the Cape Horn Biosphere Reserve.