Field Trip: Mountain Top Arboretum

I first learned the word ecotone four or five years ago when I started playing the NYT Spelling Bee. There’s a mountain meadow clearing along one of the trails in Kaaterskill Wild Forest, a wide gap in the woods not far from the famous Falls, and I took about a hundred pics of its dense mass of grasses and goldenrod and ironweed the first time we visited, two years ago, on an unnaturally hot September day. I’m not sure when I became conscious of that spot as an example of an ecotone — a transitional place between two plant cultures, sort of a feathered edge — but I think of it often with respect to this “forest” I’m attempting to grow and how to approach it. Do I think of it like that particular ecotone while the trees grow up? Is that my model for the transition from the street out front toward the future forest in the back? (Decidedly yes.) Or what kind of ecotone will I make when someday I can tear up the asphalt behind the house and finally plant in the space between the driveway and the forest? Also, I think about what and where the pathways will be.

Two weekends ago, we attempted to take some visitors to Kaaterskill Falls, only to be reminded by the mile-long train of cars trying to get into the trailhead lots that it was Labor Day weekend and we weren’t the only ones who had that idea. We decided to head for Colgate Lake instead, only to realize Mountain Top Arboretum was along the way, and I had just been saying to a friend that it’s one of the field trips on my list to fit in before winter.

Fate really is the loveliest tour guide.

So I found myself unexpectedly exploring the meadows and forests and trails and boardwalks of the arboretum, chatting all the time but still stopping to idly snap pics all along the way. Anyone who has ever hiked with me knows how often I pause for pictures, but I was giving almost no thought to it — just snapping what caught my eye while engaged in conversation with the West Coast cousins I don’t get to see often enough. It wasn’t until I got home and swiped through the photos that I realized nearly all of them were of paths, from one type of landscape to another. 

As you explore the grounds, you venture from a meadow down a winding road lined with wildflowers, through a fenced tree preservation area, out into a deep woods, and eventually to a “hidden marsh” that you definitely did not see coming. The number of different landscapes you wander through is pretty magical and so seamless that you don’t even notice it happening — you only notice (on repeat) that you’re someplace completely different than where you just were. Or maybe that was a function of all the catching up we were doing. But along the way, I fell in love with all the different approaches to pathways. And even more in love with asters than I already am.

We didn’t have a chance to spend any time in the visitors’ center or to really learn much about the mission of the arboretum, but their site says:

Mountain Top Arboretum is a public garden in the Catskill Mountains dedicated to displaying and managing native plant communities of the northeastern US, in addition to curating its collection of cold-hardy native and exotic trees. Its mountain top elevation of 2,400 feet at the top of the New York City Watershed creates a unique environment for education, research and pure enjoyment of the spectacular and historic Catskills landscape. The Arboretum trails and boardwalks connect 200 acres of plant collections, meadows, wetlands, forest and Devonian bedrock—a natural sanctuary for visitors interested in horticulture, birding, geology, local craftsmanship, hiking and snowshoeing!

I’m eager to go back in different seasons (snowshoeing there would be amazing) and learn more about the place, but there also seem to be a lot of good resources about native trees and more to be explored from afar on their site. If you’re in the area — or visiting the Hudson Valley and Catskills region — it’s well worth a hike. And I’ve included some of my favorite spots in nearby Tannersville for you to check out below.

Meanwhile, I hope you find as much beauty and inspiration as I do in these photos.

Mountain Top Arboretum
4 Maude Adams Rd
Tannersville NY (Catskill Mountains)

WHILE IN TANNERSVILLE:
• Get incredible baked goods at Shandaken Bake — check his Instagram for hours, and be sure to get there early
• Browse the beautiful yarns next door at The Knitting Room — you can even sit out in their shared back garden and nosh and knit
• Wander the other little shops and the antique mall, and don’t miss the cheese counter tucked inside Last Chance Antiques Cafe
• Have a casual lunch at Lucky Catskills in town or fancier lunch at Deer Mountain Inn near the arboretum; drinks and/or dinner at Tabla or Hotel Lilien