Some Upcoming Programs
(check back for additional details)

Naturalists and Novelists: Birds, Bewick, and the Brontës

David Spector

December 2, 2025, 6 p.m.

Dickinson Library, Northfield, MA

A Northfield Bird Club and Dickinson Memorial Library program presented by David Spector at the library.

How does knowledge about birds move from scientific discovery to use in the wider culture? In this talk David will describe some of the birds in the novels Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë and Wuthering Heights by her sister Emily Brontë, introduce the wood engravings of bird illustrator Thomas Bewick, and discuss his influence, and that of the science he cites, on the Brontës. David will make the case that attention to the birds can give new insight into the reading of classics, and even reveal a two-century old conversation between sisters.

David Spector is an ornithologist who has done research on warbler song and has an interest in birds in literature. He is a retired professor of biology at Central Connecticut State University, former board president of the Hitchcock Center for the Environment, and co-editor of the Bird Finding Guide to Western Massachusetts.

Giant Wasps

Paul Sievert

January 27, 2026, 6-7 p.m.

Dickinson Library, Northfield. MA

The Harris Center's American Kestrel Project: A Fledgling Conservation Project for NH's Monadnock Region

Phil Brown

February 10, 2026, 6:00 p.m. (snow date: Feb. 12, 6:00 p.m.)

Northfield Mountain Recreation Environmental Center, Northfield, MA

Build a Bluebird Nest Box

Jon Rastallis

March, 21, 2026 (time TBD) 

Details TBD

Northfield Mountain Recreation Environmental Center, Northfield, MA

Warbler Madness!

David Brown

April 30, 2026, 6 p.m.

Dickinson Library, Northfield, MA

This program may include an optional bird walk (TBD)