Well, if #Zuck is living here, then we should tax the shit out of him!

Locals outraged over developer's shocking act at popular hiking trail: 'We don't know why or for what purpose'

"There was some chatter."

by Alexis McDonell, July 3, 2025

"For generations, #BurntJacketMountain was a quiet sanctuary in the #MaineWoods. It was a place where locals hiked after work, kids scrambled up trails with their dogs, and tourists stumbled upon postcard views of #MooseheadLake. Then, one day last fall, the trail was closed without explanation, reported Bangor Daily News.

"Now, residents of #BeaverCove and nearby #Greenville are learning just how vulnerable even longtime public-use lands can be when money and greedy #developers enter the picture.

"In 2022, more than 1,400 acres surrounding Burnt Jacket Mountain were quietly sold for $8.1 million to an anonymous buyer operating through two holding companies. The deal included over two miles of lakefront and the entire trail system. The buyer has since filed plans to build a 3,750-square-foot lakefront home and closed the trails to the public, leaving residents with more questions than answers.

" 'It's what everyone is wondering,' Joe Babbitt, the select board chair in Beaver Cove, said, per Bangor Daily News. 'There's all kinds of gossip out there, saying it's everyone from the sultan of Egypt to 'insert your billionaire of choice here.''

"While private ownership of forests is common in Maine — about 95% of forest is privately owned — public access has often been granted out of custom and cooperation. Burnt Jacket Mountain was historically owned by #PaperCompanies and then timber firms like #McPhersonTimberlands, which allowed #PublicUse.

"However, that informal understanding is rapidly vanishing, replaced by high-end marketing, out-of-state buyers, and closed gates.

"The loss has hit the community hard.

"Burnt Jacket was a [close-to-town] locals' gem, this loss definitely stings to hiking enthusiasts that have used the trails time and time again over the years," Steve Yocom, executive director of Destination Moosehead Lake, said, per Bangor Daily News."

Read more:
https://www.thecooldown.com/green-business/burnt-jacket-mountain-maine-trails-closed/

#MarkZuckerberg #TaxTheBillionaires #ZuckSucks #Maine #MaineTrails #TaxTheRich #PenobscotLand #Landback

#MarkZuckerberg has bought #BurntJacketMountain near #MooseheadLake and has cordoned it off (folks have been able to hike on it since forever).

Mystery Fuels Unease in #Maine Woods: Who Bought Burnt Jacket Mountain

An anonymous new owner fenced off beloved trails and put up surveillance cameras in a region with a long tradition of allowing public access on private land.

By Jenna Russell and Heather Knight
Visuals by Sophie Park
Jenna Russell reported from Beaver Cove, Maine, and Heather Knight from San Francisco.

Nov. 15, 2025

Excerpt: "Soon enough, though, a woman who used to work in Greenville’s town office said she had the answer and posted it on Facebook: The new owner of the mountain was Mark Zuckerberg.
The billionaire founder of Facebook had spent time in the Maine woods before. In 2017, for their fifth wedding anniversary, Mr. Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, had traveled not to Aspen or Cabo, but to #BangorME and #MillinocketME, where they hiked on the Appalachian Trail and met with workers who had lost their jobs when local paper mills shut down."

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/15/us/mystery-maine-burnt-jacket-mountain.html

Archived version:
https://archive.ph/VWJNn

#Billionaires #TaxTheRich #EatTheRich #Maine #MaineWoods

The final #APCAW presentation is Thursday, July 12th. #Penobscot #basketmaker and founding director of the Maine Indian Basketmakers Alliance, #TheresaSecord will be the guest speaker.

APCAW was kind enough to provide me with a link to last week's video and a PDF guide from the conference. I will be looking through the guide and will post about some of the key points at a later date.

Even though the conference is free, pre-registration is required.

To register:
https://maineaudubon.org/events/everything-ash-webinar-series-june12/

Link to June 5th presentation video (including the bit I missed with #RichardSilliboy):
https://us02web.zoom.us/rec/share/n63rnkAomz4AitHdAfBRC1hbSMCS2fuFUrQ7HU2UfP5gmrJiXoLREHE5UePF9EWU.TQktDNJCVGQMJjfu

#EmeraldAshBorer #AshTrees #TraditionalEcologicalKnowledge #NativeAmericanBasketry #Sustainability #IndigenousStewardship #CulturalPreservation #InvasiveSpecies #EAG #PreservingNature #Biodiversity #TEK #TIK #TraditionalIndigenousKnowledge #Basketry #PreservingTheSacred #PreservingTheForest #WabanakiConfederacy
#Wabanakik #WabanakiAlliance #MaineFirstNations #MaineWoods #TraditionalEcologicalKnowledgeStewards

So, I attended a Zoom conference on saving #Maine's #AshTrees from the #EmeraldAshBorer. Unfortunately, I missed the presentation by #RichardSilliboy (who got knocked out of the meeting by a thunderstorm), but I did find this film with him in it!

They Carry Us With Them: Richard Silliboy

by Jeremy Seifert

"This film, part of our feature multimedia story 'They Carry Us With Them: The Great Tree Migration', profiles Richard Silliboy, a tribal elder and vice chief of the #AroostookBand of #Mikmaqs, and a #BlackAsh #basketmaker. As he weaves a potato basket at his home in Littleton, Maine, Richard contemplates the arrival of the emerald ash borer and the tenuous future of this ancient art."

https://emergencemagazine.org/film/richard-silliboy/

#SolarPunkSunday #TraditionalEcologicalKnowledge #NativeAmericanBasketry #Sustainability #IndigenousStewardship #CulturalPreservation #InvasiveSpecies #EAG #PreservingNature #Biodiversity #TEK #TIK #TraditionalIndigenousKnowledge s #Basketry #PreservingTheSacred #PreservingTheForest #WabanakiConfederacy
#Wabanakik #WabanakiAlliance #MaineFirstNations #MaineWoods #TraditionalEcologicalKnowledgeSteward

As insect invaders approach, researchers use a combination of indigenous knowledge and Western forestry science to save a valuable tradition

By Willy Blackmore Nov 25, 2019,

"Suzanne Greenlaw doesn’t like chainsaws. She moves quickly through the chest-high ostrich ferns, frilly leaves heavy with rain, as the orange saw sputters and then chokes. 'She gets all freaked out,' says Gabriel Frey, laughing as he yanks the starting cord again with one heavily muscled arm, the saw whirring to life. Putting the bar to a trunk of shaggy, gray-tinged bark, he begins to cut, the grinding sound of the saw echoing through the damp, green-lit stand.

"The felled tree is one of three that Frey and Greenlaw carefully picked out of the woods on the cool, damp July day in far northern #Maine. Plenty of logs are hauled out of the forest there, in #AroostookCounty, which is home to a chunk of the #NorthMaineWoods, a 3.5 million-acre expanse of commercial timberland. But Frey and Greenlaw, and the stand of gray-barked trees, are part of a tradition that’s far older than any timber camp or lumber mill. The trees are #FraxinusNigra, commonly known as #BlackAsh or #BrownAsh, which have forever been at the hearts of the lives of Maine’s indigenous tribes.

"Greenlaw, a #Maliseet forestry scientist working on her PhD at the University of Maine, is at the forefront of the effort to protect the state’s brown ash. The trees are at risk of being wiped out by the emerald ash borer, an #InvasiveSpecies that has been killing ash trees in North America for the better part of 20 years. With the help of Frey, a renowned #Passamaquoddy basket maker, as well as the broader #Wabanaki basket-making community, the married couple is fighting to preserve the rich tradition the tree supports."

https://www.theverge.com/2019/11/25/20976144/emerald-ash-borer-baskets-wabanaki-invasive-pest-maine-tradition-trees

#IndigenousTraditions #IndigenousWisdom #EmeraldAshBorer #SaveTheTrees #ClimateChange #InvasiveSpecies #MaineWoods #IndigenousPeoplesDay