US-MA-Long+Lake+Park


 * =Birding in Massachusetts=

Middlesex County
=Long Lake Park= Littleton, Massachusetts 01460 Long Lake Park webpage Long Lake Park map

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Long Lake Park
Coordinates: 42.5245899, -71.4706564 eBird links: Hotspot map View details Recent visits My eBird links: Location life list Submit data

About Long Lake Park
Long Lake Conservation land is formerly the location of cow pastures and apple orchards, with some remaining apple trees. The land is crisscrossed with numerous stone walls which are not, in most cases, boundary lines. Some stone walls eventually lead into the water. Over 7 miles of 200-year-old stone walls have been mapped on this property. The property was most likely used by Native Americans as a campsite through the centuries. The property abuts land that was once part of the Nashobah Praying Village, the last Christian Indian village in the area established by John Eliot. Newtown Road, which is one border of the property, was the border of the 500-acre Nashobah Indian Reserve mentioned in the original deed of the Town of Littleton. Near the shoreline of this parcel, arrowheads have been found. There are stone mounds in several places on the parcel which may have significant Native American meanings.

The site rises gradually from Newtown Road to an elevation of about 260 feet to the hilltop, midway to the rear where the elevation is about 360 feet. From this hilltop, the site slopes downward toward the north with the northerly property line being Long Lake.

Adjacent to the acquired land on the west side are 75 acres of existing conservation land. This land has been acquired through the years by gifts or tax foreclosures. It includes several thousand feet of undeveloped shoreline of Long Lake and the lake's outflow brook. This land is now administered under this same management plan for the acquired Long Lake Conservation Land. This creates 180 acres of conservation land.

Long Lake Park hosts a wide variety of natural habitats including bordering vegetated wetlands, forested wetlands, conifers, hardwoods, grasslands, and edge habitat.

The southernmost portion of the parcel consists of a wet meadow which contains a stream, a vernal pool, and an upland meadow. This area extends several hundred feet north along the eastern half of the property, eventually giving way to a very thick briar patch and a red maple wetland. This wetland continues north for several hundred more feet, decreasing in width, until it ends in a narrow "finger". Here originates the apparently spring-fed stream which flows to Newtown Road. To the east of the "finger" is a mixed hardwood forest of maple, oak, and ash, while to the west is located a several decades old white pine forest. Both forests continue north to the AT&T easement, the area north of that appearing to have been logged in the past and consisting of scattered red pine, white pine, and hardwood species, all of varying degrees of maturity. In the extreme northwest corner is a small hemlock grove and a portion of an unusual wet bottom forest actually growing in the shoreline waters of Long Lake. From Long Lake Park webpage



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View Map in a new window || L1183302 US US-MA US-MA-017 42.5245899 -71.4706564 Long Lake Park