Go Out Doors and MacCallum Wildlife Management Area [May 2023]

Ellsworth McAfee Park in Northborough, MA was hosting an outdoor art event called Go Out Doors where local artists painted, as you might have guessed, doors, that were then displayed in the park. There were nine doors in total, placed along one of the sidewalks through the park. I liked the landscapes and the goats, and the second door from the left below (A Walk by a Pond) had a bunch of local wildlife sprinkled throughout the painting, including a frog, Canada goose, wild turkey, skunk, deer, groundhog, and raccoon.

 

Doors (from left to right) (click to enlarge) - Kids at Play (Brittni Laquidara), A Walk by a Pond (Rose Herrmann), Local Getaway (Lisa Hayden), No Place Like Home (Suzanne Cox), Purple Guitar (Jill Strait), What's your Dream (Anne Plaisance)

The park also has courts for pickleball, volleyball, and basketball, as well as soccer fields, a playground, and a walking track. When we were there, it was fairly busy with youth soccer, kids on the playground, people playing pickleball, and parents and families walking. After admiring the doors, we headed down the street to the Wayne F. MacCallum Wildlife Management Area (MacCallum WMA).

Massachusetts Wildlife Management Areas are managed by the commonwealth through MassWildlife and are intended to provide land for wildlife. They may be used for hunting and fishing as well as hiking and bird watching, and are typically less developed than parks, with parking lots and trails that may be unpaved. MacCallum WMA covers 906 acres in Northborough and Westborough and contains Lake Chauncy and Little Chauncy Pond. Until 1971, the Lyman School for Boys, a reform school established by the state, ran the school and a farm on the now WMA land.

Hole in the trees

We hiked a ~3.5 mile loop to Lake Chauncy, up the lake, and back to the west parking lot. Trails were not paved but main trails to and around Lake Chauncy were wide and easily passable, varying from dirt and gravel to grass. Side trails through the woods were narrower though still easy to follow. There are maps available but there is no signage in the WMA itself and trails don’t always appear on the maps. You probably won’t get lost, but you may not end up exactly where you’re intending to go the first time.

Pond by the west entrance

The landscape varies from ponds and lakes to forest and fields leased for corn growing. Wildlife sightings were plentiful and included a red-tailed hawk, a goose, red-winged blackbirds, frogs, turtles, and a coyote(?!). The weather was nice, the trails were pleasant, the surroundings were interesting, and we didn’t get eaten by a coyote, so all in all, it was another successful hiking trip.

Eastern coyote (according to Google Lens)