Sunday, February 10, 2019

Quisset Wildlife Management Area - Mendon MA

Round Meadow Brook is a principal tributary of the Mill River, which joins the Blackstone River in Woonsocket. The brook's headwaters form a pleasant little valley that you drive into from the north. There is a good sized conservation land there, full of rock piles, and I have barely scratched the surface. At the beginning, driving in and passing Quisset Hill, I feel there are rock piles to my left, then I see them behind houses:
It is a natural location: the brow of a hill, looking west out over a wet valley.

Continuing to the dead end, I parked, and from the parking area went downstream (blue outline 'A'). I saw a few rock piles here and there, and nice stone walls, as shown previously. Here we look west across the brook to a small niche, and beyond a pile on a boulder:
Closer: 

I continue across and west up the hill (Inman Hill) and somewhere around blue outline 'B' there was another distinct site.
You see rock piles like the above, receding in a line to the right in the next picture. There are also piles along the edges of those bumps on the left.
Here we look back at those bumps, from another pile in the 'line'.
 The actual "bump":
Another pile, with better view of nearby walls. The walls are like the earlier ones but not as heavy.
Seeing vertical sided piles in many places, I was thinking these sites are calendrical ("marker" pile) sites. In most cases, within outline 'A', I did not see any lines or spacings that I associated with vertical sided piles. Now, part way up the hill, it did seem more like a typical "marker" pile site.

I did not get any higher on the hill and was worried about getting lost, so I swung around to my left and downhill, hitting the dirt road (dotted line on the map) and heading east back towards the entrance. There were larger mounds at 'C', which I will post about later. 

For now, let me comment that this "Meadow" is just one of dozens of similar topographies in the areas between hills like Quisset, Inman, Daniels, and Chestnut. Dozens of opportunities for exploration. If you live near, you should take advantage of what must be some pretty nice woods in there.

4 comments :

Curt Hoffman said...

Peter -
Which (if any) of these locations corresponds to the one you reported on last week? Is it location "C"? (no letters on the map)

pwax said...

The "When ancient trails become visible" is 'C', the rest 'A'.

We ain't done with 'C'

outdoor addict said...

Hello, I live abutting this land on the Blackstone side and have explored this land many times over the last 30yrs. There are rock piles/ formations scattered throughout this land and Mendon Town Forest near Southwicks Zoo.

Anonymous said...

Very interesting, I lived at the base of Inman hill all my life and found one myself about a year back and just stumbled upon this blog, maybe I’ll make an account and post some pics soon