Every Saturday at 11, come with your family & friends to explore Port Washington and New York’s little-known but rich habitats and wildlife—with nature guide David Jakim.
Collect pond life, learn about birds, track animal footprints of fox and coyote in the sand and after the rain.
Learn about our edible and medicinal plants and their age-old stories—something that kids especially like to do. We’ll learn to identify, prepare, eat, and enjoy our wild edible invasive species. As we investigate the secret lives of different plants and animals, their diverse habitats, soils, and waters, we will gain an understanding of how human life connects to the forests, fields, and streams in surprising ways. Shakespeare’s Duke Theseus tells us that, of
“The forms of things unknown, the poet’s pen,
Turns them to shapes and gives to airy nothing
A local habitation and a name.”
As we walk and talk, these forms and the meaning of their names will come alive to us.
Jakim’s tours are designed for children as well as adults. What fun it is walking down forest trails when children use wicker baskets to collect their own cornucopia, with beautiful treasures they’re encountering for the first time—colored leaves shining out among rocks and crystals, acorns, walnuts, seeds and spices!
They’ll find their first leaves and flowers in the spring and the last of the brilliant leaves falling from the trees in the fall! Gathered around campfires and sitting stones, we’ll share observations of flora and fauna, and our collective cornucopia will also include stories, folklore, jokes, and poetry. Through building a connection to specific places, we will also build our sense of connection to the Indigenous Matinnecock tribe that inhabited Port Washington until the 19th century.
During our tours at The Hempstead Harbor Woods and Sands Point Preserve, we’ll trace the footsteps of ancient geological processes and encounter the remarkable formations that bear witness to the passage of time. Imagine standing on the sands and maritime bluffs formed from an ancient river delta that flowed underneath a massive ice sheet into the then-empty Long Island Sound, 15,000 years ago.
We’ll witness the power of glaciers, the origins of huge boulders strewn across the landscape, the connections between our geology and ecology, and the resilience of life. We’ll also be exploring Port Washington’s richest and most diverse habitats.
Upcoming walks include the Hempstead Harbor Woods, the Unitarian Universalist Church at Shelter Rock Road, the Guggenheim Preserve, Manorhaven Preserve and Growing Love Community Garden, the Hempstead Hard Shoreline Corridor, Baxter Pond, the Manhasset Bay Walk, Christopher Morley Park, Cedarmere, and the Nassau County Museum of Art.
Detailed information about these walks, habitats, and how to register is available online with Port Washington Wild Walks: PortWashingtonWildWalks