Nature Journal Club Draws From ​“Urban Oasis”

East Rock Park on a sunny November Saturday was an idyllic setting for the most recent New Haven Nature Journal Club meet-up. The biweekly event focuses on gathering in natural settings to witness, observe, and document the surroundings through drawings and writings, with a bit of guidance and a bunch of support. 

The group, led by Madelyn Neufeld, meets on Saturday mornings twice a month: once in East Rock Park and two weeks later at another location that changes each time. Neufeld started this club back in August after researching the Wild Wonder Foundation — which provides free nature journal resources — and finding no groups in Connecticut.

Neufeld, who currently lives in East Rock, said she learned about nature journal meet-ups while living on the West Coast where it began, adding that as a science illustrator she was ​“adjacent to it,” focusing more on drawing than journaling.

The group has been growing each month with two to three new people each time, with Neufeld spreading the word via social media, the Arts Council website, and good old-fashioned flyers hung up around town. 

Each meet up focuses on an activity, some of which she finds on the Wild Wonder Foundation’s website. After everyone gathers, there is an introduction and discussion. Once the activity is introduced, people then leave to complete it, and after an allotted amount of time — usually about an hour — everyone meets back up to share their journal pages and discuss. 

Ben Cannan, who has been to most of the meet-ups and has filled in as host for one, also participates in the New Haven Sketchers group, which tends to do more urban type sketching. He said this one could be referred to as ​“rural sketching” or ​“urban oasis” sketching.

East Rock Park could definitely be considered an urban oasis, especially on this day that saw the temperature at around 50 degrees with partly cloudy skies and the trees still in the throes of autumnal bliss. Ten people showed up, some returning and some for the first time, meeting at the table near the ranger station. Neufeld told the group that there were plans to walk around a bit ​“so you don’t get cold.” She then offered everyone who was new the choice of a pen and offered the entire group use of a multitude of supplies, including pencils, pens, colored pencils, and even watercolor pencils and brushes. There was also the offer of the communal sketchbook which one person can take and use instead of their own pad or sketchbook.

“No pressure,” Neufeld said with a smile. 

After introductions, the day’s activity was presented to the group. Everyone would take a short hike, around one mile, that would loop around the park, practicing ​“external expression” on paper to record the experience of the hike. Everyone would be drawing a map of the hike beforehand so they could use it during the hike to mark points where they found ​“treasure” and had ​“experiences.” Neufeld’s hope was that afterward everyone would have ​“a way to look back at the hike, to remember it and visualize it.” She also encouraged people to add writings if they liked including creating ​“little poems.” 

The group was then instructed to draw a ​“light template” of the map, using either Google Maps or a map of the park that could be obtained in the ranger station. We were also told we could leave room to take notes that could be expanded upon later, or pick something up to take back to write about later, like a leaf or rock. 

This reporter drew her map from the hard copy and added meta data as recommended by Neufeld, such as the date, time, and temperature. I chose to follow along with Cannan and Ryan Licwinko, another stalwart of the sketching scene, as we made our way along the trail. One might consider it overwhelming when considering what to write about or draw in such a grand area, home to such a wealth of plants, trees, animals, insects, and other feasts for the senses, but each participant seemed to hone in on something specific that others may not have taken note of. 

The Mill River to our left caught my eye — how the trees reached towards the water, how the leaves reflected and floated upon it, how the sunlight danced on its surface. At one point we encountered a large rock that Cannan lifted gently to reveal Eastern red-backed salamanders. And any fan of trees, including ones that have been uprooted and taken on other life forms, would be in their glory along the first half of the route. 

Some sketchers gathered in groups or pairs, some stayed on their own, but everyone made the experience a singular one that eventually would be shared. We even had a fun conversation about the prevalence of the supernatural and scary in Connecticut, Massachusetts, and New England in general. By the time we got back to the table, everyone had found something they wanted to show everyone or talk about.

The next activity involved sharing by leaving your journal open on the table so everyone could walk around and look at what you found. Wandering around the table and looking at how each person decided to journal — some through words, some through sketches, and some through a combination of both — initiated many discussions and photo opportunities as well. One final photo was taken with everyone’s journals together, and discussions turned to future meet-ups.

Neufeld has decided to add a virtual one-hour long meet-up on Wednesdays as well. 

“It’s a good way to get used to it without going out,” she said. 

The virtual meeting is also is not dependent on weather, though this reporter was already thinking about how lovely it might be to come back out and see this same path change over the next few months and to record it for posterity. And as someone with a wide variety of journaling experiences under their belt as well as a love of nature, it was refreshing to marry the two and find a new perspective among the geese, burning bushes, and willow trees. 

The New Haven Nature Journal Club meets twice a month on Saturdays in person and virtually every second Wednesday evening. For more information about these meet ups please visit the club’s Instagram or Facebook group page.