Story

[xoxoxoBruce]

I'm standing on the bridge over the Scantic River which is probably not more than 18" deep.
On the left is the back side of a private residence that was a stagecoach inn on the original Boston Post Road, before Ben Franklin moved the road 10 miles north, through Wilbraham, when he worked for King George in 1763.
On the right is a hay field/pasture of the era.

[xoxoxoBruce]

From the bridge you can easily see the house that goes with that hay field.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Thirty years ago this house had lost ALL it's paint and some of it's windows. The present owner worked his butt off bringing this beautiful old house back from the dead.

[xoxoxoBruce]

When the house was done (if a house is ever done )it was time to tackle the yard. He decided to leave the trees that had grown up in the hay field and just cut the brush that had grown up over the last few years of neglect. He wasn't making a lawn, just returning the hay field to a field with open sight lines.
The feds fined him $20,000 for cutting brush on the floodplain.

[xoxoxoBruce]

His neighbor accross the road had a tree go down into the river. For the last 400 years it would have been pulled out and probably cut up for firewood. But definitely pulled out to clean up the river. Now everyone is afraid to touch it for fear of the feds.
Sad state of affairs.

[404Error]

Wow, Bruce, that place is maybe 10 miles, as the crow flies, from where I grew up in Enfield, CT! We used to fish and go tubing in the Scantic river as kids, it's not much more than a scenic meandering river in most places but it does have a few short rapids here and there.
Lots of history in that area of New England, just about every town has an Historical Society that mandates what you can and can not do with historical places like that house. You can't move a rock from a stone wall without their permission.

[Billy]

The first makes me think my home town. It is winter, all the trees have no leaves in my home town now.

[xoxoxoBruce]

The Historical isn't too bad but the Environmental is a nightmare. The only people that want to be on it are rabid tree huggers that patrol the town looking for any possible infraction. It's so bad if your stone wall falls down they don't want you to put it back up.
Behind my Grandfathers barn was a piece that was rocky and full of springs so it was only good for pasture. Now they're calling it wetlands with all the attendant restrictions.
All these people have moved out of the city or subdivision suburbs and want to turn the place into wilderness. Well first off it's MA so forget the wilderness crap and secondly if they got their wish they wouldn't like it.