About the Forests

The Yale Forests comprise 10,592 acres of forestland in Connecticut, New Hampshire, and Vermont. The goals of this ownership are to provide educational, research, and professional opportunities to the Yale community and beyond.

Faculty and students use the Yale Forests as a laboratory for teaching, management, and research. Three members of the faculty oversee the forests and mentor students and post-graduate fellows who actively participate in the education, management, and research that occurs. Yale Forests are maintained as working forests, which includes working with the forest products industry to harvest timber and non-timber forest products from the land. Revenue from these products directly support the educational opportunities the forests provide.

The area encompassed by the Yale Forests includes almost all of the topographical and soil conditions, site classifications, and forest cover types found in New England. The forest composition reflects a latitudinal gradient ranging from a central hardwood ecosystem in Connecticut to a northern hardwood ecosystem in New Hampshire and Vermont. Both regions of the School Forests support extensive stands of oak, pine, and hemlock due to a legacy of historical land use.