- Up next on "Borealis".

(upbeat music) In Bowdoinham, ice shacks dot frozen waterways.

Part shelter, part social club, they're places where neighbors swap stories and keep traditions alive.

The Millinocket Marathon started off as a small way to lift up a former mill town during the quiet winters.

Today, it's a powerful display of community spirit and perseverance.

Then we head to the Wells Reserve at Laudholm, where a conservation project to restore a once abundant rabbit species has been successfully underway since 2017.

And new for this season of "Borealis", I'll take you on a different hike each episode.

This week, we'll hit the trails at the Great Pond Mountain Wildlands in Orland.

Stay with us.

- [Announcer 1] Production support for "Borealis" is provided by.

- [Announcer 2] The Nature Conservancy in Maine, joining science, action, and innovative partners to help connect communities and address the global climate crisis.

From our forests to our rivers to the Gulf of Maine, learn more at Nature.org/JoinMaine.

- [Announcer 3] Maine Office of Outdoor Recreation, reminding you to be a good guest on trails, in towns, and everywhere in between, by participating in the Look Out for Me campaign.

Learn more at VisitMaine.com.

- [Child] My dad taught us that protecting Maine's water starts on land.

As a hydrogeologist for Poland Spring, his job is to monitor the springs year round, to check the water levels, and help keep the springs healthy.

Poland Spring, for 180 years.

- [Announcer 1] And by viewers like you.

Thank you.

- You guys ready to hike?

(laughs) (upbeat music) (bird chirps) (loon calling) ♪ I wanna get lost in the wilderness ♪ ♪ With you, darling ♪ ♪ I wanna get lost in the rivers ♪ ♪ And the woods ♪ - Yeah!

♪ Get you up on the mountainside ♪ ♪ And we can just climb ♪ - Welcome to "Borealis".

I'm Aislinn Sarnacki.

Winter in Maine has a funny way of testing you and rewarding you at the same time.

The days are shorter, the air is sharper, and the cold slows things down, inviting us to experience the outdoors in a different way.

In this episode of "Borealis", we're leaning into the season, showing you why winter is a wonderful time of year to be outdoors.

First, we go to Bowdoinham, where the frozen Cathance and Abagadasset Rivers become a neighborhood of colorful ice fishing shacks.

Part shelter, part social club, these seasonal shacks are a perfect example of how winter in Maine can bring people together.

(bright upbeat music) - [Sam] An incoming tide is usually the best time for catching fish.

- [Aislinn] For Sam Cook, there's no greater winter fun than fishing for smelt.

On a cold day in January, Sam invited me into her cozy smelt shack in Bowdoinham to show me what this beloved winter pastime is all about.

Here on the frozen surface of the Abby River, smelt shacks sit clustered together, wood stoves sending smoke into the frosty air.

This small seasonal ice fishing community is part of a longstanding tradition passed down through generations.

- [Sam] So much fun.

It's just my favorite thing to do in the winter.

- [Aislinn] Our goal is to catch rainbow smelt, a small, silver fish with an iridescence that makes it reflect the colors of the rainbow.

For countless generations, locals have been catching this tasty fish for sustenance and fun.

- Fried smelt are delicious.

Fried in a pan, they're delicious with butter.

Like, whatever way you fry them, they're delicious.

This is where we cut up our bait.

- [Aislinn] What is that?

- Sandworm.

(laughing) (Aislinn squeals) And it will bite you.

Not painfully bite you.

They're not a very big fish, so you don't want, like, a huge piece of bait.

- [Aislinn] This long rectangle cut into the ice is called a race hole.

It allows smelt anglers to bait several lines at once, and as the tide comes in, or goes out, you have to constantly check your lines to make sure they're at the right depth.

- And the way that you know where you are is you let this all the way down to the dirt.

You can feel it hit.

It will bag up the line.

And then you come back three times.

Kenny!

- What's up?

- [Sam] Not much, how are you?

- [Aislinn] While we wait for the fish to bite, we're visited by a number of family and friends.

(dog barks) Smelt fishing is as much about socializing as it is about catching fish.

- It's entertainment, mostly.

It's just like sitting around the fire.

You can sit around in here, for hours.

Especially if you're catching fish.

(Sam laughing) - You have friends, you have fun, you share information.

- Yeah.

- And fishing or not fishing, it's a great way to connect.

- And you're supposed to talk to people.

You're supposed to ask people how they're doing.

You're supposed to go visit them, and- - It's part of the whole thing.

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

- Look, she said, "You're welcome to open up our camp.

That's the number.

I should be there in about 44 minutes.

If you wanna start a fire in that other camp, you can."

(all laughing) - [Patty] We'll have it all warm for you.

- Is it frozen?

- Yup, it is.

Get it chiseled out for her.

Definitely was built up.

Look at that.

- [Sam] Well, we're getting through.

- [Aislinn] Swapping stories is a popular pastime, and local fisherman, Jimmy Morrill, has plenty to tell, like the time he accidentally blew up a fishing shack when he was 13 years old, by dumping fuel in the wood stove.

- This is no lie.

Like, look at this.

And I was like that to the door.

It blew me right through the door, and took the door right off the hinges.

(all laugh) And it burnt the whole camp.

- Lesson learned.

(both laugh) You be careful.

Don't give him any fuel.

So there's this really dreadful tradition, and you guys are all set, because I already did it for you this year, but you bite the head off of the first one that you get.

So you would get the smelt, you'd take it off of its hook, and then you, like, put it right in your back teeth, and then you pull hard and bite down at the same time, and then you immediately spit it out on the floor- - [Aislinn] Oh, okay.

- Or in the race hole.

But it keeps your shack from being jinxed.

- [Aislinn] Okay.

- I know, that makes no sense.

- You did it, though?

- Oh, I've done it a million times.

- [Aislinn] I'm glad Sam already blessed the shack this season, because all the sudden, fish start to bite.

I got something, I got something.

- (gasps) Yay!

- Yeah you do!

That's a big one.

- Woo-hoo!

- [Sam] All right, I'm gonna take it off.

- Wow, we got one.

- Yeah.

- Do you wanna keep him?

- Nah, I think I'll let him back.

There he goes.

Many anglers just toss the fish back in the water.

To them, it's about the activity and the atmosphere of smelting, not the number of fish they bring home.

A long-time ice fisherman, Craig Coombs, is joining the community of smelt shacks on the Abby today with a shack that he just built.

- I just used a bunch of two by threes, and a couple pieces of plywood, and insulation foam, and some strap-in, and that's about it.

Nothing fancy.

(saw buzzing) - [Aislinn] Smelt fishing shacks are built to be lightweight, and often, they're homemade out of various materials.

- [Craig] Good enough.

- [Aislinn] A true example of Maine ingenuity.

- This shack was made out of material that was a shipping container liner for wine that was shipped from New Zealand to Maine in February, and this shipping container liner kept the wine at an ambient temperature of 65 degrees, and so I figured it was perfect to build a smelt shack out of.

- [Aislinn] For those who want to fish, but don't have their own shack for staying warm, there's another option.

Along the Kennebec River and its tributaries, a number of historic fishing camps rent shacks that are set up with everything you need.

We headed to one of these camps on the nearby Cathance River.

- We run the tides, so you get here when it's slack tide, and you'll either fish the incoming tide for six hours, or the outgoing tide for six hours.

- Derek Saxon recently purchased this community of 17 camps from his friend and mentor, Jim McPherson, rebranding it from Jim's Camps to D's Camps.

What do you think smelt fishing means to this community?

- I think it means a lot.

Yeah.

I think a lot of them love it.

You know, a lot of thank me for keeping it going.

- [Aislinn] It's Friday evening, one of the most popular times to smelt fish, because many people are off work for the weekend, so they can stay up late.

- All right.

You guys need anything, let us know.

- [Fisher 1] Yup, thank you, thank you.

- [Derek] You got the bait, we got the lines.

All you need to do is bring some good conversation, and some food.

- And it's not so much the catching fish.

Catching fish is great.

But it's just great- - Family time.

We have family- - Yeah, family.

- Next door.

- And the boys.

My granddaughter.

- Yeah.

- [Pat] It's just that, like a community-type thing.

It's great, love it.

- It's a winter tradition.

- Hi.

- This is our granddaughter, Rye.

And she loves it.

She said she's gonna bite the head off the first one- - No, I'm not!

- [Annie] Right on the neck!

- [Derek] You didn't get skunked.

- Yup!

- Yeah.

- Okay.

(Aislinn laughs) - [Aislinn] For dinner, they'll enjoy cowboy stew heated up on a wood stove.

Eating good food, and for some, enjoying a few drinks, is a part of the experience.

- Just continuing the tradition, and spending time together.

Spending time together outside, doing something- - No screen time.

- Yup.

- Just enjoy each other's company and stories.

- We love fishing.

- Yup.

- As the light fades, the party continues, hoping to catch a few small, silver fish.

Next, we're headed to a town that knows a thing or two about grit.

The Millinocket Marathon isn't just a race, it's a winter tradition build on community, resilience, and love for the cold.

Come along with me as I run with these hearty winter athletes, and take you into the heart of one of Maine's most unique winter events.

(casual upbeat music) (soft music) Surrounded by wilderness, and under the shadow of Maine's tallest mountain, Katahdin, the small town of Millinocket, Maine is a quiet place in December, that is, until thousands of long distance runners start streaming into town.

- Free hot cocoa, hot cider!

- Hey, how about us, huh?

(all laugh) - Enjoy your time here in our beautiful little town, and we thank you all for coming.

- [Aislinn] The Milinocket Marathon, held on the first Saturday of December, is much more than a race.

It's a wild celebration that lifts up the community.

- Well, this whole thing began 10 years ago.

I just read an article about this region, and it was kind of a sad piece about the end of the paper industry, and it sort of struck me as something I would like to try to do something about.

- [Aislinn] The Great Northern Mill in Millinocket was once the world's largest paper producer, and its 2008 closure devastated the local economy.

- I just said, well, let's just go run a race and spend some money.

And so we started out the first year, 10 years ago, just 52 of us, and now we have 3,000 plus people signed up.

We did something really revolutionary, in that we made this event a free event.

Instead of paying a fee, and expecting things to happen, we would do the basics, and you come spend money.

- [Aislinn] The race is now a weekend-long event, with live music, a huge craft fair at the local high school, and a kids fun run.

It's all fueled by volunteers, including many from Wabanaki Public Health and Wellness.

- The value alignment with our values as an organization, and overall as Wabanaki people, was spot on.

It was about service, it was about love, it was about community, it was about connection, it was about welcoming all people.

We begin the marathon with a blessing, as well as a song.

(performer speaking foreign language) That's a traditional welcome of the marathon, really welcoming and sending the runners off in a good way.

(gunshot fires) - [Aislinn] The starting gun fires, and we're off.

And by we, I mean me too.

I'm in that crowd of runners somewhere.

It's my second year running the race.

The race begins in downtown Millinocket, and heads uphill along Poplar Street to a famous logging road known as the Golden Road.

Runners then follow this wide gravel road, which is covered in snow and ice, northwest, through the wilderness, before circling back to town on Millinocket Lake Road.

- It's a Boston Marathon qualifier, a well-measured course, a well-marked course, and the rest of what happens is kind of magical.

All the supplies for the water stops are donated.

We don't really set up anything officially, but there's a lot of unofficial things happening.

- [Aislinn] Along the course, local residents set up elaborate aid stations, offering a wide range of food and drinks.

- Gatorade?

- Thank you.

- Saturday only, take one, get one free!

- I'm giving out Fireball, Chex mix, Peanut M&Ms, Swedish Fish, and Haribo gummies.

- They're frozen!

Most of the people who run in the race complete a half-marathon, which is just over 13 miles long.

A smaller group runs the lap twice, completing a marathon, which is 26.2 miles.

- What I love about the Millinocket Half is running a half-marathon, or a marathon, requires perseverance, and courage.

You have to keep going, even when it's hard.

And this town, the whole town comes out.

At every single mile marker, there are people cheering you on the way.

And it doesn't matter who you are, or how fast you're running, or how fancy your shoes are, it just is a community event.

- [Host] It's a beautiful day in Millinocket, Maine!

- [Aislinn] The race is open to anyone, though you must sign up by a certain deadline.

Many participants walk the course, or do a combination of jogging and walking.

Others run nonstop, and are more competitive.

- This is the, what, like eighth year that we've done it?

- Yeah.

- We've been around for a while.

- My uncle worked at the paper mill, and his family left when it closed, and so seeing the revitalization here is really special to me.

- [Aislinn] Rick Watkhatys from upstate New York read about the race in Runners World Magazine years ago, and has traveled to Maine to participate ever since.

He's dubbed himself the Millinocket Rocket.

- I got bib number 78, and I just turned 78.

Can you believe it?

We love it.

I mean, the weather's not always great, but the people, we spend a lot of money.

(laughing) - [Aislinn] And then there's Bailey Hanafin, age eight.

- We dress up as ducks, and we have a couple more heads, two reindeers.

- [Aislinn] Bailey is running the race with her mother, Angela, who was born and raised in Millinocket and is now raising her family there.

- It just brings so much to the Millinocket area.

Everything is there, everybody's there for everybody.

- It's kind of a sleepy town 364 days a year, and Marathon day, it's just humming.

- Yeah.

- It's a really, really, really good vibe.

- [Aislinn] The Maine Sports Commission calculates that this event brings over $3 million into the region annually.

- People really are vested in the town, and want to see something like this back here, right?

I mean, our dad used to be in the paper mill industry, and then the mills closed, and the town was definitely different.

- Depressed, and it's making a turn.

- Sort of the official start of the holiday season.

You know, you have Thanksgiving, then you have this little time before Millinocket starts.

It's just so festive.

- [Host] All right, let's hear some noise as the top three finishes today's race!

- [Aislinn] To cheers from the community, Matt Cheney of Brunswick won first place in the full marathon with a time of two hours, 38 minutes, and 39 seconds.

- The views of Katahdin, especially the first lap, were so stunning today.

- [Aislinn] Sarah Mulcahy of Fort Kent was the number one female runner for the marathon, and fifth place overall, with a time of three hours, 12 minutes, and 35 seconds.

But she has one more claim to fame.

- I'm the only person that's done the full marathon every year.

Oh, the course is brutal.

The first lap's never bad, but knowing you have to go do it again after 3,000 people have run on it, it's all like mashed potatoes by the time you get there.

So you just have to power through.

It's all mental.

And if you watch the spectators, they make the run.

When you've got all these people, these diehards, and they're sitting at aid stations, and it's 20 below zero, and they're there with their water for you, and they're cheering you on, they're thanking you for coming.

That's what this race is about, and it's community.

- [Host] With a time of 3:12:35, let's hear some noise for Sarah Mulcahy!

(crowd cheering) - Every mile, you feel that love from the town of Millinocket, and everybody who just wants to support the people that are here to support them.

It's quite beautiful.

(soft music) (bells clanging) - Here in Maine, conservation doesn't always look dramatic.

Sometimes, it's hidden away, in the forgotten corners of the landscape.

250 miles south of here, at the Wells Reserve at Laudholm, scientists and volunteers are working to protect one of New England's most vulnerable mammals, the New England cottontail rabbit.

We visited this old farmstead turned nature reserve to see how small, intentional changes can make a big difference, and how this teeny rabbit is helping guide conservation work for an entire ecosystem.

(gentle music) (soft music) Tucked away against the ocean, and covered in a blanket of fresh snow, the Wells Reserve at Laudholm sits quiet most winter days.

It may be hard to tell, but this old farmstead sits on a dynamic piece of land.

- We have an amazing diversity of plant and animal life here, and it all is connected.

- [Aislinn] Laudholm is home to several scientific studies and projects.

Since 2017, biologists with the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife have been working hand in hand with the reserve to make sure a very special species of rabbit can find a foothold here.

- [Cory] The New England cottontail is a state endangered species here in Maine.

They're a shrubland-dependent species, so they like thickets of shrubs and young trees.

- [Aislinn] Cory Stearns is a senior research biologist with the department.

As a small mammal specialist, he's a part of a special project to help protect and restore the New England cottontail.

- They are New England's only native true rabbit, and I say true rabbit, because a lot of people refer to snowshoe hares as a rabbit, but technically, they're not.

- Did you see that that was the tree right there?

- [Aislinn] Stearns and a small team of other biologists and grad students from the University of New Hampshire are here at the reserve to conduct a fecal sample survey.

- That's done in the winter where we do fecal pellet monitoring, where we collect fecal pellets of New England cottontail to be able to estimate population size.

- [Aislinn] The work is tough.

The dense, thorny habitat favored by the rabbits is difficult to navigate.

Researchers bushwack their way through the shrubland thickets, searching for cottontail droppings to collect.

- I see two.

The understory is so thick, just pushing through that vegetation, so it's definitely been difficult out here today.

- [Aislinn] The groups cut through large patches of thickets, about 30 meters apart.

When the fieldwork is completed here, the samples will go to a lab at UNH.

- [Amanda] We're going to extract DNA from all of these pellets, and we can run that through a system to essentially identify individuals in the population.

And so that will give us an idea of how many rabbits there actually are on this landscape, and just assess how the population is doing over time.

- [Aislinn] The New England cottontail is nocturnal, so with permission from the reserve and the biologists, we set up several motion-triggered remote cameras to capture their nighttime activity over a two week period.

This is what we saw.

(bright music) (bright music continues) Historically, cottontails were abundant across southern Maine, but starting in the 1960s, development destroyed much of their habitat, and their numbers began to decline.

Today, these rabbits are now known to inhabit just six Maine towns, York, Eliot, Kittery, Wells, Scarborough, and Cape Elizabeth.

In 2004, the state closed the New England cottontail's hunting season.

They were listed as endangered in Maine in 2007.

- The habitat that they rely on has been in long-term decline, since the mid-1900s.

So at this point, in York and Cumberland County, it's down to 3% or less of the landscape, and so it's a very rare habitat type.

And then you add on human development that is fragmented, and what is still suitable, and it makes it tough for rabbits to move between what is and what isn't good habitat.

- [Aislinn] Unfortunately, what makes for good habitat for cottontails isn't necessarily desirable to people who live in the areas that these rabbits, and so many other animals, call home.

- Rabbits need the habitat, there's a wide variety of other wildlife, particular birds.

So if we wanna keep those species on the landscape, we still need to provide this thicket-type habitat to maintain those species.

- [Aislinn] On the reserve, these rabbits thrive on protected land.

In other parts of southern Maine, biologists rely on local residents to keep shrubland areas free from development, ensuring the rabbits have enough natural habitat outside of Laudholm.

- For us to fully restore the species where we want them to be, we really need it to be a community effort, not just IF&W biologists, but our partners at towns, land trusts, and private land owners to do the habitat management that's needed to get the habitat back on the landscape so we can then get the rabbits there.

- [Aislinn] Each spring since 2017, the Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife has been introducing additional cottontail rabbits to the reserve through controlled releases.

- We have some areas that are good habitat, but don't have the rabbits.

So we've been bringing the rabbits back to those areas so they can repopulate, and then spread out from there.

- We've been seeing an uptick in the population size here, and we've been seeing expansion into patches outside of the Wells Reserve.

So the rabbits here are breeding, the population is growing, and individuals are dispersing to colonize new patches around the Wells Reserve, which is ultimately the goal of these restoration projects.

- [Aislinn] The future of the New England cottontail is still unknown, but these biologists are optimistic that this resilient bunny will make a comeback.

- The New England cottontail is a unique species for New England, so it's important for us to keep that in our natural history, and around, and maintaining a healthy ecosystem, that it contains the rabbits, and all the other wildlife that use similar habitat.

- The bunnies are thriving here, because many people have worked to protect this area, and make it a vital, safe environment for all life.

- This week's hike takes us to Great Pond Mountain in Orland, one of my favorite winter hikes for enjoying the sunrise or sunset.

Several overlooks from the top offer open views of the region, extending all the way to the ocean.

(soft music) We are in the Great Pond Mountain Wildlands, 5,200 acres of conserved wilderness in the town of Orland, Maine.

And we are hiking Great Pond Mountain, which rises just over 1,000 feet above sea level, but from the top, has these open ledges that offers amazing views of the forest, and surrounding hills and ponds.

We are hiking the Stuart Gross path, which was named after the man who founded Great Pond Mountain Conservation Trust in 1993.

The hike, out and back, is just over three miles, and that includes a little loop at the end.

There's a lot of sustainable forestry happening throughout the Wildlands, and this is a great example of it along this trail.

So these tubes are protecting young oak and chestnut trees from deer, and then another thing happening in this area is beech trees are being cut down, because they're diseased.

And they're actually being cut at hip level.

It's called high stumping.

And the whole purpose is so that they don't sprout and grow back.

(soft music continues) (soft music continues) This mountain has a number of spots where you can stop and take in the view.

This is my favorite spot.

It's known as the South Overlook, and from here, you can see the Schoodic Mountains, Mount Desert Island, Blue Hill Mountain, and then all the way to Camden Hills, so a lot of iconic landmarks just from this one location.

We came up here for sunset, so that means it's going to be getting dark soon, but we have headlamps, so we can hike down safely.

(soft music continues) (music fades) - [Announcer 4] If you missed an episode of "Borealis", or just want to rewatch one of your favorite segments, head on over to our YouTube page.

You'll find full episodes, individual stories, and bonus content that you won't find anywhere else.

Watch "Borealis" anytime, anywhere, on YouTube.

- Next time on "Borealis".

(gentle uplifting music) Each spring, a quiet migration happens under the cover of darkness.

We'll take you inside the statewide effort of Maine's big night.

Come fiddleheading with us at Pineland Farms as we learn about one of Maine's most delectable native plants, and how to harvest them responsibly.

We go birding, as spring migration kicks off.

Come along with us to a few of Maine's bird festivals, and meet some very knowledgeable bird nerds.

And I'll take you on one of my favorite hikes up South Turner Mountain in Baxter State Park.

(gentle uplifting music continues) (gentle uplifting music continues)