The blue trail enters the preserve from A.P. Gates Road near the intersection of Woodmont Circle. It was created to provide residents in the area easy access to the preserve and create shorter loop hikes. It quickly follows over a bog bridge across a vernal pool to the intersection with the red trail.
Crossing a small intermittent stream and continuing through a mixed hardwood forest with mountain laurel and many beech trees will lead to the "T" junction where the red trail splits either left or right.
The red trail starts at Tater Hill Road about 500 feet past A.P. Gates Road and the cemetery. A finger of it crosses an intermittent stream, then heads up a short climb and into a small hollow before it forms a loop. Going right will lead through old pasture land which is now a mixed hardwood forest.
Passing the junction with the blue trail will lead to an area of deep ferns. Old stone fences show the old agrarian past and now also marks the preserve’s boundary. The trail winds through wetlands, intersects the blue trail, crosses a small intermittent stream, and meanders back through mixed hardwoods to where it split.
The 87 -acre Miller Farm Preserve was purchased by East Haddam Land Trust in 2018. Back in the ’40s and ’50s, Charles and Margaret Miller raised a family as subsistence farmers. When Margaret’s daughter, Peggy, inherited the land, she knew she wanted to preserve it in perpetuity. This parcel protects the Roaring Brook and Eightmile River Watersheds and is located in Audubon Connecticut’s Lyme Forest Block Important Bird Area. Its trees and shrubs, including masses of winterberry, shelter and feed woodland birds. Salamanders, frogs, and toads, amphibians particularly sensitive to habitat loss, live in its ferns, moss, and wildflower-dotted wetlands.
Turn east onto Clark Hill Road in Hadlyme (opposite Hadlyme Congregational Church). Clark Hill Road turns into Tater Hill Road. At approximately 3.1 miles, turn left onto A.P. Gates Road. There is a Miller Farm parking area about 0.2 miles on the right from Tater Hill. An additional small parking area will be constructed about 0.1 miles past A.P. Gates Road on the left on Tater Hill.
IMPORTANT: Until the Parking area on A.P. Gates Road is available, park on the grass, adjacent to Tater Hill Cemetery at the corner of Tater Hill and A.P. Gates.
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