Vermont Housing Conservation Board 2005 - Vermont Housing and ...

Liz Thompson/The Nature Conservancy
The Nature Conservancy aquired land at the southern end of Snake Mountain in Bridport. At the northern end of this
unusual geological formation is the Snake Mountain Wildlife Management Area in Addison, well known to hunters and hikers.
“He loved this place,” Gary Pittman
says. “We would go out walking here
together, grandfather and grandson.”
Then in 2003, Kevin Pittman was
killed, at 18, in a car accident. In Kevin’s
memory, his grandparents decided
to offer their Snake Mountan property
at a bargain price to The Nature
Conservancy (TNC), whose Vermont
chapter used its own and VHCB
funding to complete the conservation
purchase this year.
“With its vistas, somebody with
a great deal of money could build a
house up on that ridge,” Gary Pitt-
man observes. “That’s the last thing I
wanted to happen.”
The family’s discounted sale
enabled TNC to protect the cliffs and
talus slopes, expressions of the Champlain
Thrust Fault that long ago lifted
Snake Mountain up to 1,300 feet above
sea level.
According to The Nature Conservancy,
the now-protected property
contains “three high-quality natural
communities, two vernal pools providing
habitat for high populations of
Jefferson’s, four-toed, and blue-spotted
salamanders, and an impressive list of
rare and uncommon plants, including
the dwarf chinquapin oak, which is
only known at one or two other locations
statewide.”
Gary and Donna Pittman have
placed memorial plaques to Kevin
at the property entrance, and at the
overlook that they and their grandson
most enjoyed. They hope more people,
in the years to come, will enjoy the
walks they shared.
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