Vermont is home to many productive trout streams, but none as famous as the Batten Kill. For more than 150 years, the river's reputation for producing big brown trout and beautiful native brook trout has lured anglers from across the country to southwest Vermont. Starting in the 1970s, the Batten Kill was managed strictly as a wild trout stream, initially with great success. But in the mid-90s a dramatic decline in the number of yearling trout had state biologists, anglers and others scrambling for answers. Thanks to a lot of hard work from a variety of groups, efforts are now underway to restore the Batten Kill as one of New England’s premier wild trout waters.

Bird Mountain WMA straddles the towns of Castleton, Ira and Poultney. It gets its name from the prominent 2,216-foot outcrop on the northeastern edge of the property locally known as Birdseye Mtn. It was purchased in 1976 shortly after the banning of DDT, a chemical pesticide that led to the demise of the state's peregrine falcon population. Common wildlife species include deer, wild turkeys, gray squirrels, rabbits, ruffed grouse and woodcock, along with numerous songbirds.

About a decade ago, a group of hunters got together to do volunteer work improving the habitats of Vermont's wild creatures. From that small beginning, the Working for Wildlife program has spread to an effort involving volunteers at dozens of sites around the state on the last weekend in April. The focus is always on making the wild land work better for the wildlife that live there. We travel to the White River to look at efforts to reform a riparian buffer and to the woods of central Vermont to watch apple trees being released.