Fordway Brook Preserve

 Location: ~130 Crowley Road, Candia NH 03034
​
​Parking: Small gravel pull-off with room for 1-2 cars. This is not a maintained parking area.

Trails

There are currently no trails at Fordway Brook Preserve.

History

Fordway Brook Preserve was purchased from a developer in 2010. The forest was logged and the area along Crowley Road subdivided into house lots, but the back land was too wet to build homes on. Instead, the former landowner offered the land up for sale to buyers interested in conservation. Bear-Paw purchased the land with the help of funding from the NRCS Wetland Reserve Program. The property was purchased with the intention of protecting the water resources, which include Fordway Brook and a large wetland complex, high quality wildlife habitat, and a large block of unfragmented forest.

Local Bear-Paw supporters Jim & Judi Lindsey joined natural resource professionals and supporters Phil Auger and Frank Mitchell for a walk around Fordway Brook Preserve.

​Fordway Brook feeds into the Exeter River, which turns into Squamscott River, one of the seven tributary rivers of Great Bay. The Exeter River is also the source of drinking water for the city of Exeter. As one of the main streams leading into the Exeter River, Fordway Brook and its headwaters are extremely important for the region's water quality.

Habitat & Wildlife

The predominant habitat type is hemlock-hardwood-pine forest, followed by Appalachian oak-pine forest. Although the map shows significant areas of grassland, those are a remnant of the logging done by the previous landowners and have since regrown naturally into early successional forest. The large area of open water is fed by Fordway Brook, which has a wetland complex of wet meadow and temperate swamp surrounding it.