Who We Are

CTBigHome.com was created to serve as the go-to source for individuals, couples, families or groups searching for a natural history focused event to attend.  Whether it be a hike, a lecture or a meeting, our calendar will provide the most complete listing for the State of Connecticut.

Suppose you awaken Saturday morning with no plans.  But the sun is shining, and you suddenly feel like getting outside and learning something new – check our calendar to see what’s available.  During the warmer months you may have several options to choose from on any given Saturday.

Or are you a family with children who are thrilled at learning more about CT’s flora and fauna?  Our amazing geology?  Scan our calendar with everyone sharing the same screen, to window shop what is of most interest to all.  Follow the links provided to be taken to that organization’s website to learn far more about their evolutionary branch of life.

Perhaps you are a teacher eager to discover citizen science opportunities for your students by using your own school’s campus as an outdoor classroom?  Here you will find talented naturalists that will be able to identify that frog call (FrogWatch USA), or the plants whose seeds stick to your pants cuffs and socks (NGSS: 2-LS2-2), or the name of the shrub whose buds are just opening (Project Budburst).   Any one of our contributing natural history organizations will, if asked, likely provide you with one or more members that could help your urban school participate in an international bioblitz (City Nature Challenge).    Or raise Monarch butterflies and release them in late summer to begin their incredible journey to Mexico (Monarch Watch).   Plan a nighttime class gathering to capture and identify lightning bugs (Firefly Watch) or have a mercury vapor light set up to attract large nocturnal moths and beetles – using the internet to share your discoveries (iNaturalist).  As renowned biologist E.O.Wilson posited – the first key step towards wisdom is learning the proper names of things.  Once you have a correct identification, a species name, the internet will be able to provide a wealth of detailed information that will help you bring enthusiastic realia to your lessons. 

Connecticut is in one sense a ‘small’ State.  Texas, the ‘Lone Star State’ boasts it is so big that its panhandle alone could swallow almost four Connecticuts.  But we are a ‘big’ State in many other categories.   Even Texas can not match our geological record, where once rose mountains larger than the Himalayas, where glaciers swept the land several times, where parts of the African continent still stick to our North American continent.  No Texas river ever rivalled the Connecticut River, possibly the world’s largest, as the last glacier receded.  

Would you like to meet a world-famous naturalist, or hear them present their research?  Starting in Berlin CT, the most central part of our State, you are closely surrounded by an incredible concentration of human brain power.  Yale, Wesleyan, UConn, Trinity, Quinnipiac, Central, Southern and Eastern are all less than an hour drive away.  Harvard, MIT, Brown, Columbia, NYU, less than a two-hour drive.  No other place on Earth provides as deep an offering of approachable natural history experts.